Giving Profiles

Faculty Chairs: David Allen Wehr
Jack W. Geltz Distinguished Piano Chair

The Jack W. Geltz Distinguished Piano Chair enables Duquesne’s Mary Pappert School of Music to present high quality concerts and educate high quality musicians.

The full-time, tenure-track faculty position was created by a gift from Jack W. Geltz, B’49, GA’84. The Geltz endowment makes it possible to retain an exceptional performer and teacher like pianist David Allen Wehr, who was appointed to the chair when it was created in 2006. Wehr, who previously was Duquesne’s first Hillman Distinguished Professor, brings 30 years of performing experience to the classroom.

The Geltz endowment provides more than a guarantee that Wehr can continue performing; it makes it possible for him to be both a teacher and a performer, the perfect position for guiding the next generation of pianists. “Someone has to pass on their knowledge,” Wehr says. “One of the biggest contributions I can make here is to draw upon my years of experience, my years of traveling and performing, and bring it to bear in very specific ways to the students I work with, one-on-one.”