{"id":59789,"date":"2018-02-02T10:07:36","date_gmt":"2018-02-02T15:07:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/?p=59789"},"modified":"2022-08-02T14:05:28","modified_gmt":"2022-08-02T18:05:28","slug":"martin_messinger_gives","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/news\/articles\/2018\/martin_messinger_gives\/","title":{"rendered":"Martin Messinger: Giving to Endow the Future"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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February 2, 2018<\/div>\n\t\t\n\t\t\t\t
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\"MartinMartin Messinger, a managing director of the independent investment management firm Neuberger Berman LLC, is a summer resident of the Berkshires and a longtime patron of the arts. He helped Boston University Tanglewood Institute (BUTI) celebrate its 50th anniversary, in 2016, with a gift of $105,000: $100,000 to endow the Eastman Scholarship Fund and $5,000 for current use as a 2017 summer scholarship. We spoke with him recently about his commitment to BUTI and his hopes for its future.<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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How did you first get involved with BUTI?<\/em><\/h3>\n

My property is directly across Hawthorne Street from the extensive property that BUTI has. I could hear them, but I never really got interested in the program until Hilary Respass, the executive director, talked me into coming to a concert.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been very involved with the Boston Symphony Orchestra<\/a>, and there\u2019s a great overlap. The overlap is exceptionally important, I believe, to Boston University, for the BSO\u2019s sheer prestige in Boston, in the entire world of music, and the phenomenal leadership they have.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been very active also with the Tanglewood Music Center<\/a> (TMC, the BSO\u2019s summer academy for advanced study). I\u2019ve endowed students; I\u2019ve worked on the different projects up there. So that\u2019s another aspect.<\/p>\n

The third aspect is I have been a life trustee at the University of Rochester. I\u2019m also on the board of the Eastman School of Music there, and I\u2019ve endowed a deanship of that school, and also done a building there in honor of my mother.<\/p>\n

I did it because I flunked piano, and I felt I owed it to my mother.<\/p>\n

What about your musical life now?<\/em><\/h3>\n

Down here in Florida, where I spend half the year, we have the New World Symphony. A lot of our TMC students progress through there before they get orchestra assignments. So I guess the career path is: go to BUTI, get into a fabulous music school, get into TMC, get yourself a chair somewhere. [Laughs] There\u2019s a very good path.<\/p>\n

And you see BUTI as a key first step on that path?<\/em><\/h3>\n

Well, BUTI has a very wonderful reputation in the pre-university world. There\u2019s only a few high school\u2013level programs that really stand out, and BUTI is one.<\/p>\n

And the staff is an absolute delight to work with. Hilary can\u2019t download enough information from you; she\u2019s trying to learn all the time. Academically BUTI has been very strong from the beginning, and the current team has made them even stronger. I think they\u2019re doing an outstanding job.<\/p>\n

What are your hopes for this gift?<\/em><\/h3>\n

BUTI needs support for students, so I made a gift in the form of an endowed scholarship. I\u2019ve done a number of these elsewhere. I usually specify that they be invested in the endowment, and limited to a 5 percent draw. It allows the available funds to grow with inflation, and in good investment discipline, because actually that\u2019s my field.<\/p>\n

And at the same time I\u2019d like to encourage other people to do the same thing, so we have more scholarship aid.<\/p>\n

So in a way it\u2019s a challenge gift.<\/em><\/h3>\n

Of course. You\u2019ve got to get more people to give it away while they\u2019re alive\u2014when you can see your students perform.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve been involved with other music institutions. What made you decide that you also wanted to support BUTI?<\/em><\/h3>\n

It\u2019s really my interest in music in general. I worry about music because we\u2019re offering less and less of it in the academic environment, at every level.<\/p>\n

If you want to encourage creativity, you have to do it through the arts. They\u2019re very related. If you can play a Shostakovich Fifth Symphony when you\u2019re in high school, then doing programming, for example, or anything with the internet, has got to be simple by comparison. It\u2019s just wonderful training.<\/p>\n

Do you feel that your music training helped you in the business world? <\/em><\/h3>\n

I had no music training. [Laughs.] My career ended when they wanted to transfer me to percussion.<\/p>\n

What music has done is just enrich my life. What that means, somebody else will have to decide. I\u2019ve listened to enough of my obituaries. Haven\u2019t found one I quite approve of yet.<\/p>\n

What would the ideal obituary include? Not that we\u2019re in any hurry to write it.<\/em><\/h3>\n

\u201cHe gave it away with warm hands.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BUTI<\/p>\n

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Learn more<\/a> about BUTI, including how to give<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Martin Messinger, a managing director of the independent investment management firm Neuberger Berman LLC, is a summer resident of the Berkshires and a longtime patron of the arts. He helped Boston University Tanglewood Institute (BUTI) celebrate its 50th anniversary, in 2016, with a gift of $105,000: $100,000 to endow the Eastman Scholarship Fund and $5,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3917,"featured_media":59792,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"bu_prepress_billboard":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term":"","_bu_prepress_primary_term_manual":""},"tags":[],"bu-publication":[192],"magazine-article-category":[],"magazine-topic":[],"news-article-category":[313],"news-topic":[],"bu_edition":[],"media_type":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/59789"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/bu-article"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3917"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=59789"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/59789\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":89051,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-article\/59789\/revisions\/89051"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/59792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=59789"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"bu-publication","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu-publication?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine-article-category?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/magazine-topic?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"news-article-category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-article-category?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"news-topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-topic?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"bu_edition","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bu_edition?post=59789"},{"taxonomy":"media_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/id-andrea.cms-devl.bu.edu\/cfa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media_type?post=59789"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}