LETTERS: A STRONG INFLUENCE

To the editor:

Not until this week did I receive the sad news of the death of Betty Sue Palsgrove last month.

After reading the lovely tribute to her written by my friend, Mary Jo Kaempfer, in your paper, I feel compelled to add my own personal thoughts about Suzy.

I moved to New York City, after graduating with a degree in music from Southeast Missouri State University in 1971, to pursue a career as an opera singer. I have been fortunate to have worked in that capacity and to have resided here for 25 years. I have also been and remain a private voice instructor to many students as well as to top people in show business. I have had numerous wonderful experiences in music and have been able to share my gifts with many people in this country and in Europe.

More than a few dear people in Cape Girardeau have had a huge, positive influence on me and my career, but none more directly than Suzy Palsgrove.

Her insight into my abilities as a piano accompanist influenced other instructors in the music department at SEMO to offer me a full piano scholarship, in spite of a very unaffective audition for such. Playing solos was not my forte. (Suzy knew from having heard me accompany the Central High School choir in many concerts where my true keyboard talents and experiences lay.) Had it not been for that scholarship, attending SEMO would not have been likely. And it was at SEMO I learned I had a vocal talent as well. The rest is history.

Suzy was my piano instructor at the university, and at graduation time she was very understanding of the lack of time spent on the piano solo work. After I focused most of my attention on singing, she often gave of her time to accompany me with her incredible piano expertise. Several times she was my able assistant in full concerts at SEMO -- most recently in 1992 at a homecoming luncheon when I was given the Alumni Merit Award.

Besides her amazing talent and generosity with it, I will always remember her constant encouragement to her students, her exuberance to life and music, her big smile and hearty laugh and the amazing power and strength in her piano playing -- from such a petite frame.

She is gone, but she will never be forgotten. She touched so many. Thank you, Suzy.

JUDITH FARRIS

New York