Our October concert weekend, Visions, is almost here! We are excited to welcome Nicholas Hersh, the first of three guest conductors for the season, to talk about some of the works and his excitement of working with your Madison Symphony Orchestra. You can also hear from composer Anna Clyne about her work “This Midnight Hour”; this will be the first time the Madison Symphony has performed this work!

Written piece from Kelly Hall-Tompkins:

In the early hours of this morning, I lost my Grandmother, my Gram- the matriarch of our family and one of my most foundational roots. This is a day I have dreaded for as long as I can remember, but along with the sadness, I continue to be so inspired by the profound example of strength, compassion, faith and love that she represents in my life and for everyone she touched. As we were preparing to celebrate her 100th birthday, a mere 14 days hence, we must instead gather for the sad rituals of mourning. I appreciate so much all of my friends who over many years have cheered, marveled and celebrated along with me this woman who, though petite in size, without benefit of formal education beyond 11th grade, and modest in means was an extraordinary and towering presence in her wisdom, unflappable strength and richness of character and integrity. People who know me sometimes wonder where I get the strength to do all that I do. Well, let me tell you- it comes from one much stronger than me. In this last year alone, Gram’s 99th, she contracted and recovered from covid, fell and broke a rib while also suffering from a covid cough, had replaced a pacemaker that was supposed to have lasted 7 years but lasted for 13, then suffered a double stroke, losing and recovering the same day the use of her left side, all while living 9 months into a cancer diagnosis. Following the pandemic, I watched her get outpatient stitches on her forehead after a mishap, bearing it with little more than a wince, and, in earlier years, fortunately not from the infamous story of her up on the roof of her house to check the tiles, I was amazed at her story of a different time that she broke a rib and was there with the masking tape, wrapping her torso, saying, “That’s aaaalllll there gonna do anyway, I can do this myself!” Fiercely independent, she stopped driving only 7 years ago but still lived alone in her own house until just this year when dementia became more of a persistent intruder and she was valiantly cared for ‘round the clock by her two daughters, my Mom and Aunt – but in her own home where she wanted to be.

Born in 1924 and a child of The Great Depression, those hard times never left her consciousness. She told me how inside their house, she would look at the floor and see the ground and look at the ceiling and see the stars. Since her mother had hemorrhaged to death in childbirth from having too many children, Gram, the next to last of 14 babies, was raised by her older sister, my beloved Auntie. They both worked hard cleaning houses and doing laundry for white families in Winter Park, while living in Eatonville, Florida, the oldest Black township in America, where my Auntie was also friends with the now celebrated author Zora Neale Hurston. Gram told me of how lucky they were if there was enough money for them to each receive an orange for Christmas. This after her father and brothers, the ‘men-folk’ toiled long days picking oranges in the orange groves for next to nothing. Auntie made 10 cents an hour and by the 40s, Gram made 25 cents an hour. She once told me, “Isn’t that something, working 4 hours for a dollar?” Despite such dismal wages for such hard work, my Gram and Auntie saved their money and became some of the first property owners in Eatonville. Saving money is a value passed down to me straight from her and it is a big factor in helping me to do all that I have done in life, from owning property and instruments to recording albums, something so far removed from her life in the 20s and 30s, and yet those are the giant shoulders upon which I stand.

My Gram was also one of the most compassionate humanitarians I have ever known. And though I did not initially realize what an impact that had on me in creating Music Kitchen – Food for the Soul, I was so inspired by the work that she did with her church friends every other Saturday to cook for those experiencing homelessness. The mounds of scrambled eggs and sausage and biscuits would overflow the tins out in the park, well past her 89th birthday (interrupted not by advancing age, but only by the municipal employees who shut down the operation!)

I smile when I think of how much I would have loved (and tried a few times) for the Coca Cola Bottling Company to know how much she single-handedly kept them in business, drinking her daily Cokes. I remember fondly the second trip we made together to Europe, where, at 89, she walked up to the top of the Acropolis in Greece on a hot sunny day, and the big smile and relief she had when greeted at the bottom by my husband, who had clandestinely disappeared to find her an ice-cold bottle of Coke. I think of the convertible sports car we spotted while sitting in traffic on i95 from Washington DC to New York, and her saying, “If I were 25 again…” So, naturally, for her 86th birthday I rented her a convertible which she drove with gusto, further earning her moniker of “Leadfoot Lyle!” I think of the elegant church lady and elder who wouldn’t dream of stepping out to church without an appropriate wide-brimmed hat, suit and matching heels. She had so many great hats and yet when I was in Paris, I saw the perfect one; I joyfully enlisted a lot of admiring and bemused Parisians in the effort to get it sent to her in pristine condition. I love how they affectionately referred to this woman they’d never met as “La Grande Dame au Chapeau,” sensing through my admiration her nobility. I remember how much Gram loved flowers and her garden, and how she would disappear and be unreachable for hours, much to the worry and consternation of my Mom, to later discover that that “one weed” that she had gone outside to pull up had become a multitude of tasks in service of her cherished plants. I think of how Gram encouraged me in every endeavor and was so excited about all of my concerts around the world, especially my role on Broadway. Even though she didn’t fully know what it meant, she told all of her friends, “My Granddaughter is Fiddler!” And I’m eternally grateful to my Fiddler colleagues who flew down to Orlando to join me in performing for her 95th birthday party, and all of my Broadway colleagues who recorded birthday greetings for her to enjoy there. I think of each time I have performed the Wynton Marsalis Violin Concerto and sharing with each orchestra the vision I have for the Black Baptist Church depiction in the Blues movement, how even though I was raised Lutheran, the feeling I have deep in my bones for this music stems from my childhood experiences in Gram’s church. I think of just 16 days ago, when I told her that we might have the first Black woman President and watching her excitement as she trained the unwavering focus of her blue-rimmed eyes on the Kamala Harris rally speech I showed her on my iPad. If she blinked one time, I swear I didn’t see it. She was transfixed on Kamala Harris, while I was transfixed on Gram and all that she has seen in her nearly 100 years.

