Music is the life and voice of our society. It uplift our spirits, eases our sorrows, and enriches everything it touches. Those who develop their own musical spark and share generously within our communities deserve to be celebrated. Ethel Price Heckman Bland was one such spark, and instilled a love of music in her family and in her community. The Music Award named for her is designed to encourage students in rural southeast Virginia to continue their music journey and to share their talents and skills with the land they call home.
“Music is the language of the spirit. It opens the secret of life, bringing peace, abolishing strife.”
― Kahlil Gibran
Ethel was born in November 1902 to Cephus Edgar Heckman, a Roanoke city policeman, and his young wife Henrietta. Henrietta died when Ethel was only two months old, and she was taken in by her maternal grandparents. Ethel grew up with the Price family in the village of Callaway in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. She was educated at Ferrum Training School and graduated from Blackstone College for Girls.
“Music education opens doors that help children pass from school into the world around them—a world of work, culture, intellectual activity, and human involvement. The future of our nation depends on providing our children with a complete education that includes music.”
—President Gerald Ford
As a young teacher for Roanoke city and county schools, Ethel grew to value education deeply. She was an accomplished pianist, and after marrying Preston Bland, a Reverend with the Methodist Church, she shared her musical talents with the many churches her husband served. Preston Bland served as Pastor for eight charges, mostly in rural counties, with multiple churches. Throughout these travels, Ethel passed a love of music and of education down to her children, and enriched each community she had the honor to serve as Pastor's Wife. In 1967, the couple retired to their new home in Surry County, just outside Wakefield, VA.
“Let this be my epitaph: The only proof he needed for the existence of God was Music.”
― Kurt Vonnegut
In December of 1978, Ethel died as a result of a fall after surgery to remove a tumor from her pituitary gland. When she died, Preston took comfort in his faith, and reflected upon the life they had shared and the way she had used music to connect to the people she loved. Music, he knew, was Ethel’s legacy to her children and to the wider rural community they had served for so many years. He was determined to carry her legacy forward to future generations of music students, and envisioned a small award to support music students graduating from the nearby Tidewater Academy in Wakefield, VA, where his daughter Nan taught music.
Preston's plan was put into effect upon his death in 1989, when the community was encouraged to donate to a fund administered by a group of music teachers from his church. The Ethel Price Heckman Bland Music Award was formally established that Spring and the first winner was chosen.
Ethel Heckman circa 1926, when she turned 24 years old.
Ethel and her family, about 1950. She'd married Preston Bland in June of 1926.
Ethel and Preston were married for 52 years. She died in 1978, at the age of 76.
Ethel Heckman circa 1926, when she turned 24 years old.
In the years that followed, Nan worked with local music professionals to keep the Award going, and the reach of the Award has now expanded to all students living in rural southeast Virginia, including Suffolk and Sussex, Surry, Isle of Wight, and Southampton counties. The current board includes family members and local music professionals whose goal it is to continue the family legacy and celebrate music students who excel in their understanding of music and eagerly shared their talents and skills with their community.