C.B. Hunt remembered

by John F. Sawyer

When C.B. Hunt died Jan. 25 [see Feb. 4, 2002, Register], music in Nashville lost a man who made an enormous contribution to this city's cultural life. He was my mentor, whose idea it was that Peabody College should establish a pre-college program to teach talented youngsters the joys of listening to and performing classical music. His original concept fostered the creation of what we know today as Blair School of Music of Vanderbilt University.

It all began in 1963 when Valere Blair Potter expressed her wish to honor her mother, Myra Jackson Blair -- a piano teacher -- by establishing a program in music. The members of the Justin and Valere Potter Foundation (David K. Wilson, chairman; Anne Potter Wilson and Valere Potter Menefee) asked C.B. Hunt, the director of the Peabody College School of Music, for a proposal to implement Mrs. Potter's wishes. Subsequently, C.B. submitted a plan for a preparatory music academy for talented children, a proposal which the Foundation endorsed, providing initial funding of $25,000 a year for three years. In 1964, following a national search, C.B. asked me to start the school, saying he would support me even when I was wrong. And, bless him, he did just that -- often.

Early on, I was deeply concerned about the availability of quality stringed-instrument teachers in Nashville. I sought C.B.'s advice, and he suggested that I submit a proposal to the Potter Foundation for a resident string quartet, fully funded, to teach and to perform. The foundation accepted my proposal, and in 1967 the Blair String Quartet was born.

In the late 1960s, C.B. was president of the Nashville Symphony Association, and, by that time, was dean of the Peabody Graduate School. At that time the orchestra was in deep financial trouble and in danger of folding. Aware of the negative consequences this would have on Blair and knowing how much David K. Wilson thought of the school, C.B. asked me to approach Mr. Wilson (who had earlier refused him) about chairing a major fund-raising campaign to save the symphony. C.B. knew that Wilson -- then the financial chairman of the Republican National Committee and deeply involved in political fund raising nationwide -- was the only one in Nashville who could be successful. Because of his high regard for Blair and the Nashville Symphony, David Wilson reconsidered and agreed to chair the campaign. The symphony was saved.

In the mid-1970s, Peabody College undertook a restructuring called the "Design for the Future," an ill-conceived plan that caused the demise of George Peabody College as an independent institution. One of the changes wrought by this makeover -- devised by a faculty committee at the behest of the college president -- was the Peabody School of Music's reduction to a department within a division called Educational Support Personnel. As a result, the School of Music lost its identity and its historical mission of training both music teachers and performers.

By this time, Blair had not only become the pre-college component of the School of Music but, because of its outstanding performance faculty, was recruiting and training approximately 80 percent of Peabody's instrumental performance majors. With the dissolution of the performance degrees, however, Blair had little reason to stay at Peabody. Foreseeing the inevitability of the college's demise as a free-standing institution, C.B. encouraged me to seek independence. I spoke with David K. Wilson, who supported the move. It was a two-year process. In the first year, Blair became independent of Peabody's music program. In the second year -- 1997 -- Blair separated from Peabody and became an independent institution affiliated with Vanderbilt University.

By 1978 the Potter Foundation had agreed to fund a new building for Blair Academy of Music on the Vanderbilt campus. The plans, unfortunately, did not include space for a library. I turned again to C.B., who by then was dean of the College of Fine Arts and Communication at Southern Illinois University, to help me convince Justin Wilson, my liaison with the foundation, that Blair needed space in its new facility for a music library. C.B. was successful, and with his encouragement in 1981 -- the year in which Blair became the 10th school at Vanderbilt -- the music library of the defunct Peabody School of Music was moved into the space at Blair. The collections had principally been acquired during C.B.'s tenure as director of the Peabody music school.

These are only a few of the contributions that this marvelous man made to the music community of Nashville. C.B. Hunt was the father of Blair, and in a professional sense he was my father too. What a wonderful legacy he has left us.