I had thought that the passionate violinist on the USM website home page was one of our music majors. Ha! It is Joshua Bell.

Here's the very polite email I received from his his office in response to my query about his representation on our webpage.

Maybe I'm too sensitive about these things, but when you're in the business of professing knowledge, you need to be absolutely above board in representations of the truth. Kyping someone's image for your web page just because they performed a concert on campus over a year ago just ain't kosher.

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Dear [name withheld],

Thanks so much for this information. I just checked the site and I am pretty
sure that Joshua did not give permission for his photograph to be used in
this way. I will pass this information on to his manager.

On another note, he did enjoy his short stay at USM last year and hopes to
have an opportunity to perform there again in the future.

All the best,
Leah


On 6/3/07 7:11 PM, [name withheld] <[name withheld]@usm.edu> wrote:

Dear Ms. Morris:

I write because my university is currently using Mr. Bell's image without attribution or identification on its Home/splash page. I don't know about Mr. Bell's views, but I would  not want my photograph used without identification to represent an institution to which I was not affiliated.

Here is the link: <http://www.usm.edu>. See for yourself.

In any case, I'm a big fan of Mr. Bell--I know I would have stopped to listen to the Bach Chaconne if I had been in the DC metro the day he played anonymously.

Very best,

[name withheld]