Second in a two-part series.The arrival of Joseph William Summerhays in Utah in 1866, as a lone English convert to the LDS Church, set off an explosion of offspring both numerous and artistically talented. From one man with four wives and 39 children has sprung a progeny that family historian Carol Jean Summerhays estimates might fill the Tabernacle on Temple Square.
Among the thousands who comprise the present generation, many have stepped forward to perform and promote the arts. Without exception, they are proud of their name and heritage, and feel a sense of obligation to the tradition that went before. Many of them have family anecdotes to relate.Terry Summerhays seems the personification of the laid-back, life-loving singer/businessman. As for the singing, he didn't have much encouragement at first from his father, Joe Summerhays, a prominent Salt Lake baritone. "He told me that I didn't have a voice," said Terry. "When I was 25, he heard me sing the theme from `Exodus,' and for the first time he suggested I might be a singer.
"Mario Lanza's teacher told my father that he had the greatest voice he had ever heard. And it always galled him that my wife Anna's father, baritone Humbert Keddington, could also sing high, but soft, too, which Joe couldn't."
Terry pointed out a Summerhays vocal characteristic that has troubled more than one - the ability to sing high, no matter what the timbre. "These are ambiguous voices that puzzle singers as to where they should focus their efforts - high or low," he said.
"My father studied with Paul Enrietto, a teacher from Chicago who taught Blanche Christensen and many others. I studied with him the last nine months he was here, and he said, `You missed being a tenor by a half step.' "
He has observed that the Summerhayses are good at spawning their own businesses and working for themselves. Restaurants loom large - Cowboy Grub, the nowdefunct Balsam Embers, Guadalahonky's.
His father, along with brothers Howard and Ben, continued in the pioneer wool pullery business, which endured from 1870 to 1973. "Many of us young Summerhayses worked there from time to time, until the process became obsolete," he said. "The French introduced moutoning, by which you could tan the hide and leave the wool on."
Terry founded and runs Metra, for consulting in reading, and prints his own materials. Working for himself gives him time for his (and many other family members') sports hobby - golfing.
As an entertaining bass-baritone, Terry has given pleasure to a generation of Salt Lakers. He's still singing and is artistic director of Intimate Opera, a "for fun" company in which many Salt Lake singers join to give a few concerts a year of arias and ensembles.
He worked for Utah Opera for a few years, in comprimario roles and school programs. "We Salt Lake singers used to be the envy of artists who came in for major roles," he said. "I was making $8,000 a year from the opera, just staying home, and they were scrounging here and there for a $20,000 income."
Major roles have come his way, such as Rigoletto, Figaro in "The Barber of Seville," Gianni Schicci (80 times in school shows) and Timur in "Turandot." Meanwhile, he's had the joys of eight children, ages 16-33, and 11 grandchildren.
Terry feels somewhat like his father, whom Enrietto advised to attempt the New York musical scene. "I'll have a career if life leads me to it, but I won't crawl," said Joe.
Terry's daughter, Christy Summerhays, represents the youngest generation. She remembers singing her first solo when she was 3 years old. Christy is a graduate of East High School, where she was active in dramatics and musicals, and of the Academy of Dramatic Arts in New York. She worked for a couple of years in New York before realizing she could probably learn more and be happier in Salt Lake City.
"While I was home resting, a friend who was casting a film called me and asked if I was interested," she said. Thus began a Utah career in commercials, TV movies and film, nationally and locally. She's done an episode of "Rescue 911" shot in town, and has appeared in Leucadia feature films, one with Wallace Shawn. If you keep a sharp eye out, you will see her in commercials on your home screen. And she enjoys her work as stage director for Intimate Opera.
This warm, outgoing young actress says it's terrific to be a Summerhays. "As I look back, I know I always felt the power of that connection," she said.
We caught up with Jane Summerhays, who has a career on Broadway and in regional theater, on the the eve of her departure for Israel, where she was bound on a goodwill mission on behalf of the Theater Arts Foundation, to promote interchange of arts and artists.
Jane Summerhays' father is attorney Lawrence Summerhays, one of the 10 children of William Henry Summerhays, and she recalls that he used to tap dance with her. She took dancing with Willam Christensen and studied singing with Margaret Summerhays, though she came to singing late. After taking a master's degree in theater at Catholic University, she made her first Broadway success in "Sugar Babies," first in a small part, then replacing the star, Ann Miller, in the national company.
Among important stage roles have been Sheila in "A Chorus Line," in the original American company in London, then on tour and on Broadway. She received a Drama Desk Award and Tony nomination as best supporting actress for her part in the English comedy "Me and My Girl."
Indeed she seems to have an affinity for things English. There is even an English actress, Jane Summerhayes, who is older, but with whom she is often confused in England. Coincidentally, Summerhayes' father is also a lawyer.
Jane has had parts in "The Real Inspector Hound," "Lend Me A Tenor," "Oh, Kay," and many off-Broadway and regional plays, as well as in television, both guesting and as a regular. She's suffered from the downturn on Broadway, with fewer shows being produced. Right now she has hopes for a pilot she's done, projected for next season, with Mary Tyler Moore and Madeline Kahn.
Jane acknowledged the enormous influence of Aunt Marge (Margaret) Summerhays. "It was not just voice, because I was more into dance," she said. "It was her philosophy of music and life. She always said, if it doesn't feel natural, it's not right."
Michael Ballam, a tenor of national renown who has returned to Logan to make his home, teaches at Utah State University and is founder and artistic director of Logan's very successful Utah Festival Opera, now performing its summer season at the Eccles Theatre in Logan. Ballam says it was his roots in Utah and in the Summerhays clan that drew him back, and his contribution to Utah arts has already been great.
