Alumni Awards: Hall of Fame
2026 Hall of Fame Award
Celia Keenan-Bolger (BFA ’00, musical theatre)
Since graduating from SMTD in 2000, Celia Keenan-Bolger has appeared on Broadway in Mother Play, To Kill a Mockingbird, Glass Menagerie, The Cherry Orchard, Peter and the Starcatcher, Les Miserables, and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Off Broadway she has developed new work and performed at the Public Theater, Playwrights Horizons, Lincoln Center, Second Stage, and New York Theater Workshop.
She’s currently on HBO’s The Gilded Age and has appeared elsewhere on TV in Bull, Louie, The Good Wife, Nurse Jackie, Good Behavior, and Law & Order: SVU. Her film credits include Diane, The Visit, and Breakable You.
For her work onstage, she’s received Tony, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and Theatre World Awards. For her work in social justice and community care, she received the Isabelle Stevenson Tony Award and the New York Civil Liberties Union (NYCLU) Michael Friedman Freedom Award. She has also completed training to become an end-of-life doula.
2026 Hall of Fame Award
Jamal Rossi (MM ’82, saxophone)
Jamal J. Rossi has served in numerous leadership capacities throughout a forty-year career in music higher education. He holds the title Joan and Martin Messinger Dean Emeritus from the Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester). Prior appointments include serving as dean of the School of Music at the University of South Carolina and assistant and associate dean of the Ithaca College School of Music.
While at Eastman, he led one of the most robust periods of curricular transformation in the school’s history with new degrees, certificates, and programs in film/video game music, music leadership, improvisation, and chamber music. He created new institutes including the Beal Institute for Film Music and Contemporary Media, Eastman Performing Arts Medicine, and the George Walker Center. Rossi led the creation of ROCmusic, a tuition-free after-school program for financially disadvantaged children in Rochester, and he forged local, regional, and international partnerships with organizations such as the American League of Orchestras, ArtistShare, Gateways Music Festival, and Yamaha Corporation.
Rossi earned degrees in music education and saxophone performance from Ithaca College, the University of Michigan, and the Eastman School of Music, and he was an active saxophone soloist and chamber musician throughout his career.
Past Recipients
2025
Pasek & Paul – Benj Pasek (BFA ’06, musical theatre) and Justin Paul (BFA ’06, musical theatre)
Ian Eisendrath (BMA ’03, voice)
2024
Rachel Childers (BM ’03, MM ’06, horn)
Daniel Bernard Roumain (MM ’95, DMA ’00, composition)
2023
Priscilla Lindsay (BA ’71, MA ’72, theatre)
Ava Ordman (MM ’75, BM ’75, trombone)
2022
Kyra Gaunt (PhD ’97, musicology)
Margo Martindale (Attended ’73)
2021
Robert Gillespie (PhD ’85, music education)
Aaron Dworkin (BM ’97 and MM ’98, violin)
2020
Kay Kaufman Shelemay (BM ’70 voice, MM ’72, DMA ’77, musicology)
George Balch Wilson (BM ’51, music literature, MM ’53, DMA ’63, composition)
2019
Richard Hawkins (BM ’91 clarinet, MM ’93 clarinet)
Laura Karpman (BM ’80 voice)
2018
Jessye Norman (MM ’68 voice)
Frank Ticheli (MM ’83 trumpet, DMA ’87 composition)
2017
Gerald Cleaver (BM ’92 music education and percussion)
Marianne Ploger (MM ’79 piano)
2016
Dale Briggs (MSE ’58, PhD ’68 engineering)
Cedric Carl Dent (BM ’85 piano)
2015
Marvelene Moore (DMA ’97 Music Ed)
Jack O’Brien (BA ’61 theatre)
2014
Harriet Berg
Bob James
2013
Sharon Jensen
Robert Phillips
2012
Wayne S. Brown
Robert Cogan
Ann Arbor ONCE Festival
2011
William Anderson
1961 Russian Tour Band
2010
Nancy Ambrose King
Larry Rachleff
2009
Bruce Galbraith
Carolee Stewart
2008
Jerry Bilik
Cynthia Phelps
2007
David Eisler
Francis Bundra
2006
James Forger
Carl St. Clair
2005
Harry Begian
George Shirley
2004
Rosalie Edwards
Robert Spring
2003
Judith Becker
Emil Raab
2002
Emerson Head
Fred Ormand
2001
Christine Dakin
H. Robert Reynolds
2000
Edward J. Downing
Elizabeth Weil Bergmann
Earlier Winners (1977-1999)
Roberta Alexander
Mildred Andrews
Leslie R. Bassett
Josef Blatt
William Bolcom
Eugene Bossart
Allen P. Britton
George R. Cavender
Russell Lewis Christopher
Hugh Cooper
Robert J. Courte
David Crawford
Richard Crawford
George Crumb
Louise E. Cuyler
Orien Dalley
Hans Theodore David
Chip Davis
William Doppmann
Nicholas D. Falcone
Ross Lee Finney
Armando Ghitalla
Elizabeth Green
Nelson Hauenstein
Harold Haugh
Ralph Herbert
Thomas Hilbish
G. Maurice Hinson
H. Wiley Hitchcock
Marguerite V. Hood
Howard T. Howard
Marian Owen Hunt
Lawrence Hurst
Roger E. Jacobi
Kenneth Jewell
Ernest Jones
Edith Staebler Kempf
Maynard J. Klein
John Krell
Paul R. Lehman
Eva Likova
Clifford P. Lillya
Larry Livingston
Albert Luconi
William R. Malm
Marilyn Mason
John McCollum
Charlotte Whitman McGeoch
Glenn D. McGeoch
Robert Emmett McGrath
John D. Mohler
Earl V. Moore
Barbara Nissman
Weston Noble
Jessye Norman
Charles E. Owen
Willis Patterson
Ashley Putnam
Gail W. Rector
Willliam D. Revelli
Mary Romig-deYoung
Gilbert Ross
Gustave Rosseels
Judith Dow Rumelhart
James D. Salmon
Donald Sinta
Glenn P. Smith
Clarence E. Stephenson
Louis Stout
William H. Stubbins
Laurence L. Teal
Mary Teal
Nelita True
Glenn E. Watkins
Floyd E. Werle