Anne Amador
was drawn to the church by the choir, which embraced her – and her
clear soprano voice – immediately. The next thing to
immediately, she resurrected the children’s choir at FCC, having
directed a children’s choir in her previous church.
Her musical history
began with piano lessons in Wisconsin, continued with a sojourn in
Dallas, and eventually led to Rice University. Here she met
husband German, then at the Rice School of Engineering. Later,
she earned her second degree at Rice, this one a BMus in
music composition at the Shepherd School of Music.
When German’s
employer sent him to England to work, a professor suggested Anne
apply to Oxford, where she spent a year “thinking and writing all
the time.”
Post-graduate study
at Oxford, she explained, is very different from what she was
accustomed to. “Instead of taking specific courses, you have a
moral tutor and a subject tutor, and you write essays for them on
topics they assign to you. You have to come up with the approach
and take a stance on the topic you’re covering.”
Did you know this
about Anne?
She was runner-up
for Miss Teen Age Dallas, her sole experience with a beauty
pageant.
Following high
school, and prior to the music degree, she became an architect,
having earned an undergrad degree in architecture at Rice and a
Masters’ degree at the University of Houston!
Most of her
professional work was in interiors (because that’s what women were
assigned to). She worked in a number of interesting places.
There were, for example, the Scurlock and Smith towers, where she
integrated the architecture with the mechanical and electrical
work. There were a number of offices for lawyers, “who argue a
lot,” says Anne, and houses in River Oaks.
All of this
was Anne B.C. – before children, Chris, 15, and Isabel, 12.
Today, she
maintains her license, handling small projects and helping friends
on larger ones. With German in Nigeria for Chevron every other
month, she manages a large share of parenting and home duties,
teaches piano to a few students, and serves as a substitute
part-time volunteer orchestra leader for the third, fourth and
fifth grades at T.H. Rogers, a Vanguard school for the gifted and
talented.
