President awards Conservatory nation's highest honor for arts

President Barack Obama presented the award to dean of the Conservatory David H. Stull at a White House ceremony in the East Room. Those in attendance included Oberlin College president Marvin Krislov, Robert Lemle, chair of Oberlin College's board of trustees, and trustee Stewart Kohl.

A dinner celebrating the honorees took place at the National Museum of American History Friday evening, sponsored by the President's Committee on the Arts and the Humanities.

The Oberlin Conservatory of Music is the only professional music school to be so honored by President Obama. The other honorees for 2009 are singer and songwriter Bob Dylan; director and actor Clint Eastwood; graphic designer Milton Glaser; architect and sculptor Maya Lin; singer, dancer, and actress Rita Moreno; soprano Jessye Norman; arts patron and design advocate Joseph P. Riley Jr.; painter and sculptor Frank Stella; conductor Michael Tilson Thomas; composer and conductor John Williams; and the School of American Ballet.

The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) administrates the National Medal of Arts.

"These individuals and organizations show us how many ways art works every day. They represent the breadth and depth of American architecture, design, film, music, performance, theatre, and visual art," NEA chairman Rocco Landesman said. "This lifetime honor recognizes their exceptional contributions, and I join the president and the country in saluting them."

Krislov, who was appointed by President Obama to the National Council on the Humanities in 2009, said: "Being awarded the National Medal of Arts is a tremendous honor for the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. It is a great tribute to the conservatory's faculty, staff, and students, past and present, whose relentless dedication to achieving excellence is the hallmark of music at Oberlin."

Established in 1865 as one of the two divisions of Oberlin College, the conservatory is America's oldest continuously operating conservatory of music and is the only major music school in the U.S. devoted primarily to the education of undergraduate musicians.

"This is an extraordinary moment in the history of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music," Stull said. "It is directly attributable to the brilliant work undertaken by generations of faculty, students, and alumni since our founding more than 140 years ago. We should all take great pride in receiving the highest honor in the land for artistic excellence and achievement. I offer my deepest gratitude to President Obama for his recognition of Oberlin, and for including us in his first group of honorees to receive the National Medal of Arts."

The conservatory prepares gifted students for professional careers in music and a lifetime of effective advocacy for the arts. The degree programs are designed to develop understanding and insight into the arts, as well as the knowledge, skills, and technical competence essential to professional musicians.

Central to its mission are the more than 500 performances and events Oberlin produces each year by ensembles, students, and faculty of the conservatory and by guest artists, including residencies by Distinguished Professor of Voice Marilyn Horne, Professor of Conducting Robert Spano, and guest conductor Sir Simon Rattle.

The effectiveness of an Oberlin Conservatory education can be measured in the success of its students and graduates. Among recent awards won by conservatory students and recent graduates are the Metropolitan Opera National Council Audition Grand Prize (2008, 2007, 2003, 2002); Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition Grand Prize (2007, 1996); Fulbright Scholarships (nine in the last five years); and Javits Fellowships (three in the last four years). In 2008, eighth blackbird, a contemporary music ensemble fully formed at Oberlin, won the Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance.

Oberlin has performed at Carnegie Hall to rave reviews; launched a national record label (Oberlin Music) distributed on iTunes and other digital media channels; performs annually at the Kennedy Center as part of the Conservatory Project Series; and undertook a nine-day tour of China with its 66-member student orchestra, performing in five cities, including Beijing and Shanghai. The conservatory supports innovative student-developed performance projects and arts initiatives through the Creativity & Leadership project, Oberlin's new entrepreneurship program, funded by a $1.1 million grant from the Ewing Marion Kauffman and Burton D. Morgan Foundations.

A leader in music education, Oberlin offered the country's first four-year degree program in public school music (1921); introduced the Suzuki method of string pedagogy to the U.S. (1958); was the first U.S. undergraduate institution to establish a program in electronic music (1969); and is building the world's first gold-level LEED-certified (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) music teaching facility, the Litoff Building. Oberlin was the first professional music school to admit African Americans, including Pulitzer Prize winning alumnus George Walker. An Oberlin graduate founded the Cleveland Orchestra, and its extraordinary concert facility -- Severance Hall -- carries his family name.