Excellence in Artistic Activity
Kenneth Boulton
Excellence in Artistic Activity
Dr. Kenneth Boulton
Assistant Professor of Piano, Director of the Community Music
School
Five years ago, Southeastern’s Department of Music and Dramatic Arts was looking for a professor to teach piano and direct the Community Music School.
Not everyone would relish that combination of duties, but it
was Kenneth Boulton’s dream job.
Although his own artistry as a pianist has earned him the
2008 President’s Award for Excellence in Artistic Activity,
teaching heads Boulton’s “most rewarding” list,
along with the joy of sharing a concert stage with his wife and
fellow pianist JoAnne Barry, and his “ecstatic, humbled,
honored, floating five feet off the ground -- all those things at
once” experience of being nominated for a 2008 Grammy.
Boulton modestly maintains that he was no piano prodigy
just an ordinary third grader in Arlington, Wash., who began
taking piano lessons “as a fun hobby.” But by junior
high, his talent began to shine. He was motivated to take music
seriously when he realized that performing with and for others was
fun.
“I had the chance to do chamber music with some string
students in the next town,” he said. “We would play for
wedding receptions, put on concerts. That gave me an idea of how
music could be a really social activity.”
His keyboard talent came to the attention of faculty from
Washington State University who gave him lessons several times a
year. “I just loved and admired the way they thought about
music, communicated about music, worked with music,” Boulton
said. “They were the kind of people I really wanted to
emulate.”
Boulton’s goal of being both performer and professor
was reinforced when he began teaching privately as an undergraduate
at Washington State and graduate student at the University of
Maryland.
“I was absolutely captivated by the communication and
the satisfaction I got from my students,” he said.
“Teaching is extremely rewarding. In working with kids,
you’re not only working with the child, but you work with
their parents and really make the goal of developing the student a
true team effort.”
So, when Southeastern put out the call for a piano professor
who could also recruit and direct the expanding CMS program, which
offers individual and ensemble music lessons to both children and
adults, Boulton -- then head of the piano/keyboard department at a
large community music institution in Wilmington, Del. -- knew it
was for him.
“I had been searching for several years for a higher
education post, something at a place that I could perhaps call home
for the long term,” he said. “I knew this was my chance
to stay involved with music education for children, even though I
might have to take myself out of the teaching role.”
While his Southeastern students are young adults, not
youngsters, “They have given me so much pride and
gratification,” Boulton said. “It’s not
like taking them from baby stages, which is kind of what I was
doing before. But they are childlike in the sense that they really
don’t know the work ethic that is needed. I try to show them
from my own work the time and passion they need to give to their
music to succeed, not only here, but in graduate school and
beyond.”
Boulton’s “own work” encompasses hundreds
of solo and chamber music performances, clinics, adjudications,
competitions and awards, including his 18-year keyboard
collaboration with his wife, a classically trained organist and
musicologist. Averaging at least one performance a year up
next is a Fanfare 2008 recital “We’ve maintained
a very active duet and more recently piano duo performance career,
and there is a lot more we want to do,” he said. “Every
program that we’ve played we experience something special,
something distinctive, something unique. I just find it one of the
most fulfilling things I have ever pursued and I know she feels the
same way. We just relish it.”
Boulton’s accomplishments also include eight
recordings, with the latest being his Grammy-nominated album,
Louisiana—A Pianist’s Journey. The album “rescued
from obscurity,” as his department head David Evenson said,
classical piano works by composers who were inspired by Louisiana
and New Orleans.
Boulton did not win the ultimate prize, but he and his wife
did get to experience the glamour and glitter of the Grammy week.
Boulton also had the honor with a nerve-wracking three weeks
notice of being invited to perform for the 2008 Grammy
Salute to Classical Music at the Walt Disney Concert Hall.
“Yes, I did the red carpet thing with the photographers
and the cheering gallery,” he said, laughing. “Of
course when I passed through, they didn’t know me from
Adam. You could have heard a pin drop.
“It was a really, really wondrous experience,” he
added. “Just to be recognized by your peers as belonging to
that select club is remarkable. I don’t think my feet ever
touched the ground, red carpet or not.”
Next on this musical plate is an album of Carnival-inspired
music. He is proud to be involved in projects that spotlight
Louisiana-related music, especially since the shock and devastation
of Hurricane Katrina crystallized the fragility of the
state’s unique culture.
“Being a resident of Louisiana and someone who
wants to be here for a long time and really cares about the
cultural and economic health of the region it means a lot to
me personally,” he said. “I feel like I’m here to
stay and I couldn’t be happier with that prospect.”
