Following an unexpected path, one classically trained pianist has become the first Latin American dean in the history of Stetson University in Florida. Another pianist served as the first dean of the graduate school at the Fashion Institute of Technology and is now on the faculty at Yale University’s Jackson School of Global Affairs.
An alumna who earned her master’s in Voice is now associate vice dean for graduate education and lifelong learning at the Whiting School of Engineering at Johns Hopkins.
A fourth Peabody graduate, an author and full professor of tuba/euphonium at the University of New Mexico, is working on plans to start a music and arts school.
As leaders in higher education, these alumni have a formative influence on the lives of thousands of young people. They consider their varied achievements to be an extension of Peabody’s excellence in—and commitment to—both art and education.
Here are their stories.
DEAN OF MUSIC AT STETSON UNIVERSITY: WASHINGTON GARCIA
A child prodigy who grew up in Ecuador, Washington Garcia (DMA ’03, Piano) came to Peabody for graduate studies when he was 18, receiving his DMA in piano performance at 25. Since then, his concert career has taken him around the world, and he has offered solo recitals and master classes in almost 30 states.
By 2021, when he became dean of the School of Music at Stetson University, the 44-year-old performer had also served as a full professor of piano and as the founding director of the School of Music at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
Now, as the first Latin American dean at Stetson, he oversees more than 250 students pursuing undergraduate degrees in music education, music performance, music academics, and composition.
“The professional development and experiential learning activities that music students experience at Stetson are incomparable—unique academic and artistic opportunities focused on student-centeredness and community engagement,” he says.
Since his tenure began, Garcia has been instrumental in leading and supporting fundraising efforts that have collectively surpassed $10 million. These funds have been pivotal in advancing several key initiatives, including the feasibility study for a new performing arts center, the inception of an instrumental competition slated for the fall of 2024, and the establishment of a tuition-free program within Stetson’s community music school, which is aimed at supporting young artists with financial need.
A child prodigy who grew up in Ecuador, Washington Garcia (DMA ’03, Piano) came to Peabody for graduate studies when he was 18, receiving his DMA in piano performance at 25. Since then, his concert career has taken him around the world, and he has offered solo recitals and master classes in almost 30 states.
By 2021, when he became dean of the School of Music at Stetson University, the 44-year-old performer had also served as a full professor of piano and as the founding director of the School of Music at the University of Nebraska at Omaha.
Now, as the first Latin American dean at Stetson, he oversees more than 250 students pursuing undergraduate degrees in music education, music performance, music academics, and composition.
“The professional development and experiential learning activities that music students experience at Stetson are incomparable—unique academic and artistic opportunities focused on student-centeredness and community engagement,” he says.
Since his tenure began, Garcia has been instrumental in leading and supporting fundraising efforts that have collectively surpassed $10 million. These funds have been pivotal in advancing several key initiatives, including the feasibility study for a new performing arts center, the inception of an instrumental competition slated for the fall of 2024, and the establishment of a tuition-free program within Stetson’s community music school, which is aimed at supporting young artists with financial need.
In July, the school will host its first international chamber music festival, a two-week program that will bring middle and high school students to train with Stetson’s music faculty as well as with educators from universities such as Cornell and Harvard.
And even as he handles his administrative workload, Garcia still performs as a soloist. In March, he made his debut with the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra performing Mozart’s Concerto in D minor, K. 466, and in September, he will make his debut with the Guayaquil Municipal Philharmonic Orchestra in Ecuador performing Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1.
Garcia attributes his ongoing artistic success to his Peabody training, and his determination to increase student support to his mentor, late Conservatory Dean Steve Baxter.
“When I graduated with my doctorate, I came up to him with tears in my eyes and said, ‘Steve, there is no way to pay you back for what you’ve done for me.’
“And Steve said, ‘Yes, there is. Do the same for somebody else someday—because you will have the opportunity to do so.’”
CHAMPIONING THE CAPSTONE EXPERIENCE AT YALE: MARY E. DAVIS
Much of cultural historian Mary E. Davis’s (MM ’84, Piano) scholarship has focused on fashion and its connections to music, sports, and society.
