Artists of the Week: Ash­lin Townsend and Bekah Scott

MISHAWAKA, IN – This week’s Artists of the Week is vo­cal per­former Ash­lin Townsend, a Mu­sic Ed­u­ca­tion ma­jor with a fo­cus in vo­cal mu­sic, and pi­anist Bekah Scott, a Pi­ano Per­for­mance ma­jor; who both re­cently per­formed in their joint Ju­nior recital.  

Townsend has been per­form­ing since sec­ond grade, she re­calls this mem­ory, 

“In sec­ond grade [I was] in a group called Sto­ry­tellers. I dressed up as a snow­man and had to sing and act. I re­mem­ber this so clearly be­cause I for­got my lines, which is every per­former's worst night­mare,” said Townsend.  

Scott has been play­ing pi­ano since she was seven, for nearly four­teen years. 

Townsend re­calls her most mem­o­rable mo­ment at Bethel, “Last year's per­for­mance with the Con­cert Choir in Carnegie Hall [was the most mem­o­rable mo­ment]. Ar­riv­ing in New York City and see­ing Carnegie Hall was al­ready amaz­ing, but ac­tu­ally be­ing in­side, on­stage, per­form­ing? It was truly an honor,” said Townsend.  

Scott re­calls her most mem­o­rable mo­ment at Bethel, “Hon­estly, [my fa­vorite mem­ory is] just hang­ing with my room­mate Ash­lin and mess­ing around in prac­tice rooms. Some­times mak­ing good mu­sic and some­times mak­ing...mu­sic,” said Scott. 

Townsend spent most of her child­hood in Rocky Ford, CO, but moved to Ply­mouth, IN her ju­nior year of high school. She grad­u­ated from Ply­mouth High School in 2017. She chose Bethel be­cause of its “small and beau­ti­ful cam­pus.” When she grad­u­ates, she plans to be a mu­sic teacher. 

Scott grew up in Mishawaka, IN, but moved to Pen­sacola, FL for two years (‘14-’16). She grad­u­ated from Elkhart Chris­t­ian Acad­emy in 2017. When she grad­u­ates, she plans to be­come a pi­ano teacher, as well as work­ing at a school as an ac­com­pa­nist for the choir and teach pri­vate lessons to stu­dents.  

When asked why she chose Bethel, “I wanted to go to Bethel since I was in mid­dle school. I wanted to go to a Chris­t­ian school and some­place close to home. I fell in love with the mu­sic de­part­ment when I vis­ited in high school as well,” said Scott. 

When re­call­ing their re­cent recital, “Bekah and I for­got about our recital hear­ing date… the sec­ond day of classes this se­mes­ter (Fri­day)… How­ever, we man­aged to get through the hear­ing, leav­ing us both re­lieved for a short time at least. The next cou­ple of weeks lead­ing up to the recital, I felt fine. It was the night of the recital that I got very ner­vous. Wait­ing for my turn to go on stage and per­form was the most nerve-wrack­ing part. Over­all, I feel like the recital went re­ally well. Bekah was def­i­nitely amaz­ing, and no I'm not be­ing bi­ased just be­cause she's my best friend. She re­ally is amaz­ing at pi­ano,” said Townsend.   

“I was ex­tremely ner­vous, but I fought through the nerves. I shake a lot when I'm ner­vous and I had a few brief mo­ments of hes­i­ta­tion, but I re­cov­ered and kept play­ing, and that's what counts. Most of my pieces (all but one solo and a duet with my pro­fes­sor, Rob Rhein) were mem­o­rized. That added to the stress, just try­ing to re­mem­ber every­thing and keep my spot in the pieces. I ex­ceeded my ex­pec­ta­tions for my­self but I'm def­i­nitely still per­fec­tion­ist, so I know I still have lots of room for im­prove­ment. I'm so thank­ful to every­one who came and sup­ported us. Look­ing for­ward to work­ing on my se­nior recital for next year,” said Scott.  

Townsend is also a stu­dent worker in the Mu­sic De­part­ment, as well as a mu­sic the­ory tu­tor.