Samuel Adler is one of the two or three most impressive men I have ever met, and one of the two or three most decisive in the development of my own career.

From the days of his dramatic escape from Nazi Germany to his adolescence in Worcester, Massachusetts and his student days at Boston University and Harvard; from his founding of the Seventh U.S. Army Symphony Orchestra to his days as a faculty member at North Texas, Eastman, and Juilliard, Sam has led a life filled with adventure and accomplishment. All in the service of music. Ever a prolific composer of fine music, Sam has also been a dedicated teacher whose students all have musical voices of their own: a resourceful administrator who at Eastman helped build an outstanding composition department and attracted top-notch faculties; a pedagogy-inspired author of influential books on sight-singing, choral conducting, and orchestration; winner of many awards and honorary degrees, Sam Adler has led a long life of lasting accomplishment. Typical was a contribution of his to a concert I was performing in the 1980s with Eastman colleagues: violist Martha Strongin Katz, oboist Richard Killmer, and bassoonist David Van Hoesen at Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall. When I mentioned by chance on Wednesday that we had had trouble finding a three- minute encore for New York City the following Monday, Sam told me not to worry. The encore, which turned out to be the hit of the evening, was ready on Saturday afternoon! When, in his seventies, Sam was invited to join the faculty of the Juilliard School at a time when his wife Emily was the head of the orchestral program at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, he tirelessly commuted weekly on Delta from Toledo to New York City and back.

In the fall of 1972, when I was a candidate for the directorship of the Eastman School of Music, Sam, whom I had never met before, was the chair of the faculty search committee appointed by University of Rochester Chancellor W. Allen Wallis. After my selection as the new director, Sam became a trusted councilor, wisely advising me on all sorts of delicate political matters concerning the well-being of a school we both loved, which in the meantime has gone on from strength to strength as one of the world's leading institutions of musical instruction.