Change from basketball to baritone a blessing, Embree says

Marc Embree

"I am so very grateful for the life I have been able to have. I am indeed one really lucky man," says singer Marc Embree. "I could not have imagined, not in my most extravagant dreams the great experiences and extraordinary people that have touched my life."

A 1971 graduate of the former Westmar College, Le Mars, was preparing for a visit "home" to Le Mars this week.

Embree, recognized internationally as a singing actor for leading roles in New York City Opera performances, and his wife Jane Bunnell, equally acclaimed as a singer with the Metropolitan Opera, will be in the area as to perform in a benefit concert, "A Musical Reflection - The Simple Beauty of Song," in Sioux City Thursday.

Decades ago, when the Nebraska native came to Le Mars for college, his eye was on the basketball court, not the choir room.

"I came to Westmar initially to interview with the late Coach Paul Knudtson and heard the Westmar Chorale in concert." he explained. "They sang the Bach motet, 'Jesu Meine Freude' a capella. It was an incredible experience for a country boy and one that changed my life."

From there, Embree said, he "wandered" into a singing career.

"My whole experience at Westmar was invaluable. I was given so many opportunities to perform and to grow up in an incredibly supportive and safe environment," Embree, a bass-baritone, added.

Now on the voice faculty at DePaul University School of Music, Chicago, Embree is quick to give credit to those on the former Westmar faculty for their help in charting him toward his accomplishments and the acclaim in such publications as the New York Times and Newsweek.

"There were several teachers that I feel had a great influence on my career," Embree said.

He credited Dr. Ruth Monroe now at Drury College in Missouri with helping him discover what he sees as the "fundamental, number one discipline of the theater, the nuts and bolts of creating characters and loving it."

Another of his early career benefactors was the late Dr. Larry Ebert, who taught composition at the college.

"It was he who taught me to listen to music with 'big ears,' to think outside the box with no pre-conceived basis," Embree said.

His voice instructors Dr. Wayne Mitchell and Frank Summerside gave him a solid and secure technique that has sustained him, he added.

"I was not any easy student to deal with. They persevered for which I am grateful," Embree said. "Today, I return their patience and demanding discipline to my own students -- to live and learn."

Embree seeks to cultivate the seeds of learning planted in himself with those in his own classrooms today.

He offers this challenge to his students.

"Be yourself. Learn who you are. Learn to breathe and keep learning to breathe. Learn to take direction," he suggests. "Perfectionists are losers and take no chances. Give yourself permission to make mistakes and to learn from them."

Challenge yourself, he tells them.

"Learn your material and be flexible," he says. "There are way more solutions to a challenge than you can come up with. Learn to listen. Extend yourself to your audience and know what story your want to tell them."

His Westmar days, Embree said, were "an exciting time" for a young music student such as himself.

"There were so many teachers of great influence not just as teachers but as role models and citizens," he said.

Embree also thanked Dr. Wayne Marty, Dr. Gene Ulrich, Dr. and Mrs. Dwight Vogel, Dr. Mark Minor, Dr. Art and Betty Larson, Dr. Charles and Harriet Semke, Coaches Milt Martin and Jack Scott, Dr. Robert Herrick and his uncle and aunt in Le Mars, Dr. Robert and Valda Embree, asking forgiveness for any names left out.

Embree met his wife in 1986 in a performance of "Martha" with the Kansas City Lyric Opera.

The couple moved to Chicago three years ago to take up their respective positions on the voice faculty at De Paul.

"We live in the city and truly enjoy it," Embree said. "We are fortunate in that we both love what we do and are still both performing but slowing down some and enjoy teaching."

"We have always tried to keep a balance in our lives. This has been possible because of our enjoyment of the theater and concerts as well as gardening and cooking," he said. "And what singer doesn't enjoy cooking?"

Thursday's concert in Sioux City is a benefit program for Embree's grandniece, Chloe McClure, of Sioux City, and other young Siouxland heart patients.

The event begins at 7 p.m. at Western Iowa Tech Community College (WIT) in Sioux City.

Embree's return to Siouxland will also be providing the opportunity to perform with a former Westmar classmate and musical collaborator, Philip Pfaltzgraff, pianist for the evening of operatic and Broadway songs.

Pfaltzgraff is now a member of the Wayne State College music faculty.

The 50-voice WITCC Singers chorus directed by Jean Busker will also be included in the benefit performance.

Included among the songs to be sung by Bunnell is one written especially for Chloe, daughter of Meghan and Josh McClure, while she was in the hospital.

Chloe, born with a heart complication, has undergone a series of five surgeries and received considerable help and support from the heart organization, Embree said.

"Those of us in her family are most grateful for the support given Chloe," Embree said.

The benefit is sponsored jointly by WIT's Institute for Lifelong Learning and music department in cooperation with the Siouxland Heart Walk Committee.

With this performance, Embree's advice to his students seems to ring true in his own life.

"Never stop listening. Never stop learning," Embree tells them. "Never stop trying to make the world a better place with your music."