Interview with Jim Anthony

Narrator: This interview is being conducted in the home of Dr. Anthony at Oak Crest Village. This is part of a series of interviews comprising the TURFA Oral History Project, conceived and supported by the Towson University Retired Faculty Association, with generous support from the Dean of the College of Fine Arts and Communication. This interview, as well as others in this series, are available in the Towson University Archives. 00:26 RM: Greetings. I'm Ron Matlon, professor emeritus from Towson University. And the interviewee today, our guest is Jim Anthony who is professor emeritus from the Department of Music. Welcome, Jim. JA: Good to see all of you. 00:40 RM: Jim, let's start at the very beginning. Where were you born? JA: Well, I was born in Springfield, Massachusetts. My family happened to be there, my father and mother. My father was in the FBI, but our family was from Arkansas. He joined the Army when the war started. Then after the war, we moved back to Arkansas and I was raised in Arkansas. I actually never went back to Springfield, Massachusetts, until just a few years ago. So I don't have any ties there. I was raised in Arkansas. I started studying piano when I was in third grade, and I was inspired by watching our church organist play. I basically decided that I wanted to be an organist, which I did become. So I’ve lived with music, in my case classical music, all my life. I couldn't imagine life without it. I went to the University of Arkansas for undergraduate school, and then I went to the University of Michigan for graduate school. 01:49 RM: What years did you attend Arkansas and Michigan? JA: I attended the University of Arkansas ’60 to ’64, and then Michigan ’64 to ’71, when I came to Towson. 02:05 RM: After you graduated from Michigan, has your entire career been in higher education? JA: Yes. 02:10 RM: Why did you choose a career in higher education? JA: Well, that's where a job was. I was a musician. My doctorate is in the history of music, musicology. And so it's only jobs in higher education for people like that really. So, I got a job at Towson. My doctorate wasn't finished at that point. I went back to Michigan in summers for several years to finish my dissertation. I'm also an organist. I got a job as a church organist and did that for most of my career. I didn't have a choice of jobs, really. 03:04 RM: When you came to Towson, what was the university called then? JA: Towson State College. 03:10 RM: Towson State College. Okay. And why did you choose Towson? JA: Because I got a job there. I applied for various jobs. I shouldn't say this, but that was the only job interview I had. No, actually, that's not true. I did have a couple of job interviews, but Towson offered me a job. I came as an instructor because I didn't have my doctorate finished at that point. Then I was promoted to assistant professor when I got my doctorate finished. 03:47 RM: When you first came to, what was then Towson State College, what was your impression of the place? JA: Well, I was impressed, but it was primarily a teachers’ college still at that point. Certainly, in music, it was mostly training music teachers for public schools. We had two degrees, a Bachelor of Arts and a Bachelor of Science. But most of the students got a Bachelor of Science degree. And in music, we didn't have a Bachelor of Music program at that point. 04:24 RM: And what year did you come to Towson? JA: ’71. 04:27 RM: And what year did you retire? JA: Well, I retired from my full-time job in 2014. Then I kept on teaching one course, one of these freshman seminars, until 2020, when the pandemic hit. I finished out that spring semester, but then I decided I didn't want to teach the whole course online. So I didn't go back. 04:54 RM: And you were in the music department the entire time? JA: Yes. 04:58 RM: Okay. Over that time period, what kind of undergraduate and graduate courses did you teach? JA: Well, I made a list of them the other day. I taught 15 different courses, maybe more. I taught music appreciation for non-majors. I taught the survey of music history for the majors. We have specialized upper-level courses in literature like music of the Baroque period, and music of the Classic period. I taught those. I taught a history of opera class. After my colleague Clifford Alper retired, I taught the history of the symphony and history of the concerto. When we got our graduate program, I started teaching graduate bibliography classes, history review for graduate students. I taught the whole gamut. 06:04 RM: You must have set the record for the number of syllabi you had to prepare. JA: Right. 06:10 RM: Were you ever an administrator at Towson? JA: No, I did serve as chair of the department when the chair was on sabbatical for one semester. But I was never an administrator. 06:29 RM: Let me sidetrack for just a moment. Do you have a favorite piece of music? JA: No. I saw that question on the list, and I always say that’s like if you have a family and they ask you who your favorite child is. I mean, there are so many pieces that I love and couldn't live without, but I couldn't say. I mean, I'm an organist. I love the music of Bach. There are various Bach pieces that I couldn't live without. But I love Mozart. I love opera. I like Verdi and Wagner. But I couldn't say which is my favorite piece. 