Introducing

Dr. Mark F. Walker (1918-1991)

Dr. Mark Fesler Walker was born June 5, 1918 in Alamogordo, New Mexico, the only child of John Lee and Vera Fesler Walker.  Although born in the southwest, Walker grew up on a farm in Indiana. He completed his undergraduate and master’s degrees at Jordan Conservatory at Butler University in Indianapolis. He married Flora Kathryn McCain in 1941 and enlisted in the U.S. Army. Walker would serve as bandleader in Camp Cooke (Vandenberg Air Force Base) in Lompoc, California and Fort Walla Walla, Washington. After WWII, the Walkers returned to Indiana where Mark would serve on the music faculty of Butler University from 1946 to 1961. In addition to his duties as a music professor, he earned a Ph.D. in Music Theory and Composition from Indiana University in 1955 with his dissertation “Thematic, Formal, and Tonal Structures of the Bartòk String Quartets”, the first academic study of that composer’s music in the United States.

            After fifteen years residency at Butler University, he took a position at Ohio State University on the Graduate Music Faculty and taught from 1961 to 1968. At this time, his musical activities included not only teaching, but also directing regional choral and orchestral ensembles, and serving his community through various musical organizations. His compositions and arrangements were published and performed by professional, college, and amateur ensembles, including the Columbus Symphony Orchestra. In addition, his arrangements in T-I-P-P-S for Band (1959), co-authored with Nilo W. Hovey became a standard textbook for decades throughout the country. ASCAP honored him with eight contributions to serious music from 1966 to 1973.

            In 1968, Walker accepted a position on the faculty of Youngstown State University, eventually becoming the Chair of the School of Music before his retirement. While there, he took on administrative duties in addition to continuing his work of teaching and advising. He served as president and member of the advisory board of the Ohio Theory-Composition Teachers organization and earned several honors with the Ohio Music Education Association (OMEA). He was frequently commissioned to provide arrangements for ensembles throughout the state. His string quartet won a national competition and was performed at Carnegie Hall in 1979. Mark F. Walker retired in 1985 and continued to be active as an arranger and director for the next few years. He died January 9, 1991 and is buried in Youngstown next to his wife of forty-nine years.

Besides an active professional life, Walker wrote much music for his family and friends. He and Kathryn had five children, Sara Kay Walker, Jane W. Hallett, Harriett J. Walker, Ellen Kim, and Susan Mae Walker Vitullo, each of whom learned to play string instruments. Beginning in the 1950s, he began to arrange music for his family to perform in church, on holidays, and other occasions. As an active performer and music teacher on violin, viola, and piano, Kathryn would also ask Mark to arrange pieces for her students for recitals and concerts, as well as various chamber ensembles she performed with throughout the area. Of these works, his chamber music compositions and arrangements became family favorites and have been treasured across many generations.