For more than 30 years, musician Karen McFarland performed all over the country with her cherished Helmuth Keller viola and Dotschkail bow that she bought in Keller’s shop in Philadelphia back in 1981.

Now that she is retired, McFarland decided to present the viola and bow, together worth $44,000, to the West Virginia University School of Music, where she received both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees, so that a young music student can play the instrument, as she says, “the way it needs to be played.”

“I retired from playing two years ago because I had a second career as a Unitarian Universalist minister and also because I was developing arthritis,” McFarland said. “Playing an instrument is an athletic skill. You slow down, but Tchaikovsky never does!”

A native of Parkersburg, West Virginia, Karen began playing the violin at 8 years old. She came to WVU on a Board of Governors’ Scholarship in the 1960s and studied with former WVU Symphony Orchestra conductor and violinist Donald Portnoy.

She also studied viola with Gerald Lefkoff at the same time and it was her experience with Dr. Lefkoff, now a professor emeritus, that changed her, she says.

“I found I was much more suited to the viola, which is like a violin, but bigger. It was a natural for me.”

During her student days, Karen played in the WVU Symphony Orchestra, and also in a small orchestra with cello professor William Skidmore. She earned her undergraduate degree in music education in 1964 and returned for her master’s degree in 1980. Both degrees were on the violin, but she soon switched entirely to the viola.

Shortly after receiving her master’s degree, she and a friend visited the shop of famous German violin and viola maker Helmuth Keller outside Philadelphia.

“I tried a number of violas that day,” she said. “My friend was trying out violins and we both bought instruments and said they were ‘matching sets.’ The viola was made by Keller and was brand new.”

When McFarland bought the viola, she said, “I need a bow.” But Keller said, “You can’t buy a bow now. You have to play the instrument for a year first. Then come back and buy a bow.”

“He wanted me to experience the instrument first,” she said. “He was good at listening to people play and finding out what they needed.”

McFarland says she was an all-purpose player. While living in in Blacksburg, Virginia, she taught privately and had her own junior orchestra. She also played in orchestras and ensembles at Virginia Tech and Radford universities, as well as the Roanoke Symphony, Southwest Virginia Opera in Roanoke, and the West Virginia Symphony Orchestra in Charleston. She and some female colleagues also started a group in Blacksburg called the Artemis Chamber Players.

Over the years, she also played in various groups in California, Utah, and Massachusetts while living in those states, before moving to Michigan, where she and her husband live now.

A year after she purchased her viola, she returned to Keller’s shop to purchase a bow. The Dotschkail bow she chose is a very fine German master bow, beautifully ornamented with an ivory frog and ivory fittings. Rudolf Dotschkail originally came from the Czech Republic and his bows are known for their outstanding playing qualities and dark, full, large sound.

“Helmuth Keller gave me a number of bows that I tried out,” she said. “This one was heavier. You don’t have to work it so hard because it is perfectly balanced, and has a light touch. You get great results when playing big orchestral pieces, but also when playing Vivaldi or Mozart. I never got tired when I was playing with that bow. I got the deepest, richest tones from it.”

Andrea Priester Houde, the viola professor in the WVU School of Music, loved McFarland’s bow as much as she loved the viola, when Karen presented them to her and School of Music Director Keith Jackson during a visit to the Creative Arts Center.

“This instrument is probably even better than my own viola,” Houde said. “It is so special and the bow is so special. The viola has a gigantic sound and the bow brings out the best of the instrument and its sound.”

Houde said it will take a while to find a student who fits the instrument. Unlike violins, which are all the same size, violas have never been standardized and they come in different sizes.

“Viola players don’t switch instruments all the time like pianists do,” Houde said. “For that reason, we really develop a bond with our instruments. When Karen presented her viola to the School of Music, I knew how difficult it was for her to part with it.”

McFarland agrees.

“I had a personal relationship with the instrument,” she said. “It was a part of me.”

Some musicians even name their instruments and McFarland named her viola “Matilda Agnes.”

“Matilda Joslyn Gage was a cohort of Susan B. Anthony’s in the women’s movement. Not much is known about her today, but she was always a champion of mine,” McFarland said. “She was a great public speaker on all women’s issues, not just suffrage, and the name fit because I knew that’s what the Keller viola was going to do—speak out.”

“Also, there was a movie that came out in the 1980s called ‘Agnes of God.’ I really felt, when playing my viola, that this was the voice of God under my ear. Many times, playing that viola, I would be transported to another plane. And you have to be careful and keep track of what you are doing. But sometimes the music and the instrument come together and it just lifts you out of everyday life.”

How could McFarland part with her beloved viola and bow after having such a bond with them for 30 years?

“Out of gratitude,” she said. “I am grateful for the opportunity the WVU School of Music gave me to have the kind of life I have had in music. The WVU music degree is of the highest caliber, let me tell you, and this is recognized all over the country.

“Back in the 1960s, when I was a student at WVU, President Paul Miller chose music as one of the areas in which he wanted WVU to excel. He told the school to hire the best faculty, no matter what it took, and our music faculty came from places like Juilliard and Eastman.

“I was from West Virginia and we were not wealthy. A lot of students struggle and WVU does not receive huge endowments like a Harvard or Stanford. I wanted to give my viola to my alma mater as a way of helping a student have a fine-quality instrument.”

The viola and bow will be kept in the School of Music in perpetuity. The first person to play it at WVU was School of Music alumnus Stephen Beall, the son of Music Professor Emeritus and former long-time WVU Composer-in-Residence John Beall. Stephen earned his bachelor’s degree from the Eastman School of Music in 1993, and his master’s from the WVU School of Music in 1999. He now teaches at Texas A&M University and gives violin and viola lessons privately. He came from Texas to perform on a concert at the Creative Arts Center and couldn’t bring both a violin and a viola with him.

“He was very excited to play this viola, and he played it so beautifully,” Houde said.

The next time it will be played will be during a Viola Studio recital on Dec. 1 at 6 p.m. in the Bloch Learning and Performance Hall at the Creative Arts Center. Undergraduate viola student Kiefer Kirk, a native of Charleston, West Virginia, will play the viola during that concert.

The Karen McFarland contribution was made in conjunction with A State of Minds: The Campaign for West Virginia’s University. The $1 billion comprehensive campaign being conducted by the WVU Foundation on behalf of the University runs through December 2017.

-WVU-

cl/11/10/14

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