Margot P. Clements

October 25, 1924 - December 10, 2022

If ever there was a programmed child, it was Margot. Her parents scrimped to provide her private lessons of all kinds. At eight years old, Margot began piano lessons, and was able to give a full length piano recital by the age of eleven. She had dance and voice lessons in Marie Mohr’s light opera company. Winning a competition in voice and piano, she was offered scholarships to Oberlin Conservatory and Syracuse University. She chose Syracuse to be nearer home, and there earned a Bachelor of Music Education. With her experience as a piano soloist with the Buffalo Museum Symphony, many radio appearances and other performances, Margot was wild to try her luck at a musical career in New York City.

In New York, Margot appeared on the Arthur Godfrey Talent Scout Show, and won. This led to performances as a guest on his CBS radio show. Following that, she was engaged to tour as a singer, solo pianist and accompanist with Richard Maxwell’s group “Veteran’s Hospital Programs”, giving performances along the East Coast and the midwest for the next two years.

After touring, Margot returned to New York and studied with Joseph Florestano while working as a model at Sears, Roebuck & Co. The following year, Margot married John A. Clements, a physician and pianist, and moved to Baltimore, Maryland. There, Margot studied opera at Peabody Conservatory, under the tutelage of Dr. Ernest M. Lert, former intendant of the Vienna Opera and of the Metropolitan. Her first role, Susanna, in “Marriage of Figaro” was performed at Peabody, a great success. She also sang many roles in the Hilltop Opera Co. under the direction of Hugo Weisgall.

Margot and John moved to Salisbury, England for a year when John was sent abroad as an exchange scientist. While there, they were cordially accepted into musical circles, and Margot made many solo appearances. She sang Fiordiligia in “Cosi fan Tutti” with the Salisbury Orchestral Society and gave several concerts with the Salisbury String Orchestra. Upon return to Baltimore, starting a family lessened her musical activities somewhat. She sang with the Baltimore Symphony, the Baltimore Opera and the Hilltop Opera Co., giving recitals, radio performances, acting and singing in a weekly television show.

Having moved to San Francisco, Margot was selected as regional winner of the Opera Debut Auditions and invited to participate in the Merola Program. She sang Pousette in “Manon Lescaut” with the San Francisco Spring Opera, appeared with the Oakland Symphony, the San Leandro Symphony, and the Vallejo Symphony. She sang with the Carmel Bach Festival for twenty-five years. Alberto Bolet was her conductor for appearances with the San Bernardino Symphony and the Downey Symphony. Through him, she met his brother, the concert pianist Jorge Bolet.

The Chilean North American Cultural Institute presented Margot in a recital of the Music of Ernst Bacon. Margot was privileged to work extensively with Bacon, and to form a long, beautiful friendship with him and his sister Madi Bacon, founder of the San Francisco Boy’s Chorus. In 1984, Margot was part of a distinguished group performing an evening of Bacon’s works at the Library of Congress which was recorded and later broadcast nationwide. Margot sang his setting (dedicated by Ernst to Margot) of the Emily Dickenson poem “It’s all I Have to Bring” in the documentary “Ernst Bacon, A Life in Music” by Arthur Bacon and PBS. From her wonderful life in music, Margot held three treasures most dear: the song dedicated to her by Ernst Bacon, a folio inscribed by Ansel and Virginia Adams, and a recording of the “Chopin-Godowsky Etudes and Waltzes”, dedicated to her by Jorge Bolet. Epilogue

In her later years, Margot performed regularly for the Women Musicians Club of San Francisco and the Berkeley Piano Club. When Margot turned eighty, she decided not to sing in public again. At the time she made the announcement to her audience, one of the ladies rose to her feet, clasped her hands together, and said “Please, God, when I’m eighty let me look like Margot!”

On Saturday, December 10, Margot passed away peacefully. She is survived by her husband and two daughters. She will be honored at a later time.