NEC Honors Faculty Emerita Lucy Chapman with Second Annual Marylou Speaker Churchill Award

The Marylou Speaker Churchill Award recognizes an instrument teacher and orchestral figure who reflects Churchill's qualities as a human being, educator, and musician. Churchill served on the faculty of NEC's College and Preparatory programs for 28 years and was the principal second violinist of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. 

Selected by a special committee led by NEC's Provost and Dean of the Faculty, the Award recipient is invited to campus to present a master class, lecture, or performance. Chapman will come to campus on Saturday, February 10, to receive the award. As part of her visit, she will conduct two masterclasses with students from NEC Prep and the College.

Lucy Chapman

Lucy Chapman has pursued an eclectic career spanning many musical worlds. A graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, where she studied with Arnold Steinhardt of the Guarneri Quartet, she became Acting Associate Concertmaster of the San Francisco Symphony at the age of 29. From that position, Chapman played first violin of the award-winning Muir String Quartet for two seasons. She has played solo and chamber music concerts throughout the USA, Europe, Korea, and Japan. Her recording of Bartok, Stravinsky, and Ives with clarinetist Richard Stoltzman and pianist Richard Goode won a Grammy nomination, and she has also recorded with Keith Jarrett.

For 20 years, Ms. Chapman taught violin and chamber music at New England Conservatory, where she served for many years as Chair of the Chamber Music and Strings. Chapman taught for ten summers at Kneisel Hall in Blue Hill, Maine, and was a regular senior participant at the Marlboro Music Festival in Marlboro, Vermont, until her recent retirement. Chapman holds a master's degree in Education from the Antioch New England Graduate School, where she specialized in Waldorf Education. She is a former faculty member of the University of California at Santa Cruz and Boston University.

In 2021, Chapman received the status of NEC Faculty Emerita, a program to honor designated faculty members for their many years of dedicated service and significant contributions to the Conservatory. The bestowal of Emerita/Emeritus status is an honor awarded to individuals who have achieved a career of professional accomplishment and provided distinguished service to NEC, the local community, and their professional discipline or profession. In bestowing this emeritus status, NEC will enable a faculty member so elected, honored, and entitled to continue to share their life's work and knowledge with the NEC community. As Emerita, Chapman contributed insights from her remarkable career in 2023 as an advisor to NEC's new Expanded Education department during its first year of operation. 

Marylou Speaker Churchill

Known for her generosity of spirit, Marylou Speaker Churchill taught on NEC's College and Preparatory School faculties for 28 years. She was a member of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, where she served as Second Principal Violinist for 23 years of her 30-year tenure with the orchestra.

Marylou served as Chair of the Prep String Department for ten years before joining the College faculty in the 1990s. She was a devoted teacher 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 an instrument teacher or orchestral figure who reflects her qualities as an educator, musician, and human being.