THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, May 5, 1995 TAG: 9505040162
SECTION: VIRGINIA BEACH BEACON PAGE: 03 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY JO-ANN CLEGG, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
IF YOU'RE A MEMBER of the Olds family, the one into which retired Norfolk educator Lucille Olds was born, there are two things you can pretty much take for granted.
The first is that you're going to do well in life.
``There were seven of us in our family and every one of us went to college,'' Olds said. That was not easy when you were growing up African-American during the Great Depression.
The second is that the whole family is going to be proud of you.
Especially your Aunt Lucille.
``I have the most wonderful nieces in the world,'' Olds said as she ticked off some of the accomplishments of the children of the original seven siblings. All have earned academic honors and advanced degrees. Two are especially well known locally: Francine Olds, a Virginia Beach obstetrician and gynecologist, and lawyer Eileen Olds who was recently named a judge in Chesapeake.
And then there's Nedra Olds Neal.
``She's a producer with Sony records,'' Lucille Olds said. ``She was just nominated for a Grammy for some of her work.''
Indeed she was. The work for which she was nominated in the Best Historical Album category was the 81-song collection called ``Louis Armstrong: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, 1923-1934.''
Neal, along with Bruce Talbot from the Smithsonian Institution, spent months on the project. Neal, who now lives in New York, found everything from searching music company archives to working with the old metal originals from which the 78 rpm were pressed to the final release of the set a fascinating experience.
The daughter of Lucille Olds' late brother, Ernest, and his widow Jewel, both of whom were music educators with the Virginia Beach schools, Neal attended Kempsville Meadows Elementary School and Kellam and Bayside high schools.
``Faye Whitlock, my music teacher at Bayside, was the teacher who made the most impact on my life,'' Neal said. ``She got me into the Virginia Beach Civic Chorus. I was the first high school student they admitted.''
After graduating from Bayside in 1971 she went on to get her undergraduate degree in music from Howard and her master's from the University of Michigan where she had received a full scholarship.
The master's degree was in performance piano and she completed it in a year and a half instead of the two years or more it normally takes.
Although she has performed on the piano many times, these days she limits her performances to the vocal area.
``Singing is just so much easier,'' she said, ``and much less nerve wracking for me. I was a wreck (before piano concerts).''
Despite giving up piano performances, Neal keeps incredibly busy. In addition to her work with Sony, she is also director of the Riverside Church Inspirational Choir, a member of the New York Choral Artists (a group of professional vocalists who have performed with the New York Philharmonic) and a founding member of the New York performance group called Just Friends.
One of her most recent projects was a concert called ``The Celebration of the Spirit'' which she did with Garrison Keillor of Lake Wobegon fame. The program is scheduled to be broadcast on the VISN cable network later this month.
She and her husband, Michael, live on Manhattan's Upper West Side with sons Sean, 14, and Tash, 9, but her heart is in Hampton Roads.
``I love the ocean and the seafood,'' she said. ``It's just not the same anywhere else.'' ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Nedra Olds Neal, a Bayside High graduate, was nominated for a Grammy
for her work in the Best Historical Album category for an 81-song
collection called ``Louis Armstrong: Portrait of the Artist as a
Young Man, 1923-1934.''
by CNB