On March 1, 2019, during American Choral Directors Association’s National Conference in Kansas City, a very special anniversary was marked in the same place where ACDA was created sixty years before.
One of the “legacy” activities that leadership organized during the conference was the presentation of a plaque to the current owners of the historic Muehlebach Hotel, where ACDA was founded in 1959.
“As we were on the initial site visit with the VisitKC representatives in July 2018,” remembers Lynne Gackle, National Vice-President of ACDA, “they took us to the historic lobby of the Muehlebach Hotel. A beautiful plaque that had been placed on one of the old wooden columns caught my eye. It had been given by the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barber Shop Quartet Singing in America, Inc., to commemorate their 1938 founding, also in the Muehlebach Hotel. I then looked to the right and saw another column that had no plaque and the idea immediately came to me that we needed to commemorate ACDA’s founding on this very special 60th anniversary!”
On March 1, Gackle and Tom Shelton, National President of ACDA, presented the plaque to the Marriott general manager, who installed it on that column the following week. The plaque has the following inscription:
In February 1959, a group of 35 choral conductors from around the United States met at the Muehlebach Hotel during the Music Teachers National Association’s (MTNA) biennial conference. This group created the American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) and approved its original ten purposes, which still stand largely unmodified.
With both a national and international membership, ACDA is an education organization whose expressed mission is to inspire excellence in choral music through education, performance, composition and advocacy.
Presented by
The Executive Committee and Membership of ACDA
on the occasion of its National Conference marking the Sixtieth Jubilee Anniversary
March 1, 2019.
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