Emerson Talkington opens the lid on the grand piano and settles on the bench. His hands spread across the keys and exquisite music rises from the strings. From Chopin to Brahms to Rachmaninoff, he plays as if the piano is part of him. Days away from his college graduation, he’s on target to achieve a goal he’s dreamed about for years. From an unlikely and late start, Emerson has cleared more hurdles in the last decade than many people face in their entire lives.

Since the first commencement in June 1889, Southwestern College (SC) has held graduation exercises each spring. This year’s event is planned for May 4 at 2:30 in the Richard L. Jantz Stadium. As he receives his diploma for a Bachelor of Arts in Music that day, Emerson will join hundreds of alumni since that 1889 ceremony with degrees in Music. This year, he has the distinction to be the only music major. “And,” he says, “I’m the last one.”

Born in Winfield in 2002, he attended the local schools, graduating from Winfield High School with the class of 2020, in the Year of Covid. His love for piano began when he was a student at Winfield Middle School. The vocal music classroom housed a Mason & Hamlin grand piano donated from the estate of legendary pianist and teacher E. Marie Burdette. Emerson became fascinated with that piano and lingered after school most days in hopes of a chance to play it. His innate ability coupled with YouTube tutorial videos allowed him to pick out melodies by ear and the school’s music faculty encouraged him as his love for piano flourished.

Paige Camp, the vocal teacher at the time, says, “It seems like yesterday that he was a student in middle-level choir.  He spent many days after school in the music hall, tinkering with the piano.  I nicknamed him ‘Cling-on’ as he was usually there until we had to lock up for the day.”

Allen Dilley, band teacher, accompanist for the middle school choirs, and accomplished pianist himself, often used the Burdette piano after school for practicing. “Dr. Dilley introduced me to piano technique and music theory,” Emerson says.

“I first met Emerson in the vocal music room at WMS,” Dilley says. “Classes had concluded for the day and I recall practicing Chopin’s Scherzo in Bb minor—a challenging composition. A few days later Emerson was in the room playing excerpts from the same piece, albeit without having ever seen the music. I suggested that as he began his keyboard journey, he might want to start with something a little less intimidating.”

From the middle school choir, he went on to the WHS choir where he found another friend and mentor in accompanist Billy Bearden. Lacking the Burdette grand piano he’d enjoyed at the middle school, Emerson found a small console piano in a storeroom to tinker with. He often sought out Bearden for tips on piano performance.

It was during his senior year in high school that he encountered a huge obstacle in his path—he had cancer. Bearden shares, “[After] the diagnosis . . . there’s a moment for Emerson (or maybe a thousand of them) where it feels that the universe is playing a cruel joke.” However, Bearden notes that there’s a “miracle in the mundane: he keeps playing.  Even when his physical pain makes it hard to sit up.  Even when he’s told music is a waste of time, and when all he can hear in his head is how he started too late and he’s not good enough—Emerson keeps playing.”

Emerson tapped local jazz pianist and renowned performing artist Scott Williams as his first official private piano teacher. Williams says, “I began teaching Emerson between his sophomore and junior years of high school. This is later than most people start learning the piano, but I sensed right away how serious he was. He progressed quickly, and soon sounded like he had been playing much longer. It wasn’t that long before he started getting hired as a pianist.”

With the private lessons, his early mentors noticed his growing skill with jazz. Dilley notes, “His knowledge of chords and harmony and the ability to apply them to existing melodies is excellent. He showed me how to turn a well-known hymn into a “blues” piece!” The student turned into a teacher.

Paige Camp worked with him through high school. “He joined the high school jazz band, and later the symphonic band.  There were hours of rehearsal and many performances. . . But despite the cancer diagnosis, he kept a very dry sense of humor about it all.  And he kept playing the piano.”

Through the cancer and Covid chaos, he never quit playing. It was clear to him that music, through pianos, was his life’s calling and he embraced it with his whole heart. After he graduated from WHS, he enrolled with a scholarship in Cowley College as a music major. His first experience working with Cowley piano instructor Steve Butler was when he was a high school senior. He was asked to fill in as accompanist when Butler took over conducting the Cowley Singers at a concert. “I had a couple weeks to prepare, but I was still nervous,” Emerson recalls. Since that debut audition, he has performed many times for Butler, including as a duet partner. “Playing duets with Steve brought out my best,” Emerson says.

