Dick Curl is a familiar name among followers of the local philharmonic orchestra. He is a former president of the orchestra’s board, and along with his wife they are long time and faithful sponsors of the organization.
Born Richard M. Curl in London, Ohio in 1936, his parents moved to West Palm Beach, Florida two years later, where he grew up. He developed a love for music, and had a desire to possibly get an education in music. Two things happened in high school that impacted the rest of his life. He married his high-school sweetheart Martha, and he learned to play saxophone.
“I enjoyed playing sax in school so much, that I thought it would be great if I could get paid for having this much fun, period,” he said.
While in high school, the same class as actor Burt Reynolds, he also studied radio and television repair, and found out he had a knack for that, so he decided to become an electrical engineer. The dean said I had to stay an extra year in high school for preparation for college, so he did, and he didn’t mind a bit because he could play first chair saxophone for another year,” he said.
He realized he had “music in his blood” and always kept the saxophone and played it when he could. In the early 1970s he came to Murfreesboro to work for General Electric’s plant as an engineer. When he and others defeated the unionization of the plant, top level manager and later CEO Jack Welch came to town in 1974 to see the local management, among them Dick, to find out why for the first time ever a unionization had failed.
Dick had some good years at GE. But when downsizing came to town he volunteered to leave, bought a defunct electro plating business and ventured out on his own. He did this until he was 70 years old, at which point his daughter took over the business. That was in 2004.
“I retired,” he said.
But for a man with an old-school work ethic, never afraid to find new things to do, it didn’t take long before he became part of the local symphony.
“I had been to several concerts and liked it. I got to know Lawrence Harvin (TPO’s founder) and local musicians.
“The symphony was at a point where they had no president. The board members knew me as a business manager and asked me to join. Not as a member of the board, but as president – 30 minutes into the meeting.
“I had no experience as a president,” he said, laughing.
But for Dick this was a challenge he couldn’t pass up. He counted the first half hour at the board meeting as his “experience” for the job. But like so many other times in life, he saw challenges as exactly that, and took on the job head on, just like he had done back in the 1980s, when he started an apartment rental business in the Boro. He bought a few units, then some more, and then some land to build on.
“When I went to the town to get a permit to build an apartment complex, they said I couldn’t do so, because I wasn’t a licensed contractor. So, I went ahead and got the license, started building, and visited other builders’ sites to learn.
“My wife, who had been a church secretary, ended up being the manager of the operation. And the business grew,” he said.
“I had 30 minutes experience before becoming president”
~Dick Curl
Dick was there when the symphony went from being Tennessee Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra to Murfreesboro Symphony Orchestra. He said the decision for the name change at the time was that people kept confusing the orchestra with Nashville. By anchoring the organization geographically to Murfreesboro, he argued, it would benefit them and attract music lovers locally.
“I also recall Wilson Sharpe, who has run the education outreach for many years, came to me and said there was a way we could get grants if we reached out to schools. But he needed some seed money.
“I asked him how much we needed, and he said $1,000 in seed money would result in a grant of the same size. So, I wrote the check from my own account, because I believed in getting into schools,” he said.
Dick Curl had a good nose for business and for music and the symphony. TPO’s education outreach with Sharpe continues, and untold number of students in middle and high schools in our area have benefited from this program over the years. He and his wife have contributed greatly to the orchestra since they became involved and continue to do so. They believe the symphony plays an important role in the community.
“I never made it to the symphony as an instrument player,” he said.
But he played a big role in the orchestra’s past. He keeps his old saxophone at home in Murfreesboro, and another one in their winter home in Florida. He doesn’t play anymore, but the love for music and the TPO is as strong as ever, and while not president of the organization anymore, he serves as an Executive Advisor to the Board, along with fellow music lover Dr. Lawrence Harvin.