"I've sung with so many opera companies all over the country, but none with more joy than with Utah Festival Opera," said Ballam. "It's my favorite baby right now."
He's a descendant of Hester Summerhays (sister of the original J.W.) and her first husband, Alfred Ballam. Hester drank deep at the well of Summerhays talent. "People used to say, give Hester a sheet and a clothesline and she'd put on a show!" said Ballam. "She died in 1945, at 90, after a bad fall."
Michael is the son of Grant Ballam, a Logan pharmacist, and grandson of Oral Summerhays, a prominent educator who was principal of Park School in Richmond for many years. "When he got in front of a class, it was a theatrical event," said Michael.
Oral insisted that his children each study some musical instrument, and Grant took the saxophone in high school but sold it as soon as he graduated. Nonetheless, he's been supportive of his son's musical leanings.
Michael's Uncle Oral Jr. was dean of education at Utah State University, with the longest tenure of anyone in that position (1967-1992). He's now president of the Logan LDS Temple.
Ballam met his musical wife at a piano lesson, and he proposed marriage with a song. "My mother said I sang before I talked," he laughed. The Ballams have six children, all musical. ("They can't help themselves," said Michael.) Each has his own instrument - harp, saxophone, violin, flute, trumpet and oboe - and everyone plays piano.
Utahns also enjoy the talents of tenor Roger Summerhays, a popular soloist around town. But his path has led elsewhere, specifically to a degree in chemical engineering from the University of Utah, an MBA and a career with Eimco. "I made a conscious decision not to sing," he said. "I don't think like a singer - I like solving problems."
Nonetheless, over the years the pull of singing has been strong, and he still sings with his cousin Terry's Intimate Opera. "But I've never freed up the top of my voice as much as I'd like," he said. "Phil Day, who used to be organist at First Presbyterian and a teacher here in town, told me, `If you really want to sing, you should go to Italy and find Pavarotti's teacher and study with him.' "
But for Roger, his wife and four children are more important. "I figure if there are 66 things you need to be a singer, you should have about 55 of them by nature," he said. "And I've never had a greater experience than in singing for the Salt Lake Temple workers in one of their early-morning assemblies."
"Summerhays" has been a sub-theme running through the life of Florin Nielsen, dramatist and longtime dramatic teacher at East High School (1961-85). He's a descendant through his great-grandmother, Mary Summerhays Saunders, sister to the original Joseph William Summerhays. Affectionately known to all as Aunt Polly, she lived to be 100.
"I know that she and her sister, Hester Ballam McQuarrie, sang duets together," he recalled. "They lived in Ogden for a while and then in Cache Valley. We would have sing-alongs when we got together."
When Nielsen was a teenager, he was a contributor from Cache Valley to a Summerhays newsletter. "I remember a reunion in Salt Lake, a luncheon at the Hotel Utah, very elegant," he said. "For the reunion, I would make a family chart every year, with yarn lines to show where you fit in. People were impressed that an out-of-towner knew so much about the Salt Lake Summerhays families."
Nielsen's son, Rex, is now a doctor, but at 15 he was concertmaster of the Mormon Youth Symphony and played violin there for some time.
Nielsen graduated in theater from the University of Utah, training under Lowell Lees. After teaching at East, he was for seven years fine arts supervisor with the Salt Lake City School District, working with the symphony, ballet, opera and similar entities that provide arts education in the schools.
Since retiring, he's also served on the board of Art Access (Very Special Arts), and is now president of Young Audiences.
For close to 60 years, the Summerhays Music Center has catered to the needs of schoolchildren needing musical instruments and many other community musical needs.
The store was founded by Hyrum Summerhays, who began his career as a music educator, even working for four years as music supervisor for schools in Washington, D.C. Hyrum was a band man, and he knew his territory, which ranged the state of Utah. Founding the store in 1936, he ran it like a one-man band, said the magazine Music Inc., a trade journal for music dealers, which featured the store as its cover story in September 1994. The first product was instrument rentals and sales, which still comprise a good bit of the business.
Not good at delegating authority, Hyrum attended to every feature of his business personally, building a solid, successful firm with an impeccable reputation by the time he died at 74 in 1977.
The sterling virtues of prudence, honesty and desire to serve still motivate the business, now run by Hyrum's son Briant Summerhays with a super-qualified staff.
At the head are Briant as president; his brother Scott, who is treasurer; sister Laurel, as vice president in charge of financing and collections; and brother-in-law Roger Firmage, general manager. Each of them has an MBA degree, and many of their 60 employees are similarly well-educated.
Briant is an excellent delegater, which opens the way for growth. Before his father died, Briant began running a separate store in Orem, which he still maintains independently, and the company has another Salt Lake location besides the one just off I-15 at 5400 South. Annual sales are about $7 million, and Briant thinks of the music center as a collection of small companies under one umbrella. The products are all kinds of instruments for sale or rent, including several lines of pianos, and print music.
"I come from a family committed to the business of music," said Briant. "We have all had offers in more remunerative fields, but we feel this long-term responsibility. Our father was a professional musician, for whom music education came first, business second. He was a missionary for music, and that ethic continues here.
"We approach this business as a service to the community, and as research goes on, we find that music is more valuable to society than we thought. For instance, there's been a recent study in which one group of children were given music three times a week, another group had none. At the end of the test, the children who had music scored significantly higher in all fields of learning than those who had none."
Briant is pleased that the business shows modest growth every year. "Despite very substantial, ethical competitors, our sales have continued to show annual growth every year since 1982," he said.