Class Notes

NEWS OF 1983

From Dawn Bullaro Stawiarski:

John Horchner sent in this recap of our 20th reunion:

Around 50 people showed up, and about half of those went across the street to Our Beer Bellys, where we made an attempt at what Dave Reed called “time travel.” Dave and I tried to mingle with the current underclassmen, with mixed results. Luckily, we were rescued by a late appearance by Bill Hartwell.

Neither time nor distance were a problem as Tracy Young Biediger, M.D., came from Texas, and Amy Daly-Donovan and Cindy Bowerman Deshler came from Seattle. We have a classmate in Alaska, another doctor, who brought native treats such as smoked salmon and caribou. I hope she contacts me so I can thank her.

Special thanks to the ’83 committee and all those at the College who did such a great job of making everyone feel at home. Those that missed it should set their sights on the 25th reunion in 2008.

NEWS OF 1982

From the Alumni House:

Russ Bennett’s career as a flight attendant has taken him all over the world. This year, he scheduled a long layover in Frankfurt to spend Christmas with German relatives. New Year’s Day was in New Jersey at a traditional Viennese concert: black tie, champagne buffet, Broadway soloists. Russ’s travel plans include Brussels, Aruba, Spain, and a cruise to South America and the Galápagos Islands.

Vanessa Schukis has been cast as Santuzza, the wronged woman in Cavalleria Rusticana by Mascagni, which she’ll be singing in Rome next summer. “Now I have to hit the Italian books!” she says.

NEWS OF 1981

From the Alumni House:

John Sterling has moved to West Paterson, N.J., and teaches math at Bogota High School.

NEWS OF 1980

From the Alumni House:

Jordan Kelly, a Dominican priest, teaches at the order’s Fenwick High School in Oak Park, Ill. He is chair of the theology department and director of faith formation. Jordan plans the music for all the school’s Masses and also has formed a special choir to sing the liturgy.

NEWS OF 1979 - Reunion May 21-22, 2004
Schantzfest
Dick Shantz shows off the check establishing the Shantz Music Scholarship Fund.

Photo: Courtesy of Monica Shantz
Committee members for the Richard Schantz 75th Birthday celebration. First row: Wendy Talmont Lega ’85, Eileen Doyle Bauer ’68, Kathleen Doyle Dowd ’68. Second row: Janice Lee ’91, Jen Volpato-Huntsberger ’94, Linda Pettinelli ’91, Stephanie Reimers ’92, Denise David Parker ’86, J. Michael Dowd ’68. Third row: Dennis Duda ’73, Sandra Kuehner Frable ’63, Geoff Smith ’86, Peter Lega ’84. Missing from the photo: Steven
Derstine, Deborah Leyshon, Bryan Hay ’86, Edward Walakovits ’80.
Photo: Courtesy of Linda Pettinelli

It all started last summer. You may have read about it in the Class Notes for 1985 in the fall issue of the magazine.

“For some years now, a group of choir alumni from the mid-’80s has been holding a combination of reunion and tribute to retired music faculty members Richard and Monica Schantz, on or about midsummer,” wrote Wendy Talmont Lega ’85, who went on to describe the Hawaiian luau put on by a baker’s dozen friends. Because of the Schantzes’ love of the tropics and the memory of choir tours to the West Indies, the midsummer event always has a tropical theme.

Shortly after that, Linda Pettinelli ’91 had a talk with Monica Schantz and then called the College with an idea: to hold a 75th birthday tribute to Dick Schantz in order to raise money for a scholarship in the Schantzes’ honor. Her proposal was to hold it at Homecoming—this Homecoming. “To put it together and raise that much money in less than three months is simply amazing,” said Joan Lardner Paul, director of major gifts in the Development Office.

Linda and her organizing committee worked with Monica to put together the program. Together they contacted almost 1,300 choir alumni, Moravian College Music Alliance members, and other friends, including longtime Christmas Vespers patrons. Dick Schantz gave the Christmas Vespers service the form in which we know it today, starting in 1956, and his choirs performed at 240 Vespers services.
During Homecoming weekend, choir alumni and friends from the 38 years that Richard and Monica Schantz led the Music Department raised more than $28,000 to endow the music scholarship. The October 25 tribute dinner, Schantz roast, and performance in Foy Concert Hall drew more than 200 alumni, faculty, and friends. The evening included a sing-along of favorite songs that choirs had sung under Schantz. The singers also indulged in parodies of two Vespers standards, Gustav Holst’s “On This Day Earth Shall Ring” and the hymn “Vom Himmel Hoch,” with new lyrics poking affectionate fun at their director.

On the roster of auction items, later turned into a thank-you notecard, was a watercolor of tropical foliage and a sparkling beach, painted by Dick Schantz.