There Ain't No Party "Had Ever Been Gathered" Like a Chi Epsilon Party...

Chi Epsilon (χε) Honors Society students had a Halloween Costume Party on the night of Thursday, October 28 from 5:30 to 7:30. It all happened on the Macon Campus of Southwest Tennessee Community College. I performed a dramatic reading of "Young Goodman Brown" (1835) by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Everyone really enjoyed it, according to my brother Daniel; he says they thought I was "a trained actor or something." I think the reading maintained the honors society's emphasis on English language and literature, cultural stimulation, creative and critical writing, and collegiality, and I imagine that everyone who attended would agree. Last year, at the same event, I read Edgar Allan Poe's "The Tell-tale Heart." So, kids, what should I read next time?

Sigma Kappa Delta (ΣΚΔ) is a collegiate honor society for students of English at two-year colleges. Currently, the organization has 110 chapters in the United States, including Southwest's Chi Epsilon (χε). Members are eligible for scholarships and awards. For more information contact Professor of Languages and Literature Daniel Gillespie at jdgillespie1@southwest.tn.edu.

ZANE GILLESPIE

After six years as Minister of Music at Mount Pleasant United Methodist Church (UMC) in Holly Springs, MS, I was recently called to continue to work to address public engagement in music participation as Director of Music Ministries at First UMC in Water Valley, MS. I am a Composer, Theorist, and member of both The College Music Society as well as The Poe Studies Association (PSA). I am also an active pianist and vocalist, specializing primarily in church music. My paper entitled ““Mesmeric Revelation”: Art as Hypnosis” has been published by the international, peer-reviewed journal Humanities. In addition, another paper of mine entitled “A Model of Triadic Post-Tonality for a Neoconservative Postmodern String Quartet by Sky Macklay” has been submitted to the peer-reviewed Music Theory journal Perspectives of New Music. At the end of February 2015, I served as Chair for the session entitled “Aesthetics and Philosophy” at The Fourth International PSA Conference in New York City. On June 21, 2014, my Quartet for Alto Saxophone and Strings, a commission from concert saxophonist Walter Hoehn, was performed as part of Concert V of the Eighth Annual Belvedere Chamber Music Festival held at Grace-St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Memphis, TN. Characteristically neo-romantic (in the original sense of the word), my music earned me the Nancy Van de Vate Award for Composition three times from the University of Mississippi Department of Music. A native of Pontotoc, MS, I hold degrees from the University of Mississippi (BM; MM), and the University of Memphis (DMA) where I was the 2011 recipient of the Rudi E. Scheidt School of Music's Smit Composition Award. I live in Memphis, TN.