The next time you hear\u00a0Furman\u00a0brass players\u00a0jamming,\u00a0a\u00a0chorale\u00a0exulting in\u00a0song,\u00a0or the\u00a0orchestra\u00a0filling\u00a0McAlister Auditorium\u00a0with\u00a0a romantic masterwork,\u00a0close your eyes\u00a0and get lost\u00a0in your thoughts.<\/p>\n
Think about the determination of the student musicians, their hours of practice,\u00a0their artistry. Marvel at their faculty mentors\u00a0who cultivated\u00a0such\u00a0talents.\u00a0And\u00a0contemplate the\u00a0generosity\u00a0of\u00a0Gordon \u201965<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0Sarah Herring \u201966<\/strong>.<\/p>\n The Herrings\u00a0have established\u00a0the Herring Music Chair Endowment and the Herring Music Fellowship Fund\u00a0through\u00a0a charitable commitment of $6.1 million.\u00a0The couple\u2019s gift follows\u00a0decades of\u00a0their\u00a0already bestowed\u00a0generosity\u00a0\u2013\u00a0in time, guidance and financial support\u00a0\u2013\u00a0to Furman.<\/p>\n \u201cWe hope our gift will attract exceptional students who can be magnets to draw other talented musicians to Furman\u2019s music programs,\u201d says Sarah.<\/p>\n Both Sarah, a\u00a0German\u00a0major,\u00a0and Gordon, a\u00a0history\u00a0major, were members of\u00a0the Furman Singers when they were students, an experience that gave them a special bond with Furman\u2019s music department.<\/p>\n \u201cFurman is exceptional for providing students with a rigorous liberal arts education,\u201d Gordon says. \u201cWe believe the other liberal arts are enhanced by music. Because we weren\u2019t music majors, our experience with Furman Singers served to complete our liberal arts education.\u201d<\/p>\n Gordon\u00a0was a telecommunications executive who\u00a0helped launch\u00a0The Weather Channel\u00a0in 1982. Sarah\u2019s career was in senior management in Telephone Company Operations.<\/p>\n Among the Herrings\u2019 past acts of generosity to Furman are a $1.8 million gift that led to the construction of\u00a0the Herring Center for Lifelong Learning\u00a0and\u00a0a\u00a0$1.25 million\u00a0donation that\u00a0served\u00a0as the lead gift for the Nan Trammell Herring Music Pavilion. Since the mid-1990s, the Herrings have provided Partner\u00a0Scholarships,\u00a0which support multiple music students each year.<\/p>\n Gordon, an emeritus trustee, feels that especially in these challenging times, music speaks to the soul of the individual and thereby enriches the soul of the university.<\/p>\n Bingham Vick Jr., professor of music emeritus and director of\u00a0the\u00a0Furman Singers from 1970 to 2010, emphasizes\u00a0the\u00a0importance of the Herrings\u2019 gift to the university\u2019s ability to attract gifted music students.<\/p>\n \u201cIn recent years, rising costs of Furman, increased competition for musical talent with other quality collegiate music programs, and knowing the value and the importance of the cultural experience that a strong music department could offer to students and to the community, the Herrings have taken a bold and important step and investment in the Furman musical program,\u201d says Vick.<\/p>\n \u201cI can attest to the importance and benefit Furman\u2019s strong music program has had on the lives thousands of students.\u00a0The\u00a0Herring Fellowships\u00a0<\/strong>now lead the way toward an even brighter future for the enrichment of the Furman experience.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Gordon \u201965 and Sarah Herring \u201966 have committed to give $6.1 million to the Department of Music.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":295,"featured_media":32981,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2893,2892],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32980","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-around-the-lake-fall-2020","category-fall-2020"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32980","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/295"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32980"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32980\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32983,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32980\/revisions\/32983"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32981"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32980"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32980"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32980"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}