Oberlin Portrait: Marti Newland

Photo by Trezure Taylor '05

Double degree senior Martha (Marti) Newland is pursuing degrees in voice performance and African American studies because she wants to forge a purposeful life in which she performs, researches, and, of course, leads. Marti makes this integration look easy, exerting effort and influence across an astonishingly wide swath of the arts world.

She was awarded the Duke University Endowment Fellowship in February 2003; the award funds her tuition and fees, and provides a living stipend, for her graduate studies at the University. Marti intends to work toward a Ph.D. in Musicology with an emphasis in African American art songs. In October 2002, she received a fellowship from the American Musicological Society's Committee on Cultural Diversity to attend its national conference.

Her work on African American vocal art music was recently published in the Mellon Minority Undergraduate Fellowship Program Journal. She has interned with the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, conducted donor research for the Cincinnati Opera, and acted as a cultural authenticity mentor to the Cotton Blossom Singers of the Piney Woods School in Mississippi.

Marti was a finalist for the Andrew W. Mellon Graduate Fellowship in Humanistic Studies, and, as an honors student, has completed her honors project on the life and music of composer Margaret Bonds for Oberlin's African American Studies Department. The project included a concert of Bond's Christmas cantata The Ballad of the Brown King, with the Oberlin College Choir during Oberlin's Langston Hughes Centennial celebration in November 2002.

Although her academic responsibilities are demanding, Marti still finds time to perform widely and well. During her junior year she appeared as a guest soloist with the Fisk University Jubilee Singers. She studies with Associate Professor of Voice Lorraine Manz and sang the role of Glinda, the Good Witch of the South, in the February 2003 production of The Wiz, directed by her College advisor, Associate Professor African American Studies and Theater and Dance Caroline Jackson-Smith. She has performed with the Oberlin in Italy program and the Lake Placid Summer Vocal Institute. This summer she will again lay aside the books to sing with the Aspen Music Festival's Opera Theater Program.

Marti grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio. The daughter of two successful business professionals, she showed an early gift for singing and was helped along by her family. "My grandmother would make me sight-read hymns at the piano and my sister and I loved to sing duets," she says. "Also, the teachers at the Seven Hills School, a day school in Cincinnati where I went to high school, consistently encouraged me to study excellence in black Americans in every field." The New Jerusalem Baptist Church, which the Newlands have attended since Marti was a teenager, provided the young singer with encouragement and performance opportunities. In Oberlin, she attends Rust United Methodist Church.

Marti arrived at Oberlin as a Conservatory student and added a College degree in African American studies to her educational plan after enrolling in Introduction to the Black Experience with Emeritus Associate Professor of African American Studies Adrienne Lash Jones. "I decided after the second class meeting that I loved the field."

A cofounder of the Oberlin Conservatory Black Musicians Guild, Marti helped to bring Oberlin alumna and renowned vocal coach Sylvia Olden Lee '38 to campus for a master class. Olden Lee will receive an honorary doctor of music degree from Oberlin at this year's commencement.

Marti will continue performing after she arrives at Duke. She spoke with her characteristic clarity and optimism about balancing research and performance. "I don't fall cleanly into people's boxes for me as either a singer or an academician, but to me my path is clear. I don't feel like two people. There's time for it all."

A Conversation with Marti Newland

What inspired you to be a musician?
Whitney Houston singing "The Greatest Love of All." I knew all the words at age 6 or 7. I know I wasn't the only one in my generation of singers to do that. Adults thought it was adorable. My grandmother inspired me to be a musician because she stressed the importance of the piano.

What keeps you inspired on discouraging days?
My family, especially my parents. I know they believe in me and wouldn't steer me wrong. There is a history of struggle by African Americans that has allowed me to live this life. When I compare my bad days to that struggle my discouraging moments are put in relief by the comparison. If I have a bad day practicing or reading, at least I have a place to practice and the right and ability to read.

What is the most memorable performance you have seen and why?
I think it was the first time I saw Kathleen Battle. I was 16. It was the first time that I thought, "I can do that." She was singing "Honey and Rue" by André Previn, which I just did on my senior recital.

If you could perform with any musician, living or dead, who would it be? What would you perform?
I'd love to be accompanied by Hall Johnson, the famous arranger of spirituals. We'd perform his arrangements. I'd really just love to do a European tour with Professor of Accompanying Philip Highfill. He really lives and breathes the music. We'd perform lieder.

If you could master another instrument, what would it be?
The piano. I may get to that one day. It's so practical. I'd understand harmony better. I could accompany myself. And it would be great to be that person at the party who can play jazz standards from memory.

If you could not be a musician, what other profession would you choose? What profession would you definitely NOT choose?
This is difficult. If I couldn't perform or teach music, I think I'd be in arts administration. Without music, I wouldn't be myself. Marti without music--that just wouldn't happen. I can tell you I probably would not work in corporate America.

What do you listen to for inspiration? In your free time?
The Clark Sisters. Kathleen Battle. Old tapes of sermons from my home church in Cincinnati. The mix tapes my sister makes me are wonderful since every song is a favorite.

What do you like to read?
The Bible. Biographies of black women. I also like to read all the material that's assigned for the courses I'm in. When you're pressed for time, that's very difficult, but worthwhile.

What are the three words that best describe you?
Child of God.