As a Capstone faculty member for undergraduates at Yale University’s Jackson School of Global Affairs, she recently advised a student group that collaborated with some of the world’s top companies. Their goal? To ensure disabled people are fairly and authentically represented in branding, media, and consumer products. Corporate executives ended up citing the students’ research at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this year.
“The Capstone is a small seminar, requiring students to work intensively in teams to address urgent global issues. It’s exciting to see the interdisciplinary research and case studies that start in the classroom influence international policies and governance—essentially helping to change the world,” says Davis, who from 2012 to 2020 was dean of the School of Graduate Studies at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she introduced its first MFA program in fashion design.
After Davis graduated from Peabody, she taught piano to adults while working as a paralegal, reporting on congressional hearings, and eventually working for a law firm in Washington, D.C., as a tax lobbyist. Considering the possibility of law school, she decided instead to pursue another master’s degree in music history at the New England Conservatory of Music, followed by a doctorate at Harvard University.
“My experience at Peabody is that when you just keep working at it, you learn the dedication you need to get to the place you want to be.”
She went on to join the faculty at Case Western Reserve University, where she chaired the music department. During her 14-year tenure at Case Western, she also served as the associate director of the Baker-Nord Center for Humanities and liaison to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Although Davis no longer performs as a pianist, she credits her conservatory training with informing every aspect of her singular career. “It’s the core things: the discipline of getting up early every day to practice or whenever you make your practice time,” she says. “It’s focus on detail and never letting anything slide. It’s being able to collaborate with people to do things in a harmonious way—to see beauty in things rather than to see the obstacles all the time.
“Those basic things are crucial in music but they’re also life skills. As a musician, you’re constantly being confronted with obstacles: of not being able to hit that note or get this phrase exactly the way you wanted. My experience at Peabody is that when you just keep working at it, you learn the dedication you need to get to the place you want to be.”
Much of cultural historian Mary E. Davis’s (MM ’84, Piano) scholarship has focused on fashion and its connections to music, sports, and society.
As a Capstone faculty member for undergraduates at Yale University’s Jackson School of Global Affairs, she recently advised a student group that collaborated with some of the world’s top companies. Their goal? To ensure disabled people are fairly and authentically represented in branding, media, and consumer products. Corporate executives ended up citing the students’ research at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, earlier this year.
“The Capstone is a small seminar, requiring students to work intensively in teams to address urgent global issues. It’s exciting to see the interdisciplinary research and case studies that start in the classroom influence international policies and governance—essentially helping to change the world,” says Davis, who from 2012 to 2020 was dean of the School of Graduate Studies at the Fashion Institute of Technology, where she introduced its first MFA program in fashion design.
After Davis graduated from Peabody, she taught piano to adults while working as a paralegal, reporting on congressional hearings, and eventually working for a law firm in Washington, D.C., as a tax lobbyist. Considering the possibility of law school, she decided instead to pursue another master’s degree in music history at the New England Conservatory of Music, followed by a doctorate at Harvard University.
She went on to join the faculty at Case Western Reserve University, where she chaired the music department. During her 14-year tenure at Case Western, she also served as the associate director of the Baker-Nord Center for Humanities and liaison to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Although Davis no longer performs as a pianist, she credits her conservatory training with informing every aspect of her singular career. “It’s the core things: the discipline of getting up early every day to practice or whenever you make your practice time,” she says. “It’s focus on detail and never letting anything slide. It’s being able to collaborate with people to do things in a harmonious way—to see beauty in things rather than to see the obstacles all the time.
“Those basic things are crucial in music but they’re also life skills. As a musician, you’re constantly being confronted with obstacles: of not being able to hit that note or get this phrase exactly the way you wanted. My experience at Peabody is that when you just keep working at it, you learn the dedication you need to get to the place you want to be.”
ENLIGHTENING ENGINEERING STUDENTS AT HOPKINS: CHRISTINE KAVANAGH
In the fall of 2004, Christine Kavanagh’s voice began to fail her. Newly graduated with a master’s (MM ’03, Voice) and GPD (’04) from Peabody, the soprano had moved to Minneapolis for an enviable job as a resident artist with the Minnesota Opera.
“My lifelong goal was to be a professional opera singer,” she says. “Music and performance came naturally to me, and it felt like it would be a fulfilling career path.”
