Featured February, 2022
The VSA bids fond farewell to Nora, who retired from the VSA in January, and thanks her for her dedication and joy in music.
Nora started playing violin in Eau Claire, WI, at age 8, but not before struggling through endless piano lessons and fights with her two siblings for practice time on the keyboard. Realizing that at least one of her children needed to play something other than piano, Nora’s mom signed her up for Suzuki violin lessons. “It was one of the best things that ever happened to me.”
Nora played through high school, though there was no orchestra at the schools she attended until her junior and senior years. She participated in state solo and ensemble competitions and successfully auditioned for the Greater Twin Cities Youth Symphonies at age 12. She joined a strolling string group, Mellifluous Strings, made up of high school violinists. She started college as a music major, and studied abroad for a semester at the University of London where she met with teachers she knew from Suzuki summer music camps in Wisconsin. As a sophomore, she became an English major and left her violin behind.
When her son began taking violin lessons with Debra TenNapel, “I foolishly mentioned that I had played the violin, and Deb urged me to get back into music. Eventually, I agreed, if she would agree to be my teacher.” Nora has performed with the VSA Orchestra since 2008.
Her interesting career path includes a stint in the Peace Corps teaching English, history, and African history in Kenya, East Africa; copy editing with a publishing company; reporting for a business journal; and various positions in the health care field.
Her choice of hobbies matches her unusual career path: she loves road biking, and her COVID-inspired greenhouse has been a fun learning experience. She also is a fourth degree black belt in Seidokan karate. Consider yourself warned: “I don’t recommend trying to steal this old lady’s purse!”