It’s our pleasure to share the transcript of Dr. Robert Greenberg’s inspiring keynote at Crowden’s Spring Benefit, Tuning to Growth, on March 29, 2025:
I trust we’ve all heard the stories about Anne Crowden (1928–2004), who has been described as someone “who combined the crisp rigor of a British schoolmistress with the nurturing warmth of a den mother.”
That she did. She was a crusty (though not encrusted) visionary, a no-nonsense violinist from Edinburgh, Scotland who inspired almost fanatical loyalty from her colleagues and faculty and the deepest affection from her students.
She was also one of those people who simply did not take “no” for an answer.
Her vision was to create an educational program built around and “modeled on the collaborative art of chamber music.” Anne Crowden called her new school a “grand experiment.”
And that it was. The Crowden School opened in 1983 with 13 students (some sources claim 9, others 11). At the time of its opening, it was located in the basement of Berkeley’s University Christian Church, at the corner of Le Conte and Scenic just north of the UC Berkeley campus. At the time of its opening, there was no other school like it in the United States.
Like so many of us here this evening, my connection to Crowden is personal.
Fresh out of graduate school in 1984, I applied for a job teaching harmony and music theory at what was then the spanking new school. However, Anne Crowden, wisely, chose not to hire me. She recognized – quite correctly – that the 30-year-old me was not cut out to teach innocent children.
What I did not know at that time was that among those innocent Crowden students sitting in the basement of Berkeley’s University Christian Church was my future wife and mother of my two youngest kids!
As for my wife: she never stopped talking about how fundamentally important – how spiritually, educationally, and musically viral – was her Crowden experience. She went on to get her bachelor’s degree at the San Francisco Conservatory and then did graduate work at the Jacob School of Music at the University of Indiana.
She went on to become the head of music at the Bentley Lower School from 1999 to 2009, where among other programs she created the Bentley School Chorus and . . . yes, thank you, wait for it . . . and a chamber music program!
Okay, the point: an inspired musical education will help to create an inspired musician and an inspired educator. And, for that matter – or so I believe – an inspired physician, attorney, businessperson, parent, whatever.
And no elementary education is more inspiring than the one provided at Crowden.
Let me tell you why that’s true.
Indulge me a little history.
The distinction between orchestral music and chamber music first came to be understood around 1670. Here’s that distinction as we understand it today.
Orchestral music is music for large instrumental ensembles in which certain musical parts employ more than one player per part: for example, the 16 (or so) first violins in a standard orchestra are all playing the same musical part. Because of their large size, orchestras will perform in large spaces called halls and more often than not – again, because of scale – an orchestra will be led from outside the group by a dictator; oops; I mean a conductor.
As opposed to “Chamber” or “Room” music, which is music written for between two and ten instrumental players, in which each player plays their own, unique musical part.
Additionally, since roughly 1760 or so – we have understood chamber music as being music in which each of those unique musical parts – each instrumental voice – makes an integral contribution to the greater musical conversation.
Writing in the twentieth century, the musicologist John Irving goes so far as to suggest that Haydn’s mature chamber music – composed in the 1770s, ‘80s and ‘90s – are, collectively: “A metaphor for contemporary Enlightenment ideals as expressed in Rousseau’s social contract [of] 1762, balancing individual freedom with social responsibility and accountability.” (Irving, John. Mozart: The Haydn Quartets. Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, 1998, page 2.)
“Balancing individual freedom with social responsibility and accountability.”
I just love that.
In fact, a chamber ensemble is nothing less than an exercise in the democratic process. Each part is different: a musical manifestation of the Enlightenment’s celebration of the individual person “reveling in their own life.” Yet these individual musical parts – these individual musicians – must listen to each other and empathize with one another; they must collaborate with each other while interpreting and projecting what the music under performance means; they must willingly combine into a whole greater than their individual musical parts, greater than their individual selves! And all the while, doing this on their own authority, without the dictatorial interpretive control of a conductor!
Anne Crowden’s vision of creating a rigorous, academic-educational institution based on and employing the democratic and artistic ideals of chamber music was, well, a freaking great idea; credit where credit is due.
But: Maestra Crowden retired as director of the school in 1999, and passed away in 2004. “Succession plans” notwithstanding, there was no guarantee the school would or could survive her. Sadly, it’s one of the oldest stories in the book: that of an innovative business or institution that could not survive the departure of its charismatic founder. And having emceed the Crowden Spring Benefits in both 2004 and 2005, I was all-too aware of the issue of survivability Crowden faced in those years.
Yet here we are – 21 years after Anne Crowden’s death – celebrating not just the ongoing excellence of Crowden but, with the addition of kindergarten, the ongoing growth of the school!
And that’s all because of you: from Crowden’s founding families (some of whom are here with us tonight!); to its extraordinary community of friends and supporters; to its board and its sparkling alumni; and to its superb faculty and staff. (Look, regarding Crowden’s faculty and staff: I’m not blowing smoke here. I taught at the San Francisco Conservatory for 16 years and for most of that time I chaired two departments. I know a good music faculty and staff when I see them!)
So, please: a well-deserved call out to the Crowden Head of School Dan Meyers; to its Artistic Director Eugene Sor; to the Chair of the Board of Directors, Ann Eastman; to the Honorary Co-chairs of this event, Sallie and Edward Arens, Bruce Burnam, and Shelby and Frederick Gans; and to the co-chairs of this event, Crowden’s Development Committee Chair Deborah O’Grady and Board member Sandy Walsh-Wilson. I am honored to be in their company.
All right: I’m almost done.
There is a (presumably) Chinese blessing that goes: “May you live in interesting times.”
Now for myself, I’m not sure if that’s so much a blessing as it is a curse: “May you live in interesting times.”
As a curse, it is a doozy. Because we do indeed live in “interesting times.”
The soul-searing, energy-sucking, outrage-fatigue exhaustion many of us currently feel has much to do with our sheer impotence: our present inability to do something – to do anything – about the mayhem currently being perpetrated by our federal government.
Well, here’s something we can do, here’s something we are empowered to do: and that is to continue to move Crowden forward even as we preserve, defend, and protect this precious institution and its vision from encroaching societal barbarity.
Yes: protect Crowden we must!
To continue to move Crowden “forward” means building its programs while assuring that the institution remains financially secure!
To quote Einstein (or was it Forrest Gump’s mother?): “Forrest, life’s like a bicycle: if you’re not moving forward you’re going to fall off!”
So: let us raise our paddles high. Let us tuck in a little something extra when we checkout later this evening. And let us add an extra decimal point when we write out our contribution checks to Crowden at the end of the year (or whenever we choose to write them).
Whatever; Crowden doesn’t just need our support to move forward and thrive; we, as a community – as a nation – need the likes of Crowden to move forward and thrive.
Please: give generously!
Thank you.