Profiles of Alberta Women
Roberta Stephen
Personal life
Roberta Mae Stephen (neé Dawes) was born on April 17, 1931 in southern Alberta. Growing up on a farm, Roberta and her siblings Andrew and Mary Lou had some exposure to music, along with other art forms such as dance and literature, worked into their days by their parents. However, their training in music was never a concerted effort, and it was not by the design of their parents that all three children would go on to pursue careers as professional musicians.1
In the case of Roberta, her pursuit of music brought her to the University of Calgary, where she completed a Bachelor of Music in Composition in 1973. After her undergraduate degree, she traveled to the United States, where she completed a Master of Arts in Voice at the University of North Texas. She received her Associate in Music from the Western Board of Music, and earned the ARCT from the Royal Conservatory of Music. Throughout her career she trained in multiple forms with multiple music educators, including vocal performance with Eileen Higgin, violin with Millicent Wills, and piano with Dorothy Hare and Madame LeSaunier.2
Her education launched Roberta into a career that would span many decades, and include performing, adjudicating, composing, and teaching. As a young woman, she performed in a trio with her siblings, singing soprano while Andy played violin and Mary Lou played piano. While the trio broke up in 1955 after Roberta married Charlie Stephen, they still would perform together as the Dawes Family on occasion, appearing at events including the Allied Arts Council Summer Festival in Calgary in 1960 and a performance at the Wesley United Church in Calgary in 1986.3 Roberta and her siblings all won many awards and accolades individually, and each went on to a successful career in the music industry. For her soprano performances, Roberta won top honours at the Kiwanis Music Festival in 1963, as well as a silver medal from the Royal Conservatory of Music for achieving highest marks in Alberta singing examinations.4
Roberta also continued to lend her talents to a variety of performances, including the musical “Showboat” in 1964 and the play “Coffee House” put on by the St. Andrew’s United Church in Calgary in 1966. She also served as the president of the Music, Art and Drama Club of St. Andrew’s United Church, and in 1965 was producer of the play “For He Had Great Possessions” in which her eight-year-old daughter Barbara performed.5 Additionally, Roberta was the founder and director of the Roberta Stephen Contempra Ensemble, a women’s vocal music ensemble that was active in the 1970s and 80s and specialized in 20th century tunes, particularly Canadian pieces, including a variety of folk songs.6
In addition to performance, Roberta established herself in the Calgary art community as a composer and a teacher. She wrote many pieces for voice, piano, and strings, including pieces that have been used by examination boards across Canada. Her pieces, particularly those for voice and piano, have been performed by many young musicians and included in syllabi for organizations including the Royal Conservatory of Music, Conservatory of Canada, and the Contemporary Showcase.7 Roberta’s work has also been performed in professional settings. For the 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary she wrote the piece “Panda Suite,” a composition celebrating the visit of pandas to the city. Her piece “The Eye of the Seasons” for voice, piano, and clarinet was performed in New York to critical acclaim. She has also supported the careers of young musicians through many years of teaching in voice, piano, composition, and music theory, both as a junior high music teacher and as private instructor.
Throughout her career, Roberta was involved with and helped to found many local organizations for the advancement of education, music, and composition in Calgary. In the 1970s she served as the vice-president of the Calgary branch of the Alberta Registered Music Teachers Association (ARMTA). She is also a past president of New Works Calgary, an organization founded in 1984 to create opportunities for performance of new compositions by Calgary composers and musicians. In 1990 she founded the Calgary edition of the Contemporary Showcase, an across-Canada festival that showcases performances of contemporary Canadian music by students, and includes events such as guest speakers, workshops, and scholarship presentations. Roberta was also involved in the founding of the Calgary branch of the National Association of Teachers of Singing (NATS), and served on the Regional Council of the Canadian Music Centre.
In 1980 Roberta launched Alberta Keys Music Publishing, which was for a time the only music publisher in Western Canada. The idea for the organization was born out of an observed lack of published collections of Alberta compositions which inspired Roberta and fellow composers to produce Alberta Keys, a book of compositions from Alberta. The success of Alberta Keys launched Alberta Keys Music Publishing, and the organization soon expanded its mandate to include composers from across the prairies, and later across Canada.
“Trophies are worth much less than scholarships nowadays … They were fun to get but not much use when so many have struggled to find the money for music and lessons. I’m not the least bit sorry to see these loads of meaningless little trophies disappear … The whole point of being in the festival is to learn in any case, not to receive little cups. It’s far more important that my students come away from the festival with some new ideas than with a picture and a trophy to shove into a corner with the rest of their memorabilia.”
Eric Dawson, “A Slice of Music History Retires with Kiwanis Trophies,” Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), May 9, 1981.
Roberta served as president of Alberta Keys for over twenty years, overseeing the company as it published over one hundred titles by its twenty-fifth anniversary in 2005. Publications included music for many instruments, but Alberta Keys was known in particular for pedagogical piano and vocal music publications. Its publications included work by many Canadian composers including JUNO Award winner Allan Gordon Bell. The company eventually closed its doors in 2014 when Roberta retired from the industry and the organization was sold to Pallister Music Publishing.
After her retirement in 2014, the Prairie Region of the Canadian Music Centre (CMCPR), with the support of NATS Calgary, the ARMTA, and the Rozsa Foundation, held a tribute concert titled “Roberta Stephen – A Life in Music” which featured performances of her compositions. The Roberta Stephen Composition Scholarship supporting Canadian Women Composers, a scholarship for professional development of women composers over the age of 36, was announced at the event. The scholarship reflects her own experiences as a composer in her 30s, a time when she recalls there having been “nothing for her.” Roberta died on June 19, 2021, survived by her husband Charlie, their four children, and several grandchildren.Roberta’s industry-spanning career as a musician, composer, publisher, and teacher touched on all aspects of music and music production in Alberta, and has left an enduring impact in the form of her compositions, her students, and the publications of Alberta Keys Music Publishing. Alberta Keys provided an opportunity to western Canadian composers that had not previously existed, and over its decades showcased the talent of the province.
Footnotes
1 Eric Dawson, “Performing is Pianist’s No. 1 Priority,” Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), Sept. 22, 1979.
2 “Roberta Stephen,” Association of Canadian Women Composers, accessed on May 17, 2022, https://acwc.ca/members/roberta-stephen/.
3 “Winning Family Still At It,” Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), Apr. 26, 1963.
4 Ibid.; “Three Calgary Vocalists Win Conservatory Medals,” Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), Sept. 1963.
5 “Eight-Year-Old Has Role,” Calgary Herald (Calgary, AB), Apr. 10, 1965.
6 “Western Music Examiners Named,” Edmonton Journal (Edmonton, AB), Jan. 29, 1979.
7 “Roberta Stephen,” Association of Canadian Women Composers.
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