07:09 RM: Now, outside of classical music, is there any other genre of music that you like? JA: Not particularly. I mean, I Iive with it, but I… You know, we've had a wonderful jazz program at Towson, and I've gone to lots of jazz concerts. But I have to say that that's not my cup of tea, really. And obviously, those students who were studying jazz were also in my classical music classes. So I had relationships with them. I respected them, and hopefully, they respected me. I think that jazz and popular music is the wave of the future, but I hope that we can preserve the classical tradition as well. 08:04 RM: Jim, what do you think of Broadway musicals? JA: Well, I think they are a great offering. I have seen a number of them, not so much in recent years, but they're wonderful. 08:26 RM: I know you were in the University Senate for quite a few years too. JA: Right. RM: Any reflections you'd like to offer on your years in the University Senate? JA: Well, most of the time I was there, I was the secretary. And of course, in those days, the secretary took notes like this and typed them up and sent them in. But it allowed me to meet a lot of the administrators and the leaders of the campus and so forth. I really enjoyed it. I kept on serving as one of the representatives of the Senate for TURFA after I retired. Martha Siegel and I shared that position. 09:13 RM: How many years were you on the University Senate? JA: I really can't remember; probably ten or twelve, at least. 09:24 RM: Over the span of your long career at Towson, what changes did you see taking place at the university? JA: Well, the university grew a great deal. It introduced new programs. In the music department, we introduced the Bachelor of Music program. We always had jazz classes and jazz ensemble that Hank Levy had introduced, but we didn't have a degree in jazz studies. I think they do now. Well, for example, my friend Gerry Phillips, who came the same year I did, founded an opera program. So we now have rather distinguished opera productions. We have a lot of wonderful ensembles of musicians and so forth, but they're much more specialized. As I said, when I first came there, virtually all the students were in music education. That's still our strongest program, but we've certainly diversified a great deal. 10:47 RM: Were you always in the fine arts building? JA: Well, no. The first year I came to Towson the Fine Arts Building was under construction, but it wasn't open. So we had classes in classrooms in the basement of Cook Library. I had classes in a room in Newell Hall. We shared offices with other faculty because there weren't enough offices. Lida Lee Tall. We had classes there, and we gave performances in the gym at Lida Lee Tall, if anybody can remember that. And we gave performances in Stephens Hall, of course. Then my second year, we moved into the new Fine Arts Building and we all had private offices and so forth. Of course, the Fine Arts Building was later renovated again, and so on. But that was, you know, a wonderful improvement. The first semester I was there, I taught a music appreciation class in the auditorium of Stephens Hall. And, of course, those were the days of LP records. So I rolled in a record player and put records on and put the needle down, and played the music for the students. Obviously, all of us have experienced great technological changes. In music, as I say, we had to just listen to LP records at that time. 12:29 RM: Going back to something you said a little while ago, you said after you retired fulltime, you then were teaching as an adjunct for a while. JA: Right. For, you know, like six more years or so. 12:42 RM: Were those graduate courses that you were teaching? JA: As an adjunct? No, it was a freshman seminar. It was kind of like music appreciation. I taught one on Beethoven, and I taught one on Mozart. 12:58 RM: I never did that after I retired, and I'm curious as to why one would want to go back and teach as an adjunct after retiring. JA: Well, you know, I missed it, and I thought, I want to keep my hand in. And so, I decided I would teach as an adjunct. Not that it paid much, but I enjoyed it. I enjoyed being with the students. And, as I say, I was teaching this seminar on Mozart and what's not to love, you know, 13:34 RM: From the time you started as a full-time instructor all the way through those adjunct years, did you see any changes in the students that you were teaching? JA: Well, you know, yes and no. Obviously, as our programs became more specialized, we had (quote) better students in terms of certain areas of music. It was only in the last few years that we had very many African-American students in the music major program. But we also, of course, developed the graduate program and the Master of Music program. And so that brought in a greater diversity of students. But I'd have to say that it was mainly the more specialized programs that we introduced that brought in more students. 14:47 RM: And if we go back again to how you started your career, would you have done anything differently in how you prepared for this career in teaching music? JA: Well, only to say that I wish I had been better prepared. I kind of went by the seat of my pants a lot of the time, but I learned a lot. Sometimes when I think about those first years, I think, gosh, I didn't know anything, you know. I learned on the job. Interestingly, I'm now in a retirement community, and one of my former students from those first years lives here. And I see him regularly and chat with him. I was at a concert on Sunday, and I ran into one of my former students who, frankly, I couldn't remember. But he introduced himself, and he seemed to have enjoyed my class and so forth. So I'm hoping that I made a good impression. 15:58 RM: Did your pedagogy change over the years? JA: Yes and no. Obviously, technology changed a great deal because we could, you know, show videos and all of this kind of thing in the class. When I first started teaching music history, I could only play recordings of the music that I was talking about. I have to say that my pedagogy probably didn't change, but I think for my successors, the pedagogy has changed. I kind of stuck with the old style of kind of a lecture and list, you know, talking about the music and then playing examples from it and so forth, which is the way I was taught. 