About Jerry Franks
Jerry Franks, a native of Uniontown, PA, joined the Grace faculty in 1966. As a trumpet soloist, and with the group he founded, Dimensions in Brass, Franks had a stellar performing career. It included performances at the Midwest Band Clinic, Disney World, Disneyland, Dodgers Stadium, performing in Washington DC for Vice President George H.W. Bush, and more.
Franks and his group were favorites of Indiana Governor Otis Bowen. They travelled widely representing Grace College in churches and schools. Franks had incredible teaching knowledge about all instruments, and his students were widely successful in instrumental education and performance. He served as a Conn clinician, and expertly designed instruments and maximized his knowledge of jaw and teeth structure and embouchure.
Franks’ love for Christ, and the way he suffered with diabetes yet gave praise in all that he endured, left behind an indelible legacy.
About the Worship Arts Rehearsal Space and Scholarship Project
In the Fall of 2016, Grace College reimagined its music program and launched a bachelor’s degree in worship arts with the goal of training students to serve in the local church as worship leaders and pastors. Grace’s worship arts program equips students to think like theologians, labor like artists, and shepherd like pastors.
The worship arts program resides in the lower level of the William Male Center and previously did not have dedicated rehearsal space. Thanks to the generosity of donors, alumni, and friends the newly renovated rehearsal studio project was completed and dedicated in October 2022. The rehearsal facility will be in use year-round for our current students as well as high school students attending summer worship camps.
In 2022, the Jerry Franks project expanded to include a newly established scholarship honoring Jerry’s legacy: the Jerry Franks Endowed Scholarship. This scholarship will be given annually to a Grace student pursuing a degree in worship arts. And we have exciting news! An anonymous donor provided a $20,000 matching opportunity towards the Jerry Franks Memorial Endowed Scholarship – and the match was met! Gifts can still be made to this student scholarship established in Jerry’s memory.
Will you partner with us as we seek to invest further in the lives of our current and future students through an endowed scholarship is memory of Jerry Franks?
