Elizabeth Byrum Linnartz: Reminiscences of Duke Music

Elizabeth Byrum Linnartz has taught in the Duke University Department of Music for 20 years. She is also a Duke alumna who, as a first-year student in 1974, participated in the opening ceremonies for the Mary Duke Biddle Music Building. Her unique vantage point spans the 50 years of the Biddle Music Building’s existence.

In 1974 as I was leaving high school, Duke seemed the obvious choice: my father, brother, and uncles were alumni, and Duke Gardens was so beautiful! I did not realize I was entering Duke just as the new music building was opening. Music was already a big part of my life after years of piano and voice lessons and Methodist church choir. Naturally, my first week at Duke I wandered from Bassett over to Biddle to audition for voice lessons with John Hanks. Soon I was in the Duke Chorale, meeting in the fabulous new (unnamed) rehearsal hall on the lower floor of Biddle. In Chorale I met my best friend at Duke, Rick Weinberg, a fabulous musician a year ahead of me who was majoring in conducting.

Fall of 1974, in preparation for the upcoming dedication of the new music building, the Duke Chorale was learning Ian Hamilton’s Te Deum, commissioned for the occasion by Mary Duke Biddle Trent Semans and her husband, James H. Semans. It was a doozy! The piece was in meantone tuning, which meant that it sounded atrocious when we learned our very complicated parts with a piano, but once we no longer needed piano support, our musical instincts mysteriously adjusted the tuning and amazing, visceral harmonies emerged. The composition featured a prominent part for the crotales, or antique cymbals, which enhanced the ethereal quality of the piece.

At the October 19,1974 Program of Dedication for the Mary Duke Biddle Music Building in Duke Chapel, we (the Chorale) sang a Bach motet, Singet dem Herrn, before the presentation of an honorary degree to the iconic opera singer, Marian Anderson. After all the speeches, the Wind Symphony and Chorale shook the Chapel arches with the eight movements of Ian Hamilton’s Te Deum. It was an ecstatic experience.

Mary D. B. T. Semans was so grateful to the Chorale for our hard work that when we went on our annual Spring Tour, she gave all 80 members of the Chorale $25 each (a fortune in those days) just for fun. Mary Semans was a beautiful, gracious, compassionate and generous lady, a frequent presence in the Biddle Building, for which she had been instrumental in securing funds through the Mary Duke Biddle Foundation and Duke Endowment. She and the Duke Architect (my uncle, James Ward) had worked together on specifications for the new music building (she liked the pink brick) and chose for the architect Edward Durell Stone, famous for his design of the Kennedy Center.

My junior year, having burned out on Math and Religion as majors, I switched to Music under the influence of my friend Rick. Now instead of coming to Biddle only for Chorale, Collegium, Voice, Piano, Diction and Opera Workshop, I was also coming for all the Music major core classes! That first semester, sitting in 104 listening to a lecture on music theory, I wondered why I did not feel like I was in college anymore? Suddenly it hit me—I didn’t feel guilty! The lecture was so interesting that right after class I would run to a practice room to explore what I had just heard. No outside pressure or guilt was needed to motivate my work. I practically lived in Biddle to finish an entire music major in two years.

Biddle in those days was full of folks whose names are now famous at Duke. After the Ciompi Quartet traveled with the Chorale on tour, Giorgio Ciompi was always a friend. John Hanks gave me great repertoire to sing and Barbara Lister-Sink was a fabulous piano teacher. Robert Parkins now University Organist) taught a revelatory Keyboard Theory/Dictation class and Allan Bone (of Bone Hall fame) was my conducting professor. Sam Hammond, former Duke Carillonneur, was our Music Librarian. Paul Bryan, the Wind Symphony conductor, was a colorful and unforgettable Romantic Music History teacher. When I was preparing some Hall Johnson spirituals for my senior voice recital, Mr. Hanks suggested I go sing them for Mary Lou Williams, whose office was down the hall. After listening to my renditions, she said, “You have a lot of love in your voice!” and proceeded to give me a scat lesson! What a privilege!

Biddle (and I) have changed a lot since those days. After a Masters in Vocal Pedagogy at UNC-Greensboro, marriage, five children (three are Duke alumni), teaching music in an Indonesian seminary and a divorce, I returned to the States and got my DMA in Voice at UNC-G.  The month I graduated I met Susan Dunn, then head of the voice area in the Duke Music Department, and to my surprise she asked me to return to Biddle in 2004 to teach voice, class voice, diction and the occasional topic course.

I have seen a lot of changes in the building in these 20 years. The downstairs listening library, where we checked out LPs to listen with headphones, is now movable stacks and storage. The renovation redesign of the library has updated all the technology and opened up beautiful study spaces. The fountain area has been redecorated to create another beautiful study or gathering space. The porticoes and patios are frequently in use since we learned to live outside during the pandemic: I taught voice lessons outside under the back portico with an electric piano in fall of 2020 and most of 2021. The Dean of Trinity College voiced his surprise that during the pandemic there was so much activity in Biddle, when other buildings stood empty and silent.  What hasn’t changed about Biddle is that it is still full of dedicated and gifted faculty and staff working hard to educate the next generation of musicians. 

Biddle still floods occasionally (I guess the Kennedy Center must sit on higher ground). We definitely need more space (and more applied faculty) to accommodate all the STEM majors who are serious musicians, attracted to Duke for strong academics AND the opportunity to sing or play on a high level all four years of college. We long for a bigger rehearsal space, planned but cut from the Baldwin renovation project. Nevertheless, Biddle has been a wonderful home for students and faculty who need music for their fullest expression of life and love and soul in the pressurized lifestyle at Duke. Mary Duke Biddle and her daughter Mary D.B.T. Semans have gifted musicians at Duke with a beautiful home.