So when the trouble started, she was flummoxed. “My voice—[she performed as a spinto soprano]—was always solid as a rock. My teacher Phyllis Bryn-Julson sometimes joked that it was like having cords of steel.”
Diagnosed with non-acquired traumatic cysts on her vocal cords and throat stemming from her asthma medication, Kavanagh was told there was no apparent cure or any promise of a full rehabilitation. At the same time, she tore her ACL in sword-fighting practice for stage combat at Minnesota Opera. Then came the harshest blow: Without assurance that her voice was reliable, the opera company that had so avidly pursued her now wanted out of her contract.
It was then that Kavanagh realized how much she had romanticized “what essentially was a business with a bottom line.”
Returning to the East Coast for a series of short-term jobs, she eventually transferred her skills to academic and student affairs on the Johns Hopkins University Homewood campus, as well as in a community relations and government affairs role for university administration.
“Even though I am on an unexpected path from where I first began this journey at Peabody, being a musician has helped me build a joyous and creative life.”
Today, Kavanagh works at the Whiting School of Engineering as associate vice dean for graduate education and lifelong learning, where, in part, she oversees academic policies and processes that support all aspects of the residential graduate and postdoctoral experience and precollegiate programs.
Additionally, she is associate dean for engineering program services, leading a team of deans and directors in overseeing the admissions, academic operations, and student affairs for roughly 10,000 nonresidential and residential graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and learners in the Whiting School.
“Engineers and musicians work very well together, I feel,” she says. “There’s a symmetry, balance, and discipline to how we approach things. There’s also always a sense of creating something new in both disciplines. I’ve learned to channel my creativity into finding solutions to complex higher education issues, which is very satisfying.
“Being a musician means being driven by some inner passion, some inner light that gives meaning to our days and keeps us moving forward with purpose. Part of my job is supporting all the faculty, students, and my staff as they cultivate their own passions through the work that they do. I firmly believe that music has given me a lifelong gift: I am still singing and playing music daily. Even though I am on an unexpected path from where I first began this journey at Peabody, being a musician has helped me build a joyous and creative life.”
In the fall of 2004, Christine Kavanagh’s voice began to fail her. Newly graduated with a master’s (MM ’03, Voice) and GPD (’04) from Peabody, the soprano had moved to Minneapolis for an enviable job as a resident artist with the Minnesota Opera.
“My lifelong goal was to be a professional opera singer,” she says. “Music and performance came naturally to me, and it felt like it would be a fulfilling career path.”
So when the trouble started, she was flummoxed. “My voice—[she performed as a spinto soprano]—was always solid as a rock. My teacher Phyllis Bryn-Julson sometimes joked that it was like having cords of steel.”
Diagnosed with non-acquired traumatic cysts on her vocal cords and throat stemming from her asthma medication, Kavanagh was told there was no apparent cure or any promise of a full rehabilitation. At the same time, she tore her ACL in sword-fighting practice for stage combat at Minnesota Opera. Then came the harshest blow: Without assurance that her voice was reliable, the opera company that had so avidly pursued her now wanted out of her contract.
It was then that Kavanagh realized how much she had romanticized “what essentially was a business with a bottom line.”
Returning to the East Coast for a series of short-term jobs, she eventually transferred her skills to academic and student affairs on the Johns Hopkins University Homewood campus, as well as in a community relations and government affairs role for university administration.
Today, Kavanagh works at the Whiting School of Engineering as associate vice dean for graduate education and lifelong learning, where, in part, she oversees academic policies and processes that support all aspects of the residential graduate and postdoctoral experience and precollegiate programs.
Additionally, she is associate dean for engineering program services, leading a team of deans and directors in overseeing the admissions, academic operations, and student affairs for roughly 10,000 nonresidential and residential graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and learners in the Whiting School.
“Engineers and musicians work very well together, I feel,” she says. “There’s a symmetry, balance, and discipline to how we approach things. There’s also always a sense of creating something new in both disciplines. I’ve learned to channel my creativity into finding solutions to complex higher education issues, which is very satisfying.
