Tag Archives: Teacher Musicians

Grammy-winning music icon Roberta Flack is a former English teacher

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Music icon and Grammy-winning singer Roberta Flack was once an English teacher. Photo Credit: IMDB

Many people have heard of Grammy Award-winning songwriter and singer Roberta Flack. Her best-known songs are “The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face,” “Killing Me Softly With His Song,” and “Where Is the Love?” But did you know that this celebrated jazz, folk, and R&B icon was once a public school teacher?

Roberta Cleopatra Flack was born February 10, 1937, in Black Mountain, Buncombe County, North Carolina. She was raised in Arlington, Virginia. Her mother was a church organist, so of course Roberta grew up in a musical household. At the age of nine, Roberta began to study classical piano, and by the time she was fifteen, she’d earned a full scholarship in music from Howard University. Howard is a traditionally Black college located in Washington, DC.

Roberta completed her undergraduate work, and then her student teaching at an all-white school near Chevy Chase, Maryland. She was the first African American student teacher to work at that school. After her college graduation, Roberta accepted a position teaching music and English in Farmville, North Carolina, a gig which paid her only $2,800 per year. She also taught in Washington, DC, at Browne Junior High and Rabaut Junior High School. While she was teaching, she took a number of side jobs as a night club singer. It was there that she was discovered and signed to a contract for Atlanta Records. The rest, as they say, is music business history.

Over the course of her music career, the former teacher has been nominated for a Grammy 13 times, winning on four occasions. On May 11, 2017, Roberta received an honorary Doctorate degree in the Arts from Long Island University. In 2009 she was inducted into the North Carolina Music Hall of Fame, and in 2022, she was honored with the Women in American History War by the Daughters of the American Revolution.

In recent years, Roberta continues to contribute to education came when she founded an after-school music program entitled “The Roberta Flack School of Music” to provide music education free of charge to underprivileged students in the Bronx borough of New York City. The program is offered through Hyde Leadership Charter School. You can learn more about this program at this link: Roberta Flack School of Music.

 

Annelise Tedesco named Louisiana’s 2022 Teacher of the year

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Music educator Annelise Tedesco of Chalmette, Louisiana, has been named her state’s 2022 Teacher of the Year. Photo Credit: Louisiana Life Magazine

There are many fine educators who support music education, and some of them have even earned recognition for their work in this area. One of these is Annelisse Tedesco, a music educator in Louisiana who has been named her state’s 2022 Teacher of the Year.

Annelise currently teaches music and arts electives to students in grades 9-12 at Chalmette High School in Chalmette, Louisiana. Her career as a music educator has spanned 14 years, but she’s been employed at Chalmette since 2008. Annelise coaches many scholarship winners and award-winning soloists and ensembles in her work as the school’s Music Director.

Passionate about providing music education to underprivileged students, Annelise is the co-founder of the Performing Arts Academy, a district-wide program dedicated to in-depth training in the arts at little or no cost to the participants.

The honored educator says part of working with students is remembering that many things are going on in the students’ lives outside of the classroom, both at home and on social media. She asserts that leading by example is important, not just in teaching students the material, but also in teaching the students how to navigate in the world. “Shakespeare once wrote that all the world’s a stage,” she declares. “We’re teaching kids how to perform on the stage of life,” she concludes.

In addition to her work in the classroom, Annelise serves as the Educator Advisor to the Louisiana State Board of Elementary and Secondary Education. With Donna Edwards, the current First Lady of Louisiana, the honored teacher serves as a vocal advocate for the importance of arts education in Louisiana schools.

As if all this were not enough, Annelise also works as a professional musician. She has collaborated with musicians from the Symphony Chorus of New Orleans and the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, where she was once designated a featured soprano soloist. She has also performed in Mahler for the Children of AIDS; Beethoven for the Indus Valley; as Hucklebee in The Fantasticks; as Annina in La Traviata; a summer season with Opera in the Ozarks; and two Carnegie Hall benefit concerts to raise funds and public awareness for pediatric AIDS patients and victims of the floods in Pakistan.

Annelise earned her Bachelor’s degree in Music from Loyola University, summa cum laude, and her teaching credential from the University of New Orleans.

To learn more about this remarkable educator, click on this link to an article about her published on nova.com.

Lydia Aholo taught traditional language to Native Hawaiian students

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Lydia Kaonohiponiponiokalani Aholo taught traditional language to Native Hawaiian students at Kamehameha School. Photo Credit: Kamehameha Schools Archives

I always enjoy sharing stories about educators who have worked with indigenous groups of students. One of these educators was Lydia Kaonohiponiponiokalani Aholo, a Native Hawaiian teacher who taught aspects of the traditional culture to other indigenous Hawaiian students.

Lydia was born on February 6, 1878, in the little town of Lahaina on the island of Maui. She was the third child born to mother Keahi Aholo, who died when Lydia was only six years old, and father Luther Aholo, the Secretary to John Owen Dominis, who was serving as the Governor of Maui at the time. Dominis was the husband of Queen Liliuokalani, the last reigning monarch of the Hawaiian Islands. The royal adopted Lydia, even over the strong objections of her husband and other members of her family.

As a young girl, Lydia attended first Kawaiahao Female Seminary, and then Kamehameha School, a private school for Native Hawaiian girls. In fact, she was a member of the first graduating class for girls in 1897. She then studied Music and Secretarial Sciences at Oberlin College, a private liberal arts college and conservatory of music located in Oberlin, Ohio.

Once she returned to the Islands, Lydia accepted a teaching position at her alma mater, Kamehameha School for Girls. She worked under Principal Ida May Pope. There Lydia taught the Hawaiian language. As a teacher, former students and family members described her as very strict about matters of etiquette and the proper way to conduct oneself in public. In addition to her classroom responsibilities, Lydia performed secretarial services as a stenographer and accountant, and she also worked for the Hawaiian Homes Commission and for the Federal Credit Union as a Secretary-Treasurer. She retired from the teaching profession at the age of 75.

