Assembly LVII: The Performing Arts at Yale
Thursday, October 26 through Saturday, October 28, 2000
Sample Class Report
Donal R. Treffeisen 1951E, 1952 MENG

Over 180 delegates from 33 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and four foreign countries came to Yale to learn about, see, and participate in the performing arts at Yale.

Three panel presentations covered the past, present, and future of music and drama at Yale. These were interspersed with opportunities to explore some of the current campus treasures and excitements and to attend information sessions on various aspects of university operations.

Professor David Chambers of the Drama School; Thomas Duffy, Deputy Dean of the Music School and Director of Bands; and undergraduates Graham Norris and Alexander Timmons of the Yale Dramatic Association reviewed the history of music and drama at Yale. Although now a vital and ubiquitous part of the life at Yale, both activities had rocky starts.

For more than the first century of Yale’s history, only sacred music could be heard on campus, and then only in chapel and only a capella. In 1851, an organ was installed and under President Timothy Dwight music became a de facto part of the Yale scene. The Yale Glee club was formed in 1861 and informal singing groups began to spring up for private pleasure. And in 1894 the graduate school of music was established to prepare artists for the profession.

Although courses in music theory, history, and composition were available for undergraduates, until a few years ago, all performances were extracurricular. Performance training was the province of the graduate world. But the School of Music was not established as a conservatory in the traditional sense. A Yale musical education stresses the enrichment of a performing artist by the immersion in and utilization of the university and collegiate environment. This really is but a reversal of emphasis from the undergraduate musical world and is in concert with Yale’s mission of preparing complete leaders. It is unique among the nation’s music schools. The school is astonishing in that 30% of all the Pulitzer Prizes awarded for music composition have been given to Yale alumni and faculty. Today undergraduate and graduate music studies are coming even closer together.

In similar rocky beginnings, drama at Yale was actually forbidden until 1794. Students wishing to perform then met clandestinely lest they be punished for "acting." It was not until 1900 that an undergraduate dramatic association, the Dramat, was founded. The graduate School of Drama followed 25 years later when a Harvard professor, George Pierce Baker, turned to Yale after being rejected by his own university.

The School of Drama, as the School of Music, was established with a unique approach. The emphasis was placed on the text of the play rather than on techniques. It remains so today. Playwrights for the first time were in residence with the students. The legacy and impact of a presentation--acting, direction, design and production--was in the words. The School of Drama was at times controversial and at all times serious. The light stuff and musicals were left for the undergraduates of the Dramat. Although the School of Drama presents 60 productions a year, the undergraduate theater studies program offers no performance possibilities. This is changing.

Leon Plantings, Chairman of the Music Department; Robert Blocker, Dean of the School of Music; Marc Robinson, Director of the Theater Studies Department; and Stanley Wojewodski, Dean of the School of Drama; discussed the coming together and increasing interactions of the graduate and undergraduate musical and dramatic worlds.

Today, after passing an audition, an undergraduate may take a music performance and lesson course for credit. As new spaces are found, the Theater Studies program will be able to provide for performance experience in the undergraduate curricula.

Many graduate students take undergraduate courses and train and advise undergraduates and their organizations. Many art studies undergraduates are taking double majors. Most of the youngsters we had a chance to listen to perform were not music majors but all were wonderful. Again it was shown that because of its standards, purposes, and passions, Yale’s greatest resource continues to be its student body. Major improvements in facilities, recruitment, and financing are needed if Yale is to broaden the cultural and intellectual capabilities of its children and to encourage them to improve the lives of those around them. Fortunately, these are in the works.

Richard Brodhead, Dean of Yale College and Diana E. E. Kleiner, Deputy Provost discussed the future of the arts, amplifying on the previous panels’ concerns and challenges.

Yale is embarking on an ambitious ten-year program to strengthen and enhance music studies at Yale by establishing a musical axis around College Street. Sprague Hall will be renovated and upgraded. This will be followed by an upgrade of Stoeckel Hall across the street, moving the School of Music into 435 College and completely renovating Hendrie Hall to provide rehearsal spaces, an elevator, a student commons room, offices, and a green space.

This weekend, a $250 million facility upgrade for the arts was announced. This includes completion of the renovation of the art and architecture building, construction of a new building between it and the Yale Daily News building on York street for art history and a digital art center, an expansion of the Art Gallery across High Street and a new building nearby, upgrades to the Repertory and University theaters and performance spaces for the theater arts department. The announcement of this "Area Arts Plan" was celebrated by the dedication of the exciting new Holcomb T. Green Jr. Experimental Theater on Chapel Street.

And all this is in addition to the $500 million development in the sciences and engineering announced last year. Yale is in stellar growth and the arts are its next nova.

In between the panel presentation, the delegates explored such venues as the costume shop of the School of Drama; the fantastic built-from-the-inside Music Library in Sterling; the collection of musical instruments, (where we learned that the plectrums of a harpsichord could be made only from the shoulder wing feather of the European black bird); the band room in Hendrie Hall where Maestro Lawrence Leighton Smith tried to teach 50 delegates how to conduct Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony Choral movement without stabbing one another with their batons.

We also enjoyed the performances of students in classical music and song, dance, jazz and improv theatre and the delightful interruption of one panel discussion by the noisy, enthusiastic scruffiness of members of the "Yale Precision Marching Band."

President Rick Levin closed our Assembly with comments on the commitment of Yale to the future as the Tercentennial kicks off. The Facility upgrades and expansions in the arts and the sciences underscore Yale’s determination to meet the threats and opportunities of the coming days by preparing leaders of intellectual breadth and depth, with historic and self awareness.

He described a new initiative, tentatively titled "university alliance for life-long learning" to reach beyond the university campus to provide accessibility to and interaction with intellectual resources. President Levin chairs the Alliance of Yale, Stanford, Oxford, and Princeton that plans to offer information and study programs over the Internet. As a first experiment, it will be presented to the half-million alumni of these institutions.

And finally, President Levin spoke of the major and successful effort to develop Yale and New Haven in partnership. Bio-tech company spin-offs and start-ups are booming, high school summer internships at Yale are growing, and university personnel home ownership is increasing. And as the kick-off event of the Tercentennial, Yale held an open house for New Haven and the surrounding community. Over 30,000 folks came and explored and enjoyed Yale. It would seem that "town and gown" is becoming "us."

It was an exciting Assembly covering a vital aspect of the University and more.

The arts, as Assembly Chair Susan Addiss stated, are a reflection of our experiences, emotions, concerns, and hopes presented in new ways, so too is Yale.