Lilian (MacKinnon) Piercey

(1909-2006)

Lilian Marguerite MacKinnon was born in 1909, in Waterville in the Annapolis Valley, the daughter of the Rev. Archibald MacKinnon and his wife Grace (Webster) who has been described as a “power house”. In 1927 the family moved to Halifax where Mr. MacKinnon became the minister of Bethany United Church, where he remained until 1939; the MacKinnon Memorial Chapel at the church is dedicated to his memory.

Lilian’s musical talent was apparent at an early age, and her mother became her first teacher. Lilian’s skills had developed sufficiently that soon after the family moved to Halifax, she was able to share with her mother the duties of organist and music director at Bethany. She was to remain as organist for the next 47 years!

When the MacKinnon’s arrived in Halifax, Lilian entered also the Halifax Conservatory of Music, where she studied voice, piano, and organ. Among her keyboard teachers was Mr. J. Herbert Logan, who had been one of the institution’s first two graduates in 1890. Lilian graduated in voice in 1931, although she had also majored in piano.

Throughout her long life, Lilian remained musically active. She taught piano, sang, and was generally active in the city’s musical life. She was a frequent recitalist for the CBC in its earlier days and received rave reviews for the Gilbert and Sullivan roles she played in G&S productions of the Kiwanis Club. During WWII, Lilian often sang and played for the troops.

Lilian Piercey was a strong supporter of the city’s Competitive Musical Festival which was organized in 1935 under the auspices of the Conservatory of Music. The first adjudicator for the multi-day festival was Sir Earnest MacMillan, Principal of the Toronto Conservatory of Music and Conductor of the Toronto Symphony. Lilian encouraged her students to participate in the Festival as did she herself. In 1941—the Festival’s last year before a wartime hiatus—Piercey joined Lorna Grayson in a performance of the Letter Duet from Mozart’s Marriage of Figaro; Grayson was to become the organizer of the Nova Scotia Festival of the Arts during its first year of operation. Lilian also participated in the Oratorio class for Sopranos, in which she was awarded the top mark of 90 for her performance in Handel’s aria “Angles Every Bright and Fair” from his oratorio Theodora.

One of the organizations with which Lilian Piercey was long involved was the Halifax Choral Union, later renamed the Halifax Choral Society. The Union was founded in 1922 by Ifan Williams, who had arrived in the city two years to become Head of the Violin Department at the Halifax Conservatory of Music. His responsibilities also included leading the chamber music and orchestral programmes. The Halifax Choral Union quickly became a rival of Harry Dean’s Halifax Philharmonic Society, and for many years the city had two large choirs that performed the standard choral repertory.

Throughout her long life Lilian maintained her early connection with the Conservatory, often serving as a soloist and accompanist at Convocation. Soon after her graduation in 1931, she joined what was then called the Halifax Conservatory Alumni Association and became a lifelong member. She played many roles in the Association, serving as a member of its Board of Directors for many years. For at least one term she was the Association’s President. At age 95 Lilian Piercey was among a group of long-time supporters of the Association and the Conservatory who were named Honorary Life Members.

Lilian MacKinnon married businessman Reginald Piercey in the early 1930s. Reginald was the eldest son of Mr. W.D. Piercey, the founder of the Piercey Supply Company, a member of the Provincial Legislature in the Liberal-Conservative government of Premier E.N. Rhodes (1925-1930), and the developer of Dutch Village area of Halifax. Lilian and Reginald Piercey had two daughters, Sheila (1933-2019) and Barbara (Ploeg) (1938-2013).

Mrs. Piercey was also a member of the Conservatory’s Board of Governors in the 1950s, serving as the Alumni Association’s representative. As a Board member, she was delighted when the decision was made in 1951 to invite bass-baritone Leonard Mayoh (1918-1978) to come from England to head the Voice Department and to take on responsibility for directing the Halifax Conservatory of Music Choral Union, which had been conducted since its founding in 1922 by Ifan Williams. Even before his arrival, Piercy informed the other members of the Board that she had made arrangements with Mr. Mayoh for him to give a recital that would be sponsored by the Alumni Association. Perhaps she had a reason for cultivating the association, because among his first vocal students in Halifax was to be Lilian Piercey’s daughter Sheila.

Lilian Piercey was also to play a significant role on the Board of Governors when the Halifax Conservatory of Music and the Halifax Ladies’ College decided to go their separate ways. Originally created in association with the Presbyterian Church in Canada at the same time in 1887, the sister institutions had shared their original home on Pleasant (later Barrington) Street when they sold it after more than fifty years in 1939. Although separated physically, the Conservatory and Ladies’ College retained an association—having a common Board of Governors and a single budget—until 1952, when they decided to go their separate ways. The separation after 65 years was formalized when the Nova Scotia Legislature passed an Act to incorporate the Halifax Conservatory of Music as an entirely independent institution, with its own Board of Governors. The Act stated that the “objects of the Conservatory shall be to promote the study and appreciation of music and related cultural pursuits in Halifax and in the Province of Nova Scotia.”

Lilian Piercey was among eight individuals named in the Act of Incorporation as constituting the “body corporate” of the Conservatory. Several of the others were prominent Haligonians who had already been active in the affairs of the Conservatory for many years and were to remain so for years to come. Indeed, the success of the Conservatory in the first century of its existence was closely related to its ability to attract to its Board well-connected members of the local community. Others named in the Act as members of the Body Corporate included: Arthur W. Fordham, a prominent local businessman whose family was associated with the Conservatory for much of the 20th century; Marjorie Jenkins, Supervisor of Nursing at the Victoria General Hospital; Dr. Clyde Marshall, the first Director of Nova Scotia’s Mental Health Services division of the provincial Department of Health; Ifan Williams, a member of Faculty at the Conservatory since 1920 and Director since 1934; Professor George E. Wilson, a Dalhousie historian; Dr. William A. Winfield, a prominent physician; and Harold R. Wyman, chemist, city alderman, and long-time member of the Board of Governors.

In 1998 Bethany United Church celebrated Mrs. Piercey’s six-decade career: “I never intended to make a lifetime career of it”, she reported. “I was ready to stop when my father moved on to another church (i.e., in 1939), but thought it would be would be good if I stayed on for a bit to help the new minister get started.” Retiring as organist in 1974, Lilian joined the senior choir. Over the years she and her mother Grace organized many concerts and plays at Bethany.

Perhaps Lilian Piercey’s greatest contribution to the Conservatory and the musical life of Halifax was her role in the refurbishment of the Conservatory’s auditorium. Working with Ifan Williams, it was reopened in 2004 as the Lilian Piercy Concert Hall and its acoustics have since been acknowledged as among the finest in the city. In a city where there is a dearth of dedicated performance spaces, the Hall has become a central feature of musical life in Halifax.