By Joan Grauman Morse
AAA Vice President and Historian
The AAA is pleased and very much looking forward to having Mary Ann Covone join us this year as our guest conductor! Her enthusiasm, musicianship, dedication, creativity and affability caught our attention, and we feel blessed that our attendees will have a chance to work with Mary Ann.
Mary Ann Covone grew up in Chicago in, as she describes, “a very close knit Italian family”. At the age of 10, she asked if her parents if she could study the piano. They could not afford to purchase a piano for her. Then along came her Uncle Mike with a lovely old blue accordion (blue was her favorite color) to try out instead. That moment was a total life changer!
She studied accordion at the Monti Music Center in Chicago and was a very dedicated student. She remembers fondly that her brother would often sit and listen to her practice. When Mary Ann was 15 years old, ATG held a festival in Chicago and she was taken to hear Joan Sommers and her UMKC Orchestra perform. They played “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice”. It was at that moment that Mary Ann became determined to study at the University of Missouri Kansas City Conservatory of Music (UMKC) with Professor Joan Cochran Sommers.
Focused on her future, Mary Ann worked hard after school and made enough money to purchase a Titano accordion. She began focusing on the classical repertoire, and sent Joan Sommers a tape of herself playing Eugene Ettore’s “Manhattan Concerto”. She was accepted in the program! She played in the UMKC Accordion Ensemble as well as the Orchestra, practiced for hours daily, made lifelong friends, and four years later was awarded a degree in Accordion Performance.
Mary Ann moved back home to Chicago, and soon opened her own music school with her cousin Frank (a drummer). The “Westchester School of Music” had over 100 students and several teachers. During that time, she was performing and teaching piano and accordion. She was, and still is, very active in Sigma Alpha Iota (SAI), an international music sorority for women in the field of music.
After teaching and performing for eight years, Mary Ann decided to go back to school and get a degree in law. She attributes her success in law to her study of music! “Through music, I learned how to analyze very well.” The accordion sat in its case for many years as her career and raising her daughter Anne Marie took priority. In Mary Ann’s words, “I spent much of my legal career trying to find my way back to music”. Her professor and dear friend, Joan Sommers recalls, “regardless of how she was earning a living, along with having a child who had lots of friends who loved ‘hanging out’ at her house, Mary Ann could not suppress the idea to return to the accordion as a major interest.” And so, after a thirty-plus year career as an attorney, she picked up her accordion again. This was great news for the accordion world!
Mary Ann joined ATG, at first to help with writing contracts, and soon found herself being encouraged to become the President. She felt she could “make a difference”, and she certainly did just that! Along with all of the work required as President - especially during the early days of COVID - she also founded the Chicagoland Accordion Academy in Western Springs, Illinois. She has students of all ages and she focuses on teaching them “good accordion technique applicable to any style of music they choose to play”. During her four years as President, the ATG flourished, as did her accordion academy.
Somehow, Mary Ann has also managed to travel to Kansas City, MO to play in the UMKC Community Accordion Ensemble under the direction of Joan C. Sommers, who feels that “no one could possibly have a schedule such as Mary Ann has settled on, particularly during the last few years. She is smart, even brilliant, and has made so many flights to and from Kansas City to study and perform even more on the accordion. I suspect she could also become a pilot if it struck her as a good idea!” :)
Mary Ann feels that she has helped many people through her law practice, but she feels that she has helped more people through music. As someone who has worked quite a bit with Mary Ann in the past few years, I have seen how special helping people and bringing joy to their lives is to her. Joan Sommers added, “she just goes about finding a way to make everything happen, no matter how much effort is needed”. I, too, have seen this to be true!
Dr. Helmi Harrington, founder and curator of A World of Accordions Museum has worked regularly now with Mary Ann in promoting the museum. Mary Ann was very instrumental in the creation of a wonderful documentary on the museum which aired on May 4, 2024 titled “A World of Accordions Museum…A Harrington Legacy”. In Helmi’s works, “I like Mary Ann Covone very much. We think a lot alike. She is careful with her words, mentally organized and very kind in spirit.”
I will end with these words from Joan Sommers:
“I am so happy to see Mary Ann Covone become an excellent conductor for her orchestra and others. And yes indeed, I am really proud of her!!”
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