Performances + Events
New England Conservatory is pleased to announce that violinist Adrian Anantawan is the recipient of this year’s Marylou Speaker Churchill Award, which recognizes a teacher and orchestral figure who reflects Marylou Speaker Churchill’s qualities as a human being, educator, and musician. Churchill served on the faculties of NEC’s College and Preparatory School for 28 years and was the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s principal second violinist.
The recipient of the Marylou Speaker Churchill Award is invited to campus to present a master class, lecture, or performance. Anantawan will come to campus in May to receive the award. As part of his visit, he will present a performance that focuses on and celebrates artist-teacher leadership, community building, and musical excellence, centered explicitly on disability culture in classical music.
On Saturday, May 2, musicians from the Berklee College of Music’s Music Inclusion Ensemble and members of Cambridge Common Voices will join NEC Prep students for a collaborative concert featuring musicians who identify with a disability and/or are allies and advocates for disability identity. The program highlights accessible, genre-flexible repertoire — primarily music by disabled composers and inclusive arrangements designed to welcome varied instrumentation and experience levels.
The program will culminate with an appearance by guest artist and NPR Tiny Desk Contest winner Gaelynn Lea, whose collaboration will offer students and audiences a powerful example of disabled artistry at the highest professional level.
“I am deeply honored and genuinely moved to receive the Marylou Speaker Churchill Award from New England Conservatory,” Anantawan said. “NEC has long been a place I associate with artistic rigor, generosity of spirit, and a deep commitment to teaching, so this recognition feels particularly meaningful to me. This honor is humbling and highlights the important work of all educators whose support of students and audiences imagines a musical world that is more expansive, compassionate, and open to the full range of human experience.
“Much of my work as a performer, teacher, and advocate has come from personal experience, from learning to navigate the violin through difference and adaptation to discovering that those realities can be sources of creativity rather than limitation. I am especially grateful that this award will help shine a brighter light on the ongoing work of creating spaces where disabled artists and students are not simply accommodated but truly valued for the insight, artistry, and leadership they bring to the world. I receive this honor with gratitude, and with renewed commitment to this work.”
Adrian Anantawan
Adrian Anantawan holds degrees from the Curtis Institute of Music, Yale University, and the Harvard Graduate School of Education. As a violinist, he has studied with Itzhak Perlman, Pinchas Zukerman, and Anne-Sophie Mutter. His academic work in education was supervised by Howard Gardner. Memorable moments in Anantawan’s career include appearances at the White House and the United Nations. He has performed for the late Christopher Reeve, Pope John Paul II, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
Anantawan has performed extensively in Canada as a soloist with the orchestras of Toronto, Nova Scotia, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Montreal, Edmonton, and Vancouver and has given recitals at the Aspen Music Festival and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall. He represented Canada as a cultural ambassador at the 2004 Paralympic Games in Athens and was a featured performer at the opening ceremonies of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.
Anantawan helped create the Virtual Chamber Music Initiative at the Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital in Toronto. The cross-collaborative project brings together researchers, musicians, doctors, and educators to develop adaptive musical instruments that can be played in chamber music settings by young people with disabilities. He is also the founder of the Music Inclusion Program, an organization dedicated to helping children with disabilities learn instrumental music alongside their typical peers.
From 2012 to 2016, Anantawan was co-director of music at the Boston-based Conservatory Lab Charter School, which serves students from pre-kindergarten through eighth grade. His work was recognized by Boston Mayor Marty Walsh with a 2015 ONEin3 Impact Award.
Anantawan is a Juno Award nominee and a member of the Canadian Disability Hall of Fame (formerly the Terry Fox Hall of Fame). He was awarded a Diamond Jubilee Medal from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II for his contributions to the Commonwealth.
Anantawan is currently chair of music at Milton Academy, artistic director of Shelter Music Boston, and an associate professor of music at the Berklee College of Music. Anantawan continues to perform, speak, and teach around the world as an advocate for people with disabilities and the arts.
Learn more about Anantawan at adriananantawan.com.
Marylou Speaker Churchill
Known for her generosity of spirit, Marylou Speaker Churchill was a member of NEC’s College and Preparatory School faculties for 28 years. She was a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra for 30 years, serving for 23 of those as second principal violinist.
Churchill was chair of NEC Prep’s String Department for 10 years before joining the College faculty in the 1990s. She was a devoted teacher who was deeply committed to her students’ growth, artistic excellence, and well-being. In 2006, she received the Louis and Adrienne Krasner Teaching Award for her extraordinary work with students.
The Marylou Speaker Churchill Award honors her commitment to teaching and artistic excellence by celebrating a teacher and orchestral figure who reflects her qualities as an educator, musician, and human being.
