Nina Dempsey

Dempsey, Nina

Nina (Gray) Dempsey (b Ferguson). Teacher, soprano, b Regina 22 Jun 1893, d San Francisco 30 Dec 1984; ATCM 1930, ARAM 1931, AMM 1936. She studied voice 1917-18 with Rhys Thomas and 1920-5 with Winona Lightcap in Winnipeg (where she was a soloist ca 1922 in Messiah with the Winnipeg Oratorio Society under J.J. Moncrieff), and pedagogy (summers 1920-1) with Herbert Witherspoon in Chicago. She also attended the RAM in the early 1930s. After serving 1920-2 as assistant supervisor of music in Winnipeg primary schools, she opened her own voice studio in 1923. In over 40 years of teaching, her pupils included Devina Bailey, Belva Boroditsky, Donna Bouma, Heather Ireland, Nona Mari, Helly Jedig Sapinski, Patricia Siwek, Mary Ann Taylor, Sara Boroditsky Udow, and Peter van Ginkel. Dempsey was president 1955-7 of theMRMTA. In 1965 she retired from teaching and moved to California.