Pastor at Hackney Baptist church as well as music instructor at Cowley College, Butler considers Emerson a good friend and has been pleased to recommend him when people ask for a keyboard artist.

During the semesters at Cowley, Emerson also became the proud owner of that E. Marie Burdette Mason & Hamlin grand piano. Covid prompted staff changes at USD 465, and the new music staff members were willing to transfer the custody and maintenance of that gem of a piano to the school alumnus who had fallen in love with music through it. Emerson kept playing on the original mesmerizing instrument.

He transferred to Southwestern College as a music major with a piano performance emphasis but soon after he enrolled, Southwestern announced it was terminating its music degree program. To its credit, the college committed to completing the degrees of the majors that were currently enrolled and Emerson persevered.

Cancer struck again with a vengeance later that same fall, and delayed his coursework while he battled the relapse at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Fellow cancer survivor and associate professor of music at Southwestern College Jeremy Kirk said, “Living through chemo as he did—twice—influences your tenacity. You have to be tenacious. There’s a feeling that: If I can do this, there’s nothing I can’t do.”

Returning months later with his cancer in remission, Emerson picked up where he’d left off, married Rosalyn, the love of his life, and with support from the music faculty and the college administration, he continued his pursuit of a Bachelor of Arts in Music. His grit and determination impressed the staff at Southwestern to the point where the instructors were as determined as Emerson to fulfill his goal.

Professor Kirk shares his insights. “Emerson possesses first rate music talent and he seeks opportunities for growth as a musician outside his comfort zone.” As a student in Kirk’s World Music class, he joined the performing ensemble and traveled to Hawaii with the group in December 2022. He participated in the jazz and pep bands at SC, served as librarian for the South Kansas Symphony, took private organ lessons from James Leland, and even helped Leland with the day-to-day maintenance of the pipe organ in Richardson Performing Arts Center. He completed his coursework mostly through online classes and independent studies, but he never gave up and never quit playing.

In addition to a bustling student schedule, Emerson supported himself through the years with a variety of outside jobs. His interest in automobile mechanics secured him a job as a manager at O’Reilly’s for a while. He also worked in fast food places, installed signs for Cardinal Signs, did custodial work, served as the accompanist at area churches including a couple years as organist at Winfield’s First Presbyterian Church, and as the accompanist at Ark City Middle School for the last four years. He also has a few piano students of his own.

Leland says, “I have unparalleled appreciation for the noble and realistic way he worked through college. He is conscientious about finishing any work he starts.”

Emerson has triumphed through all the challenges the universe threw at him. Bearden, his accompanist pal during high school, says, “It wasn’t triumph in any grandiose sense—no concerts or sudden label deals—but it was something better: a private rebellion, a refusal to quit.  Each day he chose the small and seemingly insignificant choice to create beauty in a world that kept offering pain.”

And he became more than just a student. “He became an artist,” Bearden says.

With graduation approaching, he prepares to launch into his next chapter of life. Emerson will join fellow SC music alumni Butler (1997) and Bearden (2005) as well as hundreds of musicians with roots at Southwestern College who became dedicated schoolteachers in small towns and cities across the nation, performed with respected symphonies, taught in colleges and universities, or worked as church musicians and composers.

For the immediate future, he plans to travel this summer, to embrace as much of life’s opportunities as possible. “I want to travel while I can. I might not make it through a third cancer occurrence.”

When he is home, Emerson plans a public performance where he will share his spark for life. Details will be announced later. He plans to expand his studio to offer more private lessons, and hopes to teach music at an area school. He is interested in piano technology and wants to eventually rebuild the Mason & Hamlin piano that opened the world of music to him.

Kirk feels certain that Emerson will have success with whatever he chooses to pursue because of the qualities of his personality. What are those qualities? According to those who know him well he is flexible, humble, inquisitive, compassionate, and kind. With a gentle nature, he is always there to help a friend—a good recipe for success in any situation.

For now, each of his instructors feels what Steve Butler expresses, “To have played a small part in his musical and spiritual growth gives me great joy!” His hometown and expanded community join the instructors to wish him the best as he graduates with his coveted BA degree in music, with an emphasis in piano performance.