Our Rotarian of the Day today is Glenn Burnett. Glenn is not a native Tulsan (or at least, he didn’t go to high school here). He graduated from Wichita High School East in Wichita, Kansas, and received a B.A. from Southern Nazarene University in Bethany, Oklahoma, in 1958 and graduated from the Dallas Institute-Gupton Jones College of Mortuary Science in 1962. He is the general manager for The Fitzgerald Funeral Service. If memory serves, Glenn used to work with the Tulsa County Health Department back in the ’80s, and was a big help in getting Be Wise, Immunize started with Bill Crews.
Glenn has been an active Rotarian for many years, and he’s attended EIGHT International Conventions. His very first one was in Singapore! He is a past president, and is notorious for being…loquacious whenever he’s allowed to speak. Despite all the grief we give him, Glenn has said that it is an honor to be a member of this club.
Glenn has three children: Glenn II, Michelle, and Kristen. (I compliment him on his excellent choice in girls’ names.) He enjoys watching movies (he has more than 900 titles at home!), pastel painting, playing bridge and traveling when he can.
This Week’s Program
Kostis Protopapas and the Tulsa Opera
Our speaker today is Kostis Protopapas, the artistic director of Tulsa Opera. He previously served as the company’s associate conductor and chorusmaster. His conducting credits with the company include productions of Carmen, Cavalleria Rusticana/I Pagliacci, Le Nozze di Figaro and The Magic Flute, as well as student matinee performances of The Cunning Little Vixen and La Boheme.
Protopapas has also been an assistant conductor for the Los Angeles Opera since 2004 and has served as assistant conductor at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and Santa Fe Opera. During the 2002 and 2003 seasons, he was the assistant chorusmaster at Lyric Opera of Chicago, under Donald Palumbo.
Protopapas has served on the music staffs of Opera Memphis and Virginia Opera. He conducted at Opera in the Ozarks every summer from 2000 to 2004 and has conducted for Da Corneto Opera in Chicago and Union Avenue Opera in St. Louis.
Born in Athens, Protopapas studied archaeology and history of art at the University of Athens. He came to the United States in 1993 on an Onassis Foundation scholarship to study piano at The Boston Conservatory and conducting at Boston University.
He lives in Tulsa and Chicago, with his wife, soprano and stage director Cathleen Dunn, and their two cats, Gus and July.
Mr. Protopapas, thank you for being with us today. Tulsa Southside Rotary welcomes you!
Southsider Quick Notes
Last week…
- Our ROD last week was Jack Koehle and our speaker was Sean Kouplen.
- Coincidentally, Sean Kouplen was proposed for membership after his speech, and he was approved by the board. So, we now have TWO proposed members to publish:
- Sean Kouplen, classification: staffing
- Patti Kuck, classification: personnel services
- The Henry Bellmon Awards will be held September 16 at the Mayo Hotel. If we sell all the corporate tables that we want, then only 100 individual tickets will remain (again, at $125 apiece). Make your reservations now!
- If you want to pick up some Topeca coffee for the fundraiser, see Josh Butts. We’re supposed to buy or sell 20 bags apiece.
- Monthly statements have gone out, and quarterly dues are due in April!
- Several of our new members got their blue badges last week! Congratulations, guys!
- The board approved $1,000 for Be Wise Immunize, which will be at the Christview Christian Church on April 24. They’re looking for volunteers for Friday night (to set up) and Saturday morning and afternoon during the actual event. Sign up! It’s a lot of fun.
- Biscuit Acres will celebrate its first anniversary on June 6. John Benjamin reported that it is completely constructed now, with the fence, shade sails, brick entrances, etc. A volunteer association is being formed to recruit and train volunteers, and the drainage will be fixed soon. All in all, it’s been a great project and John Benjamin has done a great job making sure everything got done. Thank you, John!
- Our breakout meeting at the fire station is TENTATIVELY set for April 15. If anything changes, we’ll let you know.
- The board also approved taking 225 kids from Springdale Elementary to a baseball game on May 5! That will be our meeting that week, so sign up to go! It’s a 10 a.m. game, so we should have the kids back at school around 2 p.m. It will cost around $2,000 for the whole thing, so if you could donate some money, we’d really appreciate it!
- We sent $1,910 to MSNI for Haiti!
- Lamp won Cut the Ace! No telling how much the pot was worth, but probably quite a bit. Congratulations, Lamp!
- Ken Bays, one of our longtime members, is in the hospital. He’s not doing well enough for visitors, but prayers are appreciated.
- Be sure to check the Upcoming Programs for our speaker list through the Change of Horses (June 2010). Information on it is subject to change, but we’ll do our best to keep it updated!
- Next week, we have Dan Rooney with Folds of Honor as our speaker.
