By Ken Sakamoto, Star-Bulletin
Former music professor
Allen Trubitt taught for 30 years.
UH celebrates gold
with Trubitt tribute
Musical drama
By Ruth Bingham
showcases his talent
Special to the Star-BulletinTHE pervasive theme of Allen Trubitt's oratorio is the passage of time and the impact of time on one's view of life.
Then it is fitting that the piece, "Birds of Passage," will be performed today to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Music Department of the University of Hawaii. Conductor Henry Miyamura will conduct the premiere performance of the oratorio by the professor emeritus.
It is large, unstaged, musical drama in nine movements, based on poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and the "biggest thing I've ever written," says Trubitt.
Trubitt, 66, who taught at UH for 30 odd years, spent about a year putting together the piece.
"I'm really pleased that it won't be performed posthumously," he quips during a interview.
The oratorio is the culmination of Trubitt's career. "I've seen a steady outpouring of fine musical works and an international reputation as a composer developing," says friend and fellow composer Neil McKay. "His musical style is one of consistency, originality, expressiveness, and is very much accessible to audiences."
Trubitt himself, however, finds describing his music difficult.
"All my life, I've never known what to tell people when they ask me what kind of music I write. I'm always stuck with saying, 'classical' or I sometimes say 'concert music.' There is just no term for it; you say contemporary, they think you mean pop.
"I like to think that my music is easily accessible. I probably delude myself a little about this. I'm assuming that the listener knows where music is today and realizes that what I'm doing is fairly conservative. It's not earth-shaking; it's just good listening."
Trubitt has dedicated his oratorio to Arthur E. and Mae Zenke Orvis, "because their hall has been such an important center for the music department."
It is fitting that the department in turn dedicate their concert to Trubitt, who also has been an important center for the department.
In addition to composing, teaching and performing, Trubitt twice served as department chairman and assisted everywhere, from major projects such as creating the doctoral program to solving minor departmental problems, even going so far as to help develop colleagues' careers.
Perhaps most importantly, as composer, friend and colleague Takeo Kudo pointed out, Trubitt has "always been the one that people can go to when they have problems. He's been such a pillar of support for everyone; he keeps everyone working together."
His many, impressive professional achievements include several ASCAP awards, a 1988 Presidential Citation for Excellence in Teaching, and a 1997 individual fellowship from the State Foundation on Culture and the Arts. Also, his choral work, "An American Letter," won first prize in a competition to commemorate the bicentennial of American independence.
Born in Chicago, Trubitt began his professional musical life performing as a cellist with the Seventh Army Symphony, finally accepting a position at Indiana State College in Pennsylvania, where he taught cello and music theory. After post-graduate study at Indiana University, Trubitt joined the composition faculty at the University of Hawaii in 1964.
As Trubitt explains with characteristic humility, he remained in Hawaii, because "there have always been three or four people, or more, in the department who were so much wiser, had so much more experience, had so much more knowledge, so much more ability, that there was always somebody to learn from."
Trubitt's greatest legacy, however, is almost certainly the time he gave to countless students and colleagues through the years.
"He's a superb teacher," Dale Hall says. "He's somebody who gives of himself to everybody and always has."
Colleague Byron Yasui concurs. "The students all love him. When they come back years later -- 5, 10, 15 years later -- they always ask, 'How's Trubitt?' That says a lot right there."
Although many professors focus on their best and brightest students, Trubitt took time to help those who stumbled.
"He was always open to students for advice and counseling," McKay recalls, "I really never knew anyone who was better at that, who felt an obligation to the ordinary student."
Trubitt says he paid attention to the students who weren't doing well in his classes.
"I would go out of my way and talk to them and ask them what was going on, and often that would lead to more conversation. I guess I was just interested in people. I think I might have been a better composer if I had put less time into listening to students, but I figured that was the job not just to teach to the world, but to teach to particular students. And certainly, promotion and tenure doesn't come with sitting and listening to students' complaints or problems, but I just felt that I couldn't ignore them."
Trubitt now lives the quieter life of a retiree, but is still composing currently working on a string quartet for the Shostakovich Quartet.
"But it's interesting," he muses, "Once you don't teach anything, students don't know you in a very short time.A generation goes by in four years; nobody knows you. You think, 'Well, shucks, I've been here for 30 years, surely someone will know me.' Turns out, its the custodian or the maintenance people who've been around as long as you have."
Concert notes
What: 50th Anniversary Concert by the UH Music Department.
