Dear friends,
As the new dean of the Blair School of Music, I am honored to lead this vibrant community with its rich legacy and deep commitment to educating a new generation of musicians, scholars and music educators. I am excited to share some recent achievements and highlights for the upcoming academic year. Thanks to your ongoing generosity, these successes reflect the powerful impact your annual gifts have on the Blair School.
Your support makes international partnerships possible, allowing our faculty and students to experience creative and transformative trips to Korea, United Kingdom, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Colombia, Austria and many other locations. These immersive experiences broaden perspectives, enrich artistic expression and allow them to inspire through the arts on a global stage. This October, I will join a cohort of Blair faculty in Korea for their concert at the Seoul Arts Center.
Through its commitment to community engagement, Blair hosts more than 250 annual public events—most of which are free of charge. Our school provides one of the most important and accessible portals to the music arts in the Middle Tennessee area. We are thrilled to see our live attendance grow, and, through innovative programming and ongoing outreach, we will continue to present our community with exciting arts opportunities.
Through philanthropic support, recent technology additions to Blair’s venues have greatly elevated our programming, bringing music to more people across and far beyond Nashville. Blair’s streamed performances are routinely viewed around the world in real time, giving our students, faculty and guest artists a professional platform to share their talents. Over the past year, Blair has hosted world-class guest artists Jessie Montgomery, Wadada Leo Smith, Cécile McLorin Salvant, Gil Shaham, the Barcelona Clarinet Players and many others.
Scholarship support is essential in bringing talented students from a wide variety of communities and backgrounds to Blair. The Blair Community Scholars Program, an initiative that promotes diversity in the musical arts, welcomes its first cohort of students this fall. The Blair School is also a focal point for the Nashville Vanderbilt Scholars program, which will award full scholarships to deserving Metro Nashville Public Schools students. This follows Blair’s recent collaborations with Nashville’s Antioch High School band and the DuPont Hadley Middle School steel drum band, as students learned and performed side by side with our Blair collegiate students.
Investing in our students goes beyond tuition support. Instrument repairs, travel for auditions and competitions can create significant financial burdens. This is why we are establishing a new fund dedicated to supporting incidental needs unique to music students. The fund will also provide need-based assistance to prospective students to cover travel costs associated with Blair auditions. Your support of this fund can allow students to focus on their musical education and artistic growth without financial barriers.
As we continue the momentum of Vanderbilt's $3.2 billion Dare to Grow campaign, I hope you will support the Blair School today. Together, we can empower our students to thrive professionally and personally and expand the reach of the arts in our community and the world. To make a gift, please visit vu.edu/supportblair.
Thank you for your commitment to Blair.
Sincerely,
Melissa K. Rose
Mark Wait Dean’s Chair
Professor of Piano