CSUF’s Peter Marsh to Teach Elsewhere

Violinist Peter Marsh, who was passed over last month for a tenure-track position in the music department at Cal State Fullerton, has accepted a full professorship at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Wash.

Marsh, 58, has been a guest lecturer at Cal State Fullerton for the past three years, but he was not recommended by a five-member faculty search committee in March to fill the position when it was upgraded to a tenure-track job.

CSUF music department chairman Benton Minor said Thursday that violinist Earnest Salem of Wichita State University in Kansas has been offered the position.

Marsh, who has taught at several other universities, including Ithaca College in New York and at Western Washington, had brought an international reputation to his duties at Fullerton. That included 23 years as a founding member and first violinist of the Lenox and serving as first violinist of the Sequoia String Quartet, in the year before it disbanded in 1987. He also held the same position with the Berkshire and Philadelphia quartets and has concertized around the world.

Marsh’s appointment at Bellingham, to begin in September, is a one-year appointment but is a tenure-track position, according to Robert Sylvester, dean of the college of fine and performing arts.

Marsh will be teaching violin, viola and chamber music, and conducting the university chamber and full-size orchestras. He said the appointment would not rule out continued appearances in the Southland. He is appearing this week at the Corona del Mar Baroque Music Festival and is scheduled to appear on seven programs with the Southwest Chamber Music Society next season, according to a spokeswoman for the organization.