Alumni News
MSU College of Music Alumnus Receives National Teaching Award
Conductor of the famed St. Olaf Choir Anton Armstrong has received the national Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching. The $200,000 award, bestowed by Baylor University, is designed to honor great teachers, to stimulate discussion in the academy about the value of teaching, and to encourage departments and institutions to value their own great teachers. It is the single largest award given to an individual for great teaching.
Armstrong, who earned a D.M.A. in choral conducting in 1987 from Michigan State University, received his bachelor’s of music in vocal performance in 1978 from St. Olaf College and a master’s degree in choral music from the University of Illinois in 1980.
Previously he served on the faculty of Calvin College and led the Grand Rapids Symphony Chorus and the St. Cecilia Youth Chorale. He was the first Peter Godfrey Visiting Professor of Choral Music at the University of Auckland, New Zealand. In the summer of 2001, Dr. Armstrong conducted the World Youth Choir sponsored by the International Federation of Choral Music. He has guest conducted the Utah Symphony and Symphony Chorus, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, the Westminster Choir, the American Boychoir, and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. In May 2005, the St. Olaf Choir and Anton Armstrong received a special invitation to perform for President George W. Bush, First Lady Laura Bush, and their guests for the National Day of Prayer held in the East Room of the White House. Currently, he is a Harry R. and Thora H. Tosdal Professor of Music at St. Olaf College. He is editor of a multicultural choral series for Earthsongs Publications and co-editor of the revised St. Olaf Choral Series for Augsburg Fortress Publishers.
“It is with sincere humbleness and immense gratitude that I accept the 2006 Robert Foster Cherry Award for Great Teaching at Baylor University,” Armstrong said. “I feel most overwhelmed by the honor Baylor University has bestowed upon me, for this award does not simply affirm my vocation to serve others through my teaching, it also recognizes all the wonderful family, teachers, mentors, students and singers who have touched my life and nurtured this calling in me through the years. I will strive to bring the best of my gifts as a teacher, artist and man of faith to the Baylor University community while in residence during the spring of 2007.”
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