16:49 RM: As technology developed over your teaching career, did you find that helpful or frustrating? JA: Both. I hope that I got into it. Certainly, when the Fine Arts building was renovated, and they put in online kinds of things and so forth, it was fairly easy to get YouTube and all of this kind of thing to play for the students. But that was only in the last ten years or so of my main career there. 17:29 RM: Back when you started at Towson State College, the students that you were teaching who were majors—I’m talking about the majors—what were they preparing to do? JA: Teach in the public schools primarily. RM: And is it still that way? JA: Well, as I say, it's much more diverse now, and not as large a percentage of them are in music education now, as it was. In the last few years, we’ve gotten a lot of jazz students who, when they graduate, go out and perform. Interestingly, when I first came there, we had a large program in classical guitar. It was one of the largest programs in the country in classical guitar. Primarily because one of the famous teachers taught at Peabody, and those students graduated and taught at Towson. I had never been in a school that had a classical guitar program, and it was very large. We had a great deal of guitar majors. Unfortunately, that sort of dropped off in the last few years. But and as I say, Hank Levi had brought in the jazz program, and the jazz ensemble was very well respected and very well known in the area, and so on. At that time, we didn't give a Jazz Performance major. We had a lot of students who performed in his ensembles and became jazz students. 19:22 RM: Are there any students that you've taught over the years that went on and had careers that you are just amazed at and proud of? JA: Yes, there are. We have graduated some students who have had major careers, primarily in voice and piano. We had Ruth Drucker, who was kind of the head of the voice area, and Reynaldo Reyes, who was a wonderful pianist and attracted a huge number of students. And he also was from the Philippines. He attracted a number of Asian students and South Asian students, and many of those have gone on to have careers. I mean, not necessarily worldfamous careers, but certainly important careers. 20:17 RM: Beyond just teacher education? JA: Right. Oh, yes, much more so than that. In the last few years, we have graduated some vocal students who have gone on in the opera world and some of them have sung at the Met (Metropolitan Opera) and all of that. 20:35 RM: Jim, I understand you were involved in some community projects. JA: Yes. RM: Could you tell us about that? JA: Well, I've been involved in several concert organizations. Pro Musica Rara. They perform Renaissance and Baroque music primarily. They give four concerts a year, and they bring in guest artists. I'm on the board of the Maryland State Boy Choir, which is an outstanding organization that has probably about 150 boys and young men performing in it and different groups. Talk about inspiring young people. They have had many boys who have graduated from the boy choir and have gone on to become music majors and major schools and become professional musicians. And it's a wonderful organization. My former church, where I was an organist, we had a concert series that I was involved with and still am. So, yes, I think that the future of classical music and other kinds of music mixed in is very important, and it's up to these organizations to keep it going. Obviously, it all requires money, so we have to have many donations. 22:06 RM: It requires support, and apparently you've given this. JA: Right. When I retired from my longtime church job, I was substituting in different churches. And then, when the pandemic hit, that kind of dried up. But then, actually, it was through the Maryland State Boy Choir I got this new job, and I've had that now for almost three years. It gives me great satisfaction to be able to keep on performing and to serve at a church. 22:42 RM: Let’s now look into the future. JA: Right. RM: Where do you see Towson University going in the next 10 to 20 years, both as a university and within the music area? JA: Well, that's hard to say. Unfortunately, as we all know, the world of classical music, some people would say, is in decline. So, that area probably is not going to expand a great deal. But since we do have a lot of jazz students and a jazz program, that area is still expanding. Music education hopefully is not dying, and they still need teachers in the public schools and Towson serves in that area. I certainly hope it continues to grow and to diversify and attract students from different backgrounds. I have been very impressed the last few years of the large expansion of students of color and the offerings that they are getting there. Obviously, in the music program, we have diversified in terms of the type of training the students get. So I hope that continues and improves. I think there's a great future for Towson. 24:20 RM: I thank you very much, Jim, for this interview. It's been wonderful. Is there anything else you want to add before we end the interview? JA: Well, I just would like to say, none of this could have happened without the great professionals, faculty, and administrators. And I would like to thank all of them for what they have done. The program has expanded a great deal in the right way because of these colleagues of mine who taught there for many years. I would like to thank them. 24:53 RM: And we thank you. JA: You’re welcome.