Places can be inspiring, and Western North Carolina boasts quite a few. Nestled in the mountains in Blowing Rock, Camp Catawba, a summer camp operating between 1945 and 1970, inspired its founder, Vera Lachmann, and her partner, Tui St. George Tucker, in a variety of ways. A poem Lachmann wrote for Tucker expresses that for them, Catawba is “more magnificent than imagination.” In this talk, Shulstad will provide a brief history of Lachmann’s founding of the camp and its mission. Then she will share the poetry and music created by Lachmann and Tucker that reflect their passion for Catawba, and the ways in which they constructed an artistic community within that place that nurtured the creativity of the campers.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Reeves Shulstad is a professor of musicology in the Hayes School of Music at Appalachian State University. She has been a member of the Hayes School of Music faculty since 2009. Shulstad teaches music history and special topics courses in the undergraduate curriculum. Her teaching awards include the Hayes School of Music Teacher of the Year in 2013 and the 2022 App State recipient of the Board of Governors Excellence in Teaching Award.
In addition to teaching, Shulstad has presented and published on microtonalist composer Tui St. George Tucker, a contemporary of John Cage who split her time between Greenwich Village and Camp Catawba, a boys' camp outside of Blowing Rock, NC. She is currently focusing on the ways in which deeper investigations of artistic female relationships and networks can offer a more nuanced understanding of the lives of twentieth-century female musicians. Shulstad’s research also includes pedagogy. She has given numerous presentations on inclusive pedagogical practices for the American Musicological Society's national and Southeast regional chapter, the College Music Society, the Berklee Pedagogy Arts Collective, and the NC Community College Fine Arts Association.
Dr. Shulstad holds a Ph.D. and M.M. in Historical Musicology, and a Early Music Certificate from Florida State University. She earned a B.A. in Music and English (cum laude) from Converse College.