Scholarship fund set up in honour of Cape Breton’s Fraser family

A family of music teachers in Sydney is honoured through a scholarship fund.

It has been a difficult few months for Margaret Fraser of Sydney, N.S., since her sister Katherine died of complications from kidney failure in June at age 64. Katherine was a well-known piano instructor who taught people in the Sydney area for decades.

“She was far too young and had so much more to give, and we’ll never see what else she could have done,” Fraser said.

The Frasers have been music teachers for generations.

The family tradition included Margaret and Katherine’s mother Rosemary, who passed away in 2018 and their father Peter who, at 86-years-old, is now retired.

Now Fraser is helping to create an annual scholarship fund in honour of her parents and sister called the Fraser Family Fund for Music Education.

The goal is to raise $100,000 for people who want to study music in university and teach in the Atlantic provinces.

“We feel very passionately that it would be good to be able to provide a good, solid amount of money to be able to help somebody toward their further goals,” Fraser said. “Ideally, if we were able to raise more money than that we would be able to provide somebody with full tuition.”

Kevin Orrell of Sydney took lessons from both Peter and Katherine Fraser. He said the family’s passion for teaching makes it easy for former students like himself to contribute to the cause.

“The family has had a very significant legacy in Sydney,” Orrell said. “They have been responsible for literally thousands of people that have learned music.”

“This family has dedicated their entire lives to music teaching,” said Kelly Rice of Montreal, a longtime friend of Katherine Fraser’s and a former student of Rosemary’s. Rice is helping spearhead the scholarship fund and sees the initiative as a timely tribute.

“She (Katherine) wasn’t somebody who sort of put herself forward,” Rice said. “She put her students forward. She always thought about them and she always thought about ways to encourage them. She thought about ways to help them come out of their shells to play.”

So far, about $15,000 has been committed to the scholarship fund.

Fraser said she thinks her sister would be astonished that people are giving money in her memory.

“I think she would also be tickled pink,” she said.

More information about the fund can be found at the Fraser Family Fund for Music Education – Community Foundation of Nova Scotia.

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