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Nancy is a vocal performer who shares her talent in many venues around the Twin Cities. You can find her involved in local theater, high school music programs and, of course, liturgical music. The story behind her involvement at SJA and the evolution of her music career is lesson-filled. A tribute to SJA Stewardship. Here it is.

Nancy was born in Boston and raised in Madison, Wisconsin. At a very early age, she demonstrated a keen enthusiasm for singing. Her grandmother suggested some music lessons. Her parents concurred and arranged for Nancy to take piano lessons. So she studied piano and voice for years. Her music career was launched.

While in high school, Nancy accompanied choir groups and gave vocal performances. Attending the University of Wisconsin in Madison, she was a music major, specializing in vocal performance. Wanting to stay close to her family that had relocated in Minnesota, she moved to Minneapolis in 1983. The day after arriving she met her husband, Mike. They celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary in April 2004.

For several years, Nancy and her husband attended SJA Sunday liturgies as typical folks sitting in the congregation. Nancy says, "I was focusing my energy and time on our growing children." Her daughters Chelsea (16) and Amy (13) were baptized at SJA. Her sons Brent (29) and Aaron (22), both now married, attended with the family. Nancy's SJA musical career was in waiting.

Julie Madden with Nancy at the 2003 Cabaret finale.

In 1994, Nancy sorrowfully lost her best friend to cancer. After some reflection, Nancy decided she needed to get involved and to find some fulfillment in her music. Nancy filled out a SJA Stewardship form, volunteering to become the children's choir accompanist. She said to herself, "I can do that. I can help. Why not give it a try?" Nancy was called and performed an informal piano tryout. She was quickly invited to accompany the choir. This first work with the choir led to some liturgical performances at the Basilica.

If you have been around SJA for a while, you might have found Nancy performing on the saxophone. At a recent Cabaret, Nancy played the baritone sax in one of those fun, zesty numbers. Nancy has found the baritone sax helps her vocal performances. She says, "The very large air volume needed for this sax is great training for my vocal work."

Early on while performing at liturgies at SJA, she met Kate Cuddy, then the regular Sunday pianist. Kate invited Nancy to help at Benilde-St. Margaret High School where Kate worked. In 1997, Nancy accepted a job at Benilde-St. Margaret in the drama and music department. She happily works there today.

Nancy now specializes teaching choral music and theater. Her present big project is preparing her students to perform Feast of Life for a tour to Edinburgh, Scotland. This year, being typical, has included 3 plays, Pajama Game, Sound of Music, and Once Upon a Mattress. As Nancy says, "Just filling out the SJA Stewardship form has led to all this. It's been just great."

Nancy with daughter Chelsea performing "All That Jazz" at the 2003 Cabaret.

Few people probably know that Nancy is a jazzercise instructor. During much of her adult life, Nancy joined jazzercise classes as a student and for enjoyment. To add a little challenge to her life, she eventually set a goal to teach jazzercise. Now Nancy is the teacher. In both the Apple Valley and Richfield community education programs, Nancy has 30 to 50 jazzercise students. Apart from this fitness activity, Nancy enjoys gardening, reading, downhill skiing, water sports and fishing.

One family tradition Nancy especially enjoys is her "family Christmas talent pageant". Rather than buy and give material gifts to each other, each family member performs in some way for everybody. Could be a writing, a song, or whatever. It's just a fun sharing of themselves as a gift to the family.

Nancy says, "SJA's missions of peace, justice, spiritual growth and acceptance are some of the reasons my family was drawn to the parish. As an adopted child myself, I am especially inspired by the families who are helping to support adoption in the community. And the Itzin-Anderson family is a wonderful example of this mission."

I have found Nancy's vocal performances to be classy and very entertaining. Thank you, Nancy, for all you do for SJA, for your students and for all your audiences.

Jerry Hartlaub commutes from New Brighton with his wife, Trish, to be refreshed and challenged at the "SJA spiritual oasis". He's a Sunday mass slide jockey and often waiter at SJA events. For fun he's jogged over 35,000 miles, written a bunch of poetry, just printed his first book and invented lots of stuff in a 30-year bioengineering career. These days he teaches cardiac physiology and pacemakers as a consultant (ya, he's mostly retired), serves on non-profit boards and does Junior Achievement gigs. But most rewarding is providing some regular child-care for 2 of the world's smartest, cutest grandchildren.