Tennessee Arts Academy Award Recipients

The Tennessee Arts Academy honors individuals and organizations each year in a variety of categories during the Bravo Awards Banquet and Performance and during the TAA Finale luncheon. Current and previous award winners are listed below, as well as descriptions of each award category.

Linda Wilson Miller

Joe W. Giles Lifetime Achievement Award
Finale Luncheon
Curb Event Center
July 13 • 11:30 AM

During her forty-nine-year career in speech and theatre, Linda Wilson Miller has helped thousands of students develop the confidence and ability to communicate well. Her teaching years took place at Henry County High School, in Paris, Tennessee. Miller was hired when the school opened in 1969, after being recommended by her predecessor and legendary high school speech teacher Ruby Krider. “Miss Ruby” was my mentor and my inspiration,” says Miller. “Her energy and passion for speech and theater education are unequalled, as is the number of students she impacted over her years of teaching.” Miller quickly established herself in her own right as one of the most outstanding speech and theatre teachers in the country. She has coached thirty-two students to nineteen national speech tournaments, and in 1974, led her former student, Cherry Jones, the Tony and Emmy award winning actress, to a second place national finish in the Original Oratory competition of the National Forensic League.

Miller retired from the classroom in 2014, but she continues to coach Henry County High’s forensic team and one-act play competition cast. Miller is a longtime member of Delta Kappa Gamma, an honorary society for key women teachers. She also serves her community on the board of directors of the Paris-Henry County Arts Council. In 1996, she was named the state educator of the year by the Tennessee High School Speech and Drama League; in 2001, she was inducted into their Hall of Fame. Miller has attended the Tennessee Arts Academy for at least fifteen summers. She credits the Academy for giving her wonderful ideas she was able to take back and use in the classroom. “I am so grateful to have literally spent my life in school,” she says. “It’s such an exciting and challenging place to be, and if I had the chance, I would do it all over again.” Miller is married to Bob Miller and has one son, Chad, a daughter-in-law, Sabrena, and four grandchildren.

Tennessee Senate Majority Leader Mark Norris

Lamar Alexander Founder’s Award of Distinction
Bravo Awards Banquet and Performance
Curb Event Center
July 11 • 6:30 PM

Mark Norris is a consistent and tireless advocate for arts and education. He is completing his eighteenth year in the Tennessee Senate and is the longest serving senate majority leader in Tennessee history. He has been the primary sponsor of the state’s budget for eight consecutive years, during which state funding for kindergarten to twelfth grade education has increased by $1 billion. He was the primary sponsor of Tennessee Promise, which provides tuition-free education to graduating high school seniors. He has also been instrumental in providing annual funding for the Tennessee Arts Academy and in preserving and supporting Tennessee’s specialty license plate program, which provides millions of dollars to the arts, including arts education. As a member of the General Assembly’s arts caucus, he created the state’s Gift-A-Tag Program to boost sales of specialty plates.

Norris is a lifetime member of the Tennessee Parent Teacher Association and has twice been named its Legislator of the Year. He has pioneered funding for programs addressing adverse childhood experiences, including the ACE Awareness Foundation and the University of Tennessee’s Center for Health in Justice Involved Youth. He has championed the cause of juvenile justice reform for many years. He sponsored the Juvenile Justice Reform Act of 2018 and also enacted changes to prevent the incarceration of juveniles in solitary confinement.

Norris is a graduate of the University of Denver College of Law and has practiced law in Tennessee since 1980. He is special counsel with the law firm of Adams and Reese LLP. This year, he was nominated by President Trump to serve as a federal judge in the United States District Court for the twenty-two county Western District of Tennessee. When he’s not tending to the peoples’ business, he tends to his cattle at home on his family farm in Shelby County. He and his wife, Chris, live there with four generations of family, including their two grandchildren—Field and Louise, ages 6 and almost 4.

Tony Walton

Distinguished Service Award
Bravo Awards Banquet and Performance
Curb Event Center
July 11 • 6:30 PM

Tony Walton is an award-winning director, production designer, and costume designer for Broadway, Off-Broadway, film, television, ballet, and opera. During his career, he has been honored with numerous accolades and awards for his work. He has received sixteen Tony Award nominations for his Broadway sets or costumes, including those created for Pippin, House of Blue Leaves, and Guys and Dolls, which all won Tony Awards. Among his twenty films, Mary Poppins, The Boy Friend, The Wiz, and Murder on the Orient Express earned him five Academy Award nominations. He won an Oscar for his work on Bob Fosse’s All That Jazz and an Emmy for Death of a Salesman. Two of his more recent projects include the Broadway set designs for Annie Get Your Gun and A Tale of Two Cities.

Walton was the production designer for Madison Square Garden’s A Christmas Carol for ten years as well as for Julie Andrews’ 2003 revival of The Boy Friend. His graphic work includes a great many illustrations for books and magazines; caricatures for the publications Playbill, Theatre Arts, and Vogue; and posters for many Broadway, Off-Broadway, and West End shows. During the last twenty-two years, Walton has directed and designed theatre productions of Wilde, Shaw, Coward, and others for New York’s Irish Rep, San Diego’s Old Globe, Sarasota’s Asolo Rep, East Hampton’s John Drew Theatre, and the Bay Street Theatre, Sag Harbor.

As a producer, Walton has co-presented six plays or musicals in London—three of which were in association with the legendary Hal Prince. His designs for opera have been seen at London’s Theatre Royal Covent Garden, the Sadlers Wells Opera Company, and throughout Europe and America. His many ballet designs include the Dance Theatre of Harlem’s St. Louis Women, which was performed at the Lincoln Center; the American Ballet Theatre’s Peter and the Wolf and Sleeping Beauty, which were both performed at the Met; and many ballets for the San Francisco Ballet Company and other dance companies throughout the United States.