All of her life, Lydia’s talent for. music was well-known, particularly in the area of traditional Hawaiian songs. She served as a mentor to her grand-nephew, Alfred Apaka, Jr, and instructed him in the proper enunciation, phrasing, and interpretation of traditional Hawaiian songs. In addition she became the Director of the Liahona Glee Club, which had been organized in the 1920s.

Lydia Aholo never married or had children of her own. She passed away on July 7, 1979. She was 101 years old. She is interred at Nuuanu Memorial Park. To learn more about this Chalkboard Champion, see this link to Kaiwakiloumoku Indigenous Institute.

Vampire Weekend musician once taught junior high school

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Alternative rock musician Ezra Koenig of Vampire Weekend fame formerly taught English to eight graders in New York City. Photo Credit: FamousBirthdays.com

Many individuals who have enjoyed successful careers as entertainers have also experienced success as classroom teachers. One of these is Ezra Koenig, a musician who also taught at a junior high school in New York.

Ezra was born on April 8, 1984, in New York City. As a youth, his family moved to Glen Ridge, New Jersey, where he graduated from Glen Ridge High School. He then returned to New York to enroll at Columbia University.

Right out of college, and looking very young for his 23 years, Ezra taught English courses for eighth graders at Junior High School #258 in Brooklyn, New York. He there as part of the Teach for America program. Although Ezra’s students described him as laid back, Ezra remembers those years as rough. “It was a pretty hectic lifestyle,” he confesses. “I mean, (being a full-time musician) is a hectic lifestyle too, but to teach all day, then go record or try to, you know, play a show, and then wake up and go to work again was pretty difficult.”

In the entertainment industry, Ezra is best known as the lead singer, guitarist, and principal songwriter of the alternative rock band Vampire Weekend. But the former teacher is also the creator and host of the Apple Music fortnightly radio show, Time Crisis with Ezra Koenig. He has also earned acclaim as the creator of the American-Japanese animated television series, Neo Yokio.

For his work in the music industry, Ezra has earned many accolades. He has garnered five Grammy Award nominations for his work with Vampire Weekend. He won the award for Best Alternative Music Album in both 2013 and 2019. He was also nominated for Album of the Year 2016 for his work as a producer on Beyonce’s album Lemonade.

To read more about Ezra’s experiences as a teacher, see this link to an article about him published by MTV News.

Alice Bag: CA teacher, punk rock musician, Latina author, and painter

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Retired elementary school teacher Alice Bag has also earned renown as a punk rock musician, Latina author, and painter. Photo Credit: Alice Bag

There are numerous examples of exceptional educators who also exhibit talents in artistic endeavors. One of these is Alice Bag, a retired elementary school bilingual education teacher who has also earned renown as a punk rock musician, Latina author, and painter.

Alice Bag was born Alicia Armendariz on November 7, 1958, in the barrio of East Los Angeles. Her parents were impoverished immigrants from Mexico. As a youngster, Alice had few friends in school, and was often the target of bullies. Because of her personal experiences as a Latina student who did not speak English when she entered the classroom, the future teacher became a passionate supporter of education, especially for bilingual programs. Alice was obviously an exceptional child. She was only eight years old when she began her professional singing career. She recorded theme songs for cartoons in both English and Spanish.

As an adult, Alice became the co-founder and lead singer of The Bags, one of the first all-female punk rock groups to emerge from the Los Angeles area. The band, which was formed in the mid-70’s, was most active during the years 1977 through 1981. During these years they released their best-known singles, “Survive” and “Babylonian Gorgon.”

As a young woman, Alice was a personality ripe for rebellion. “Rock ‘n’ roll stands for rebellion,” she once explained, “and if you’re feeling disenfranchised, it gives you a voice.” Alice had much to rebel against. An abusive father, for one thing; a Latino culture that favored males, for another; and on top of that, racial discrimination against the Latino community. Music gave her the opportunity to channel that rebellion. For her pioneering work as a Latina punk rock performer, Alice has been featured in the Penelope Spheeris documentary The Decline of Western Civilization, and a traveling Smithsonian exhibition entitled “American Sabor: Latinos in U.S. Popular Music.”

After the break-up of The Bags, Alice studied how to bake pastries with a French patissier, studied painting at a community college, started a daily blog and website devoted to the history of the LA punk scene, and authored two books. In 2011, Alice published her memoir, Violence Girl: East L.A. Rage to Hollywood Stage: A Chicana Punk Story, which describes her childhood of domestic violence. The coming-of-age volume launched a reading and performance tour across the United States, and is also taught in many university courses in the departments of literature, gender studies, and Chicano studies. Her second book, Pipe Bomb for the Soul, was released in 2015. She has also released two solo albums: Blueprint in 2018 and Sister Dynamite in 2020.

After Alice earned her Bachelor’s degree in Philosophy from California State University at Los Angeles, she began teaching in inner-city schools in LA using the name Alice Velazquez, her married name. She retired after 20 years in the classroom. Alice says her years as a teacher brought a sense of clarity to the lyrics of her current songs. “I was quick to get in arguments and often get in fights,” she remembers of her pre-teaching years. “Working with children, I found that I couldn’t ever be angry at a child. If there was a problem communicating or reaching the child, I felt like it was my responsibility to figure out how to communicate what I was trying to say,” she explains. “I think I became a more effective communicator. I learned how to clarify my thoughts,” she concludes.

To read more about Alice Bag and her experiences as a teacher, click on this link to a June, 2018, post entitled “No Soy Monedita de Oro” published on her blog.