I tried to post this earlier, but for some reason it missed. Dr. Ed Baird, former president of NATS and president of the NATS Foundation, died in August following complications from surgery. The University of North Texas will be hosting a memorial program Sunday, November 12 at 2:00 in the College of Music Concert Hall.
Following is the official UNT press release.
August 2, 2000
Media Advisory
DENTON (UNT), Texas Dr. Edward Baird, professor of voice at the University of North Texas College of Music, died today, August 2 (Wednesday), at Baylor Medical Center in Dallas, at the age of 67. Baird joined the voice faculty of the University of North Texas in 1962. Highly regarded as both a performer and teacher, Baird was well known to area audiences. He sang in 43 Fort Worth Opera productions and as a soloist with the Dallas Symphony seven times. Baird has performed with such high profile artists as Placido Domingo and Beverly Sills. He had more than 60 opera roles to his credit, and he had appeared with more than a dozen opera companies, as well as performing as a soloist with major orchestras. In addition to opera, Baird performed in American musicals. Performing the role of Jud Fry in "Oklahoma!" while cast alongside Betty Lynn Buckley, Leonard Drum and Robert Windsor in 1971, he was named best supporting actor at Fort Worth's Casa Mañana Summer Musicals that season. In recent years, he performed several of his favorite operetta roles in productions with the Dallas-based Texas Gilbert and Sullivan Company. Past president of the National Association of Teachers of Singing, Baird has coached some of the finest singers to graduate from UNT. Three of his students — John Carpenter, Timothy Jenkins and Mark McCrory — were winners of the New York Metropolitan Opera National Auditions. Mark McCrory (`93) performed a lead role in Chicago Lyric Opera's recent premier of William Bolcomb's "A View from the Bridge." As the youngest principal singer to perform the role of Parsifal with the Met, the late Timothy Jenkins (`77) joined the company in 1978 and subsequently performed with them for 11 seasons. Another outstanding student, Frances Ginzer (MM `79), was a soprano with opera houses in Karlsruhe and Dusseldorf, Germany, before making her debut with the New York Metropolitan Opera in Wagner's Der Ring des Niebelungen and Dvorak's Rusalka in the mid-1990s.
Baird was appointed in May, 1984, to serve as the college's director of graduate studies. During his tenure, the college implemented a new artist certificate program and re-structured its doctor of musical arts degree. He received the President's Council University Service award for contributions to the graduate program in 1990 and he was named "Top Prof" at UNT in 1993. In 1998, he was elected as President of the NATS Foundation. A native of Missouri, Baird graduated from University of Missouri at Kansas City with bachelor's (1955) and master's (1956) degrees in music. UMKC honored him with an alumni achievement award in 1987-88. He received his doctorate from the University of Michigan in 1962. He was the institution's first vocalist to receive its new doctor of musical arts degree. A scholarship was established in Ed Baird's name in 1999. Memorials may be made to that fund at UNT College of Music, Attention Cindy Andrew, PO Box 311367, Denton, Texas, 76203, or by calling (940) 369-7771.
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