Born in Walton-on-Thames, England, he has lived in New York City for more than fifty years with his wife, author Gen LeRoy Walton. The pair has two daughters and five grandchildren. In 1991, Tony Walton was elected to the Theatre Hall of Fame.

Arts Leadership Award of Excellence

is presented to an individual or group who has achieved a unique milestone in the arts that deserves recognition and honor.

Distinguished Service Award

is presented to an American whose work stands as a monument to the importance of the arts in the lives of all people.

Joe W. Giles Lifetime Achievement Award

is conferred upon a Tennessee teacher, whose life's work is widely acknowledged to have positively influenced the role of the arts in education, thereby benefiting the students of Tennessee's schools.

Lamar Alexander Founder's Award of Distinction

is presented to an individual whose meritorious accomplishments in the fields of education and the arts have profoundly impacted American culture and life.

Lorin Hollander Award

is given to a Tennessean whose influence has benefited arts education in general and/or the Tennessee Arts Academy in particular. This award is named in honor of internationally renowned concert pianist Lorin Hollander, a special friend of the Academy.

Partner in the Arts Award

honors an individual or business whose generosity and support have contributed in sustained and significant ways to the success of the Tennessee Arts Academy's mission.

Spirit of Tennessee Award

recognizes an individual or group whose work exemplifies the highest standards of artistic endeavor and brings positive recognition to the place of the arts in the lives of Tennesseans.

Previous Recipients:

Joe W. Giles Lifetime Achievement Award		Lorin Hollander Award		Distinguished Service Award
1995   Joseph Edward Hodges, Crossville 1996   Freda Kenner, Bells 1996   Sue Blass, Jackson 1997   Elizabeth Rike, Knoxville 1997   Celia Bachelder, Kingsport 1998   James Charles Mills, Johnson City 1998   Gene Crain, Memphis 1999   Patricia Brown, Knoxville 2000   Robert Pletcher, Nashville 2000   Kathy Hawk, Kingsport 2001   Tommie Pardue, Memphis 2001   Tully Daniel, Memphis (awarded posthumously) 2004   Marilyn duBrisk, Greeneville 2004   Bobby Jean Frost, Nashville 2005   Nancy Boone-Allsbrook, Murfreesboro 2005   Sally Crain Jager, Cookeville 2006   Michael Combs, Knoxville 2006   Jean R. Thomas, Chattanooga 2006   Mitchell Van Metre, Knoxville 2007   David Logan, Johnson City 2010 2011 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018   James R. Holcomb, Memphis Flowerree W. (Galetovic) McDonough, Knoxville Joe W. Giles, Nashville Richard Mitchell, Knoxville Carol Crittenden, Nashville Fred Patterson, Knoxville Gregg Coats, Memphis Ted Rose, Lebanon Margaret Campbelle-Holman, Nashville Linda Wilson Miller, Paris		1994   Cavit Cheshier, education executive 1995   Steven Cohen, state senator 1996   Nellie McNeil, teacher and advocate 1997   Tom L. Naylor, music educator and administrator 1998   T. Earl Hinton, music educator 1999   Jane Walters, educator and arts advocate 2000   Martha McCrory, music educator 2001   Solie Fott, music educator 2008   Jeanette Crosswhite, arts education administrator  2013 2014    Pat and Thane Smith, arts patrons and philanthropists Cindy Freeman and Michael Meise, music educators and arts advocates		1994   Charles Strouse, Broadway composer 1995   Charles Fowler, arts educator, writer and advocate 1996   Jerome Lawrence, playwright 1997   Lorin Hollander, concert pianist and philosopher 2000   Scott Ellis, Broadway theatre director 2000   Mary Costa, opera singer 2001   Sheldon Harnick, Broadway lyricist 2001   Tina Packer, Shakespeare actor and director 2003   Bob McGrath, singer and host of Sesame Street 2005   John Simon, author and arts critic 2005   Dean Pitchford, songwriter, lyricist, screenwriter, and director 2006   Andre Thomas, choral conductor 2007   Joe DiPietro, Broadway playwright and lyricist 2008 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2016 2016 2017 2018   Henry Krieger, Broadway composer Marvin Hamlisch, composer and pianist Richard Sherman, composer and lyricist Marc Cherry, Hollywood writer and producer Rupert Holmes, playwright, composer, and lyricist Richard Maltby, Jr., director, lyricist, producer, writer Audrey Flack, painter and sculptor Andrew Lippa, composer, lyricist, performer, and writer Doc Severinsen, musician and bandleader Christopher Durang, Broadway playwright Tony Walton, Broadway set and costume designer
Spirit of Tennessee Award		Partner in the Arts Award		Arts Leadership Award of Excellence
2000   Wilma Dykeman, writer 2001   Jim Crabtree, theatre director and writer 2002   Alice Swanson, arts education administrator and advocate 2003   George Mabry, choral conductor 2006   Dolph Smith, visual artist 2009   George S. Clinton, Hollywood film composer 2009   Jackie Nichols, theatre administrator 2009   Michael Stern, symphony conductor 2010 2015   Cherry Jones, Broadway actress Charles Brindley, visual artist		2008   Steve Spiegel, president of Theatrical Rights Worldwide		2013 2015 2016   E. Frank Bluestein, Germantown Music Makes Us, Nashville Belmont University, Nashville Lamar Alexander Founder's Award of Distinction 2013 2014 2017   Senator Lamar Alexander, United States Senator Douglas Henry, Tennessee State Senator Bill Haslam, Tennessee Governor