I reflect on all of this now, but especially the breathtaking way that these last few weeks have played out. Having just returned from performing in Europe, I decided that I needed to go immediately to Florida to celebrate my Mom’s birthday and to see my Gram. I noticed right away that she looked considerably diminished from my last visit and worried then if she would make it to her 100th birthday. But as we approached the date in October, I happened to also have a concerto appearance in Valdosta, Georgia. I have talked with my Gram about our family history for all of my life and have not only taken notes and committed to memory many important recollections she held, I also asked a friend who is a director of the Harvard Hutchins Center for African and African-American Research and a Producer of the Henry Louis Gates PBS Series Finding Your Roots to interview her. I’m so glad we did that interview over Zoom in 2019. My friend later said, “I do this for a living and I find that your Grandmother has the clearest memory of anyone I have ever interviewed.” He added that nearly everything she shared correlated with historical documentation. So when I noticed that my concert in Georgia would be a short drive to Gram’s birthplace, I decided to stay a couple of extra days and drive up there. No, decided is not the right word- I was compelled and felt led by something beyond myself. I drove up to the town and there started to have a profound spiritual experience, connecting with my ancestors such that I cannot fully give voice to it with words. As I had re-listened to the interview to prepare for this trip, I heard her recall a different town for where my Great-great Grandmother, the child of a slave rape, was buried. To my knowledge, Gram was our only living relative who knew Ella’s story contemporaneously and who had known her personally. I had heard about my Great-great grandmother Ella my whole life, so I was compelled to go there to find her grave site. I went to the church in Arlington where I thought the cemetery perhaps once was but perhaps was moved since there was now only a large green lawn. I spent time in quiet reflection, lifted up by ancestors I could not see but very much could feel. I even played a bit out there in their honor. I returned to my hotel in Valdosta and the next morning I was to drive to Florida to be with my Grandmother once again before flying back to New York. But I received a note from my friend the historian that the correct burial church for my Great-great Grandmother was in fact a different town from the one my Grandmother remembered. And now I had a decision to make- do I drive back north in Georgia for perhaps a 10-hour day to try to find the right cemetery? I knew I had to see this through, and I knew the moment was big. I hoped it would be in celebration of her birthday, but I feared it might be another calling. Of course, being so powerfully compelled, I made the trip. I found myself driving, alone, for hours through parts of Georgia it certainly felt like no one has ever laid eyes on before. If it was this remote in 2024, I can only imagine what it was like in 1938. And suddenly before me, was this simple white church, originally established in 1863 and rebuilt in 1968. There was not a human being in sight. It was hot, humid and the sun was bearing powerfully down. Against all odds, among the oldest gravestones, with almost completely faded etching, I somehow managed to spot Ella’s grave. Actually, it practically flashed itself to me. But still, I reached down to the concrete and traced the faded lettering with my fingers, feeling my way to what I was certain my eyes could see. I had once again a powerful moment of reflection as I thought of all that my Gram has told me, how she was so inspired by this Grandmother who she was only able to meet one time the year before she died. I think of all Ella suffered for me to be able to live the life that I have now. I took out my violin and played, Summerland by William Grant Still, a piece that has always evoked for me my maternal lineage. I took pictures and video and was so glad to have seen this through in a way that I could now go and share with Gram.

As soon as I walked into the room this time, just 16 days since my last visit, it was very clear that Gram was even more emaciated than before. And as I sat next to her and held her hand, I had a strong sense that it would be the last time I would see her, but of course one can hope. As I drove from her house, at the first traffic light, a large red Coca Cola box truck eased in front of me, leading the way. Back in New York, as I slept in my bed last night, I saw 3 sudden flashes of light in my mind’s eye in the middle of the night and I just knew that was the moment. When I awoke this morning, I got the sad news. As I sit here today, I remember feeling yesterday how such a profound moment in life, such as how to walk out of the door when a loved one is facing eternity, could be governed by the mundane borders of returning a rental car and boarding a flight. But the way that the procession to this day aligned so mysteriously and synchronistically, from my concert in Georgia to feeling compelled to make the ancestral drive through the state, to even a tooth filling falling out and causing me to go back to my Mom’s dentist in Orlando sooner than scheduled, allowing me to be with Gram in her final hours with us, it all gives me a sense of peace that this was the correct time and that all was orchestrated for me to be part of it in a profound way. I smile, thinking of all the times that Gram told me when I called, “Oh, me and the Lord, we have a good time in here, singing and dancing through the night- if people look in the window, they probably think I’m crazy, saying ‘what is that lady doing in there?!’” So I know she is singing and even more joyful now, released from all of the physical struggles that she endured. Still, the enormity of losing Gram has only just begun to hit me and will be a challenge to process. Her passing is a profound loss for our family. It was such a blessing and an honor for me to get to have not just a Grandmother, but – my Gram – this long through life.

Also, my Mom first “saw” this juxtaposition years ago when I released my first album and brought it to my attention. My cover photo was an accidental catch spotted by the photographer when the main stage lights suddenly went out. Even down to the earring/violin scroll- we are bookends through time