Elinor Duff

Elinor Duff, age 94, passed away peacefully in Richmond, Texas on March 11th, 2024 with family at her side. Elinor leaves a rich legacy of family, friends, music and education.

Elinor was born January 8th, 1930 in the small village of Castleton-on-Hudson in New York state to Stephen Edward Warner, a career US Postal worker, and Kathleen Gladys Prilipper. The family was heavily involved in church and civic activities as she grew up. Elinor’s love of music started early and she became the church organist at age 12 when the prior organist left to fight in World War 2.

After high school, Elinor attended the prestigious New England Conservatory where she earned her Bachelors and Masters of Music degrees. She went on to earn a Master of Arts degree in 1957 from Radcliff College where she attended Harvard classes,

January 8, 1930 - March 11, 2024

on the Harvard campus, with Harvard professors and male students, but her degree could not say “Harvard” because women were not allowed in their School of Arts and Sciences until 1963. She was still mad about it when she died.

After college, Elinor taught music at Wellesley College, then as a professor at UT Austin’s school of music, teaching music theory and analysis courses. In Austin, Elinor met Bob Duff and they married in 1962. The couple moved to Boston where they had 4 sons between 1964 and 1968. They moved to Oxford Mississippi in 1973 and finally settled in San Antonio in 1977 where Elinor raised the family and worked in music and education for four decades, primarily as a church organist and choir director, writing many arrangements of songs to suit her choirs. In the 1980’s, she tutored middle school students in English, and then, in her fifties, went to UTSA for a Masters degree in reading education and taught remedial reading at UTSA.

Elinor was in and around music her entire life. She was a long-time fan and supporter of the San Antonio Symphony and the Round

Top Festival Institute, and cherished her many years with San Antonio’s Tuesday Music Club where she made life-long friends. In the late 1980s she chaperoned a San Antonio Youth Symphony Orchestra tour across Eastern Europe, before the iron curtain fell, a thrilling trip she never forgot. She also never stopped championing women and education, strongly supporting her grandaughters pursuing the arts, and even during her last months encouraging hospice caregivers to take classes, saying she believed they could do it.

Elinor was preceded in death by her mother, father and brother Russell. She is survived by her husband Bob and their four sons and their families who will have a small private service. The family is grateful for the amazing care and attention she received at The Delaney Assisted Living Facility and Choice Home Hospice in Richmond, Texas, and earlier from Hummingbird Home Hospice in San Antonio. In lieu of flowers, please consider a donation in her honor to the Tuesday Music Club in San Antonio at www.satmc.org.