“Being a musician means being driven by some inner passion, some inner light that gives meaning to our days and keeps us moving forward with purpose. Part of my job is supporting all the faculty, students, and my staff as they cultivate their own passions through the work that they do. I firmly believe that music has given me a lifelong gift: I am still singing and playing music daily. Even though I am on an unexpected path from where I first began this journey at Peabody, being a musician has helped me build a joyous and creative life.”
INSPIRING HOPE AT UNIVERSITY OF NEW MEXICO: RICHARD ANTOINE WHITE
Baltimore-native Richard Antoine White (BM ’96, Tuba) is a professor of tuba/euphonium at the University of New Mexico, represents the department of music in motivational speaking engagements around the country, and serves as principal tubist with the New Mexico Philharmonic.
He’s also working on a book that offers a fresh approach to education and administration. The Five Educative Languages of Teaching and Administration: The Dreamer, The Storyteller, The Motivator, The Truth Teller and The Freestyler illustrates different methods for cultivating effective dialogues with students and staff members.
White says the section on truth-telling is modeled on lessons he learned from David Fedderly, his teacher at Peabody and former principal tubist of the Baltimore Symphony. “The Truth Teller style of teaching is the one that tells the student/learner exactly what they need to hear, instead of what they want to hear. It’s often uncensored, frank, and at its core a diagnostic truth entangled with a very detailed prescription of, ‘Here’s what you need to do to get it together!’”
In this style of education, he explains, the lines between teacher and student are clearly drawn. He adds a quote from the late inspirational author Joe Klaas: “The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off!”
Although White received his master’s and doctoral degrees at Indiana University, he says that Peabody provided the foundation for his performing, teaching, and administrative success. When he graduated with honors from the Baltimore School for the Arts, White was confident about his academic skills—until he handed in his first history paper at Peabody.
Baltimore-native Richard Antoine White (BM ’96, Tuba) is a professor of tuba/euphonium at the University of New Mexico, represents the department of music in motivational speaking engagements around the country, and serves as principal tubist with the New Mexico Philharmonic.
He’s also working on a book that offers a fresh approach to education and administration. The Five Educative Languages of Teaching and Administration: The Dreamer, The Storyteller, The Motivator, The Truth Teller and The Freestyler illustrates different methods for cultivating effective dialogues with students and staff members.
White says the section on truth-telling is modeled on lessons he learned from David Fedderly, his teacher at Peabody and former principal tubist of the Baltimore Symphony. “The Truth Teller style of teaching is the one that tells the student/learner exactly what they need to hear, instead of what they want to hear. It’s often uncensored, frank, and at its core a diagnostic truth entangled with a very detailed prescription of, ‘Here’s what you need to do to get it together!’”
In this style of education, he explains, the lines between teacher and student are clearly drawn. He adds a quote from the late inspirational author Joe Klaas: “The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off!”
Although White received his master’s and doctoral degrees at Indiana University, he says that Peabody provided the foundation for his performing, teaching, and administrative success. When he graduated with honors from the Baltimore School for the Arts, White was confident about his academic skills—until he handed in his first history paper at Peabody.
“The teacher said, literally: ‘Oh no, no, no! This will not do, honey.’ She showed me how to catch the bus to Homewood and the writing tutorial center…. I had passed the writing proficiency test in high school because I kept my writing ‘basic’ and viewed that as an achievement. In that moment at Johns Hopkins, though, I learned, ‘If someone tells you that you’re ‘basic,’ that’s not good!’”
In 2020, White published a critically praised memoir of his journey from a tough childhood in West Baltimore to a seat with the New Mexico Philharmonic in I’m Possible: A Story of Survival, a Tuba, and the Small Miracle of a Big Dream.
In 2022, White and Pamela Pyle, his UNM colleague, launched RawTuba Foundation, a multidisciplinary teaching and tutoring facility “committed to assisting rural and underserved individuals of all ages through friendship, creativity, and belonging.”
Now he’s starting a capital campaign to create a nonprofit music and arts school on his 6.5-acre property in New Mexico. “My primary goal is to inspire hope,” White says. “When someone once asked me what I consider my greatest accomplishment, I replied, ‘My job as a teacher. I get to go to work every day and make a difference in a kid’s life. That’s what someone did for me.’”