Don Chisholm

Ann Arbor real estate developer Don Chisholm (BBA ’55, MBA ’56) – who, with his wife Betts (BA ’56, MA ’60), established scholarships for both jazz and musical theatre students and was a major supporter of SMTD’s jazz program – passed away on March 21, 2025. Following two separate stints working for Owens-Corning Fiberglass in Toledo, Ohio (separated by two years in the US Army and a brief foray at U-M’s School of Law), Chisholm returned with his wife to Ann Arbor to put down roots in a community they loved for its intellectual and creative atmosphere. He first worked for Hobbs-Schmidt Real Estate before starting his own company, Ann Arbor Associates, with Joseph Savarino (MM ’57, piano). Initially they built apartment buildings on Central Campus, but after zoning laws were tightened they moved farther afield, buying 52 acres around South State Street, where they developed many properties including the Hidden Valley Apartment complex, the Burlington office buildings, part of the Oak Valley Center, and Stonebridge, a golf course community with more than 700 homes and condos.

In the 1980s, Chisholm returned to Central Campus to build Sloan Plaza, a luxury condominium complex named for his mother, Margaret Sloan. Chisholm owned one of the units in the building and installed his mother’s Steinway in it. There he often hosted gatherings and also made the apartment available to house classical and jazz artists who were performing in the city. Among those who stayed there were Shirley Horn, Chucho Valdes, Dizzy Gillespie, Toots Thielman, Bill Charlap, Freddy Cole, Diana Krall, Andre Previn, and Cedar Walton. All signed his guest book, the only form of payment he would accept, making it a who’s who of legendary signatures. An ardent jazz fan who helped the art form to thrive in Michigan, Chisholm was a founding board member of the Southeastern Michigan Jazz Association. He received the Jazz Hero Award from the Jazz Journalists Association in 2015 and was a longtime major donor to Kerrytown Concert House.

The Chisholms supported SMTD students with annual scholarships via the Friends of Musical Theatre Fund, starting in the early 2000s, and established the Chisholm Musical Theatre Scholarship and the Chisholm Jazz Scholarship in 2011. In 2019, they established the U-M Jazz Ambassadors Fund to support an annual on-campus week-long summer intensive aimed at recruiting exceptionally talented high school students to SMTD. That same year, the Don Chisholm Jazz Master Class Series Fund was created to allow students the regular opportunity to study with renowned jazz artists.

John Morgan

Longtime SMTD supporter John Black Morgan (BM ’60, MM ’62, music education) died on May 25, 2025, in Huntington Station, New York. Born in Norfolk, Virginia, he resided in Long Island for the last 45 years. Morgan was a clarinetist for the Michigan Marching Band under the direction of the legendary William D. Revelli, an experience that he treasured throughout his life. He was also proud to have played in Ann Arbor’s ONCE festivals, renowned for their groundbreaking approach that brought together musicians, visual artists, architects, dancers, and filmmakers to create a cutting-edge series of concerts in the 1960s, featuring the work of avant-garde composers including Morgan’s lifelong friend, Donald Scavarda.

After graduating, Morgan had a brief career as a high school band director in Ohio and upstate New York before becoming a stockbroker. He went on to earn degrees from Adelphi University (MBA ’82), William Howard Taft University (JD ’90), and Washington School of Law (MS ’97). He served as an attorney and a compliance director for many firms, including Merrill Lynch, Lehman Brothers, Probursa, Asiel & Co., Mabon, Numis, Tradition Asiel, and others. Throughout his career he remained a devoted Wolverine, traveling to Ann Arbor nearly every fall to attend football games. He strongly supported U-M’s Alumni Association, spending many hours as a recruiting volunteer and serving as the first president of the association’s Long Island chapter. In 2006, he and his wife established the John B. and Mary A. Morgan Scholarship, awarded annually to an outstanding SMTD student.

Richard Van Perry

One of the most successful pop music producers of the 20th century, Richard Van Perry (BM ’64, music education), who had more than 12 gold records to his credit, died on December 24, 2024. A native New Yorker who trained as an oboist and drummer, Perry spent his teen years singing in a doo wop group that was signed to a label and produced seven singles. After graduating from U-M, he returned to New York, where he became a partner in Cloud Nine, a music production company. But Perry’s reputation as a hitmaker and a self-described “song doctor” took off after he moved to Los Angeles in 1967, initially working as a staff producer for Warner Bros. Records. The first hit song he produced was “Tiptoe through the Tulips” for the novelty act Tiny Tim. He also produced albums for Fats Domino and Ella Fitzgerald before leaving Warner Bros. in 1970 to become an independent producer. Over the next decade he worked with some of the industry’s biggest pop stars, including Barbra Streisand, Leo Thayer, Harry Nilsson, Diana Ross, Art Garfunkel, and Carly Simon, producing her breakout hit album, No Secrets, which included her No. 1 hit single, “You’re So Vain.” One of Perry’s biggest thrills, as he shared in his autobiography Cloud Nine: Memoirs of a Record Producer (2021), was producing Ringo Starr’s second solo album, Ringo (1973), which featured all four of the Beatles.

In 1978, Perry launched his own label, Planet Records, and signed the Pointer Sisters, guiding them to their greatest commercial success with hits like “Fire,” “Slow Hand,” and “I’m So Excited.” In the 1980s he produced such megahits as De Barge’s “Rhythm of the Night” and the unexpected duet by Julio Iglesias and Willie Nelson, “To All the Girls I’ve Loved Before.” Perry sold Planet Records to RCA Records in 1982 and continued producing independently thereafter. In later years he produced the first of Rod Stewart’s million-selling American Songbook album series. In 2015, he received the Grammy’s Trustee Award for Lifetime Achievement. Perry endowed the Richard Perry Scholarship at SMTD in 1976 to support a musical theatre or performing arts technology student annually.

Harry Wayne Sargous

Professor Emeritus of Music Harry Wayne Sargous, who provided exemplary instruction to a generation of students as an oboe instructor at SMTD from 1982 to 2013, died on May 13, 2025. An internationally acclaimed musician, Sargous served as principal oboist of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra from 1971–82 and also served as principal with the Kansas City Philharmonic, the Toronto Chamber Winds, the Ann Arbor Symphony, and the Flint and Toledo symphony orchestras, and was a guest artist with orchestras across the United States, Canada, and Europe. A native of Cleveland Heights, Ohio, Sargous began his studies at the Cleveland Music School Settlement, studying theory and composition, and received his BA from Yale University (1970), where he was named Scholar of the House, an honor of highest distinction. He made his critically acclaimed debut at Carnegie Hall in 1975 and spent several summers performing at the prestigious Marlboro Music Festival.

Sargous served on the faculties of Toronto’s Royal Conservatory of Music, the University of Western Ontario, and the University of Toronto before joining U-M, where his interdisciplinary collaborations with the Department of Media and Music Technology explored the traditional and eclectic contemporary performance possibilities for the oboe. Renowned as a chamber music coach and master class instructor, Sargous shared his expertise at esteemed music festivals including Sarasota, Banff, Bowdoin, and Kapalua, and also at Interlochen Arts Camp, Japan’s Toho College of Music, and the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California, where he served as a resident artist for 17 summers. He was a founding member of the celebrated Michigan Chamber Players with saxophonist Don Sinta (MM ’62, professor emeritus of music), percussionists Michael Udow (professor emeritus of music) and Anthony Di Sanza (MM ’92, DMA ’03, percussion), and Japanese marimbist Keiko Abe.