Bucknell University senior and Pinecrest resident Lauren Godfrey is the winner of a prestigious Fulbright Grant for a nine-month teaching and research assignment in the Austrian capital of Vienna.
The music performance major will be in Vienna from October 2011 to June 2012 with an opportunity to extend her English-teaching assistantship one year.
“My award is a rare combination of research and teaching,” said Godfrey. “It is one of 12 grants awarded.”
Godfrey is the daughter of Jill and Gil Godfrey and a 2007 graduate of Palmetto High School.
Godfrey, who plays flute, said her Fulbright research proposal will deal with music.
“Specifically, I’ll be studying the relationship between opera singing and flute playing and how instrumentalists can incorporate the drama and theatrics of opera into their playing,” she said. “The title of my research is The Voice of the Flute: Operatic Vocalists and the Gateway to Professional Flute Performance.”
Godfrey will attend the University of Music and Performing Arts and study with flute Professor Barbara Gisler-Haase. She also will teach English 13 hours a week in a yet-to-be named secondary school.
Godfrey said she has wanted to return to Vienna since being a study-abroad student there in spring 2010. “I was determined to find a way to go back there because I fell in love with the city,” she said.
The Fulbright Program was established in 1946 under legislation introduced by former Sen. William Fulbright of Arkansas and operates in more than 155 countries worldwide.
