By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
For Mark Munson, his decision to retire came down to numbers – 8, 8, and 34.
Eight years of university training, eight years of public-school teaching, and 34 years on the faculty at BGSU’s College of Musical Arts, adds up to 50 years. Time, he decided to step away from teaching full time.
Munson did consider retiring from BGSU a couple years ago, but his daughter Sarah Munson, a violinist and senor at BGSU, said she wanted him to hold out so he could present her with her diploma at graduation, as he had for her brother, Alex, now orchestra director at the Toledo School for the Arts
“So, we’re graduating together,” said Munson, director of choral activities. He also teaches in the Music Education Department.
Before then he still has a couple performances. The A Cappella Choir, which he directs, will perform Friday, April 12.
On Monday at 7 p.m., after the total solar eclipse, he will conduct the University Choral Society in an Evensong Service at St. Mark’s Church, 315 S. Church St. “I’m always looking for something to celebrate,” Munson said.
That includes a series of Joyous Sounds Christmas performances that the Choral Society has presented across the street from campus at the First United Methodist Church, where Munson plays the organ and conducts the choir. Those performances started in 2017 after the Choral Society’s collaboration with the Toledo Symphony’s ‘Messiah’ ended.
The singers in the town-gown ensemble were happy to take a break from Handel’s masterpiece, and loved the program that Munson developed which included a brass quintet and recently a student bell choir.
The Evensong was inspired by the Munson family’s travels to Great Britain. The service includes Bible readings, lessons, set sacred numbers, and music reflecting the season.
Munson found two compositions that directly address the experience of a solar eclipse. “Phenomena “ was composed by American musician and minister Oliver Holden after the 1806 eclipse. “It was fun something someone wrote for an eclipse,” Munson said. “Body of the Moon” was written by Irish composer Desmond Earley to honor of the 2017 eclipse. The anthem uses the words of Galileo and adds a cello and bass drum to the chorus.
The University Chorale Society was also involved in what is his fondest musical memory at BGSU involves the Choral Society.
In 2017, Easter fell just at the right time in the semester for Munson working with Arne Spohr, who conducts the Early Music Ensemble, to prepare Bach’s St. John Passion to be presented in Bowling Green on Good Friday and in Toledo on Palm Sunday.
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Another milestone was in 2004-2005 when he and his family spent in Sweden. He exchanged positions with his Swedish colleague Lena Ekman. While the Munson family lived in Sweden for that year, the Ekman family came to Bowling Green. In Sweden Munson conducted in public school and university choirs as well as a community ensemble.
“It was such an enriching experience,” he said. While the family has traveled a lot, being tourist cannot match actually living and participating in a community. He said he and wife, Paula, divide their life into before and after Sweden.
Munson’s musical life started when he was about 8. His mother played piano and sang in church choir. After a hospital stay, her husband gave her an upright piano as a gift. Her son showed interest in the instrument, so she gave him three lessons. She soon decided he needed something more. He continued to study piano all the way through his master’s degree at the University of Michigan.
Growing up in Meadville, he also sang in glee club and played trombone in the marching band.
Munson studied music education at Indiana University of Pennsylvania. His primary instrument was piano. In his sophomore year he had to select a secondary instrument. His choices were trombone or voice. He reasoned that regardless of whether he was conducting a band or a choir, he would not be playing trombone, but singing lines. He went with voice.
“I started getting more interested in choral literature, and once I got into it … well here we are!”
Right after graduating Munson taught for one year as a fill-in teacher in his hometown. Then he went to the University of Michigan for graduate studies. Following that he taught for seven years in rural schools in his home state. Then, looking for a change, he took a position as choir director at Ottawa Hills. He learned that kids are kids no matter the setting. The students at Ottawa Hills were just like the students in rural Pennsylvania, only they drove nicer cars and wore better clothes.
After a year, he started his doctoral work at the University of Cincinnati. On earning his doctorate in 1991, he was faced with a choice. He was offered a tenure-track position at a small college in Kansas. There he would be one or two music faculty members responsible for teaching the whole range of courses and leading a variety of instrumental and vocal ensembles. Or he could take a one-year interim position at BGSU.
He selected BGSU. Here faculty members specialized, and he would be closer to his family in Pennsylvania. During that first year he had to apply for the tenure track position and was hired.
“It’s been a good fit for me,” he said. “A lot of our students are from rural Ohio, and I’m from rural Pennsylvania. I’ve taught high school, so I know what I’m training them for.”
Because the university has a graduate program, it allows for the performance of more advanced literature. He’s conducted every choral group except for the men’s chorus. Munson conducted the BG Philharmonia for a semester while Emily Freeman Brown was on leave. That semester he conducted the Mozart “Requiem.”
He returned to the ‘Requiem” this year. continuing BGSU’s collaboration with the Toledo Symphony. He prepared a combined choirs from BGSU to sing with the Toledo Symphony. Maestro Alain Trudel conducted that performance.
Trudel announced that Munson would be retiring and spoke of their work together. Then Munson took the baton and conducted the choirs and orchestra in the opening work on the program Mozart’s “Ave verum corpus.”
Working on the “Requiem” was a fitting capstone. That was the first choral piece he fell in love with. His mother, who was studying elementary education with a music minor, brought home a stack of LPs of performances of Mozart’s compositions. Munson, who was in high school, came upon a recording of the ”Requiem.” “I listened to it constantly,” he said. “That’s part of what makes the year special.”
The Choral Society’s work with the symphony reflects Munson’s interest in bringing music to the community. The Choral Society, a mix of community and students singers, does most of its performances off campus.
Also, from 2008 to 2011, he led Opus 181, a 12-voice ensemble of professional singers he founded, who did two performances a year – one in a local church at Christmas and one at the Wood County District Public Library in spring. Munson suspended the group because his mother was terminally ill. He never revived it because of greater responsibilities at the university.
Retiring from BGSU does not mean Munson will disappear. He will continue his duties at the church, and expects he will do some adjunct teaching at BGSU. “I’ll still be around.”
