After 27 years of choral directing at Butler University, associate music professor Henry Leck is retiring.

Leck, 66, announced to the university choir and chorale last Wednesday that this semester would be his last teaching at Butler.

He said his decision comes, in part, from a desire to spend more time with his family, including his four grandchildren.

On Tuesday, President Jim Danko announced that Leck has been awarded emeritus status.

Leck has accomplished much here.

He became a faculty member at Butler in 1986. He began as an adjunct instructor, leading the university choir and eventually giving conducting lessons.

Now the director of choral activities at Butler, Leck works with students with varying musical backgrounds.

The university choir is unique in that members do not have to audition. Some students have years of choral experience while some have never sung before.

Leck works with his musically diverse choir three times per week, teaching them how to blend their voices together.

A specialist in Dalcroze Eurhythmics, Leck is known for encouraging his choir members to move their arms while singing, adding emotional support to their voices.

“He’s particular, and he makes you a better singer,” said freshman Brady Davis, a university choir member. “He rewards effort when he sees it.”

Outside of teaching, Leck also wrote the textbook “Creating Artistry Through Choral Excellence” during his tenure at Butler.

Leck is known internationally in the choral world as the founder of the Indianapolis Children’s Choir, which began in 1986.

He said he was inspired after seeing the Chicago Children’s Choir and wanted to start a similar organization in Indianapolis.

“There were already great choirs in Indianapolis,” Leck said. “But there was not one that could draw in kids from all across the city regardless of socio-economic status or race. And that’s what I wanted to do.”

The choir that Leck started quickly grew into an empire. The ICC tours across the world and is recognized as one of the best youth choirs in the United States.

However, the ICC was missing one thing: a home.

Leck found that home for the ICC at Butler University, which offers the choir a safe and consistent rehearsal space.

The ICC and Butler have a mutually beneficial relationship.

“It gives the choir a safe place to rehearse and an opportunity for music education students to work with children in music,” Leck said.

In addition, the choir carries Butler’s name wherever it tours, including across the country and overseas.

Leck’s work in choral music with college students and children has affected many lives.

He estimates that roughly 10,000 children have gone through the ICC program.

A few of its past members have sung on Broadway, and many have gone on to careers in music education.

Leck’s colleagues agree that he is gifted in working with children.

“I have always been inspired by his energy and his ability to connect with students,” voice professor Eric Stark said. “Regardless of what their background in music might be, he can communicate with them in a way that helps them discover their own musical ability.”

Several graduate students came to Butler primarily to study with Leck.

Bryan Stenson, a graduate student who has known and worked with Leck since junior high school, said Leck helped interest him children’s choirs.

Leck’s humility and status in the choral world also persuaded Stenson to study with him at Butler.

“He’s a legend,” Stenson said. “But I think, in his own mind, he’s still just Henry Leck. He’s very real.”

Leck will conduct the university choir and chorale for the last time March 23, when they will sing Maurice Durufle’s “Requiem.”

The haunting, beautiful piece is one of Leck’s favorites. He conducted it at Butler once before over a decade ago.

“I identify with the harmonic language and the compositional techniques, which are so intriguing and extraordinary,” Leck said. “I’ve always wanted to conduct it again.”

Leck plans to conduct and educate across the globe after his retirement from Butler, in addition to continuing his work with the ICC.

Leck will also continue teaching as an honorary associate professor at the Hong Kong Institute of Education.

Although Leck is retiring from Butler, his contributions to the school will be long lasting.

“His legacy will be in music education,” Stark said. “He’s inspired students to do what they do, and that’s something that’s irreplaceable.”

Leck’s influence has spread from the city of Indianapolis to every corner of the world.

“Henry Leck is more than a human being,” Stenson said. “He’s an icon.”

Despite the acclaim, Leck said his students are the reason he will be remembered.

“The legacy of any teacher,” Leck said, “is the gift that’s been brought to their students.”

As the sun set on Thursday, Lilly Hall was bubbling with activity. Musical scales and melodies echoed outside the practice rooms on the second floor, classes were wrapping up in the ensemble rooms on the first floor, and the Butler Theatre was alight with people preparing for a week of tech rehearsals.

“[Lilly] is my place of solace,” said sophomore dance major Elizabeth Simoens, adding that she likes to dim the lights of the dance studios at night and dance improvisatorially alone or with a pianist.

“It’s like playtime,” she said, smiling.

Lilly Hall is full of creative energy during the day. It is the home of the Jordan College of Fine Arts as well as the Indianapolis Children’s Choir, American Pianists Association, Dance Kaleidoscope and other arts organizations.

As the night set in on Thursday, Lilly Hall began to change.

Thursday 9:30 p.m.

The basement is eerily empty. The only sounds echoing off the walls are my footsteps. Two girls chat in the lobby by the Butler Theatre on the first floor, where rehearsal for this week’s opening is ongoing.

Thursday 9:47 p.m.

A group of men in suits, all awaiting initiation into Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, sing together in the “old Lilly lobby” on the southwest corner of the building. They hold the red books given to all initiates, which contain the history and meaning of the organization.

James Caleca, sophomore music education major, was initiated into the men’s music fraternity on Thursday evening. He laughed and said that he and his fellow initiates decided it would be “a good idea to prance around Lilly Hall serenading girls” before the ceremony. Judging by the smiles on the audience, they were right.

Thursday 10:37 p.m.

Photo by Reid Bruner

On the third floor, Simoens works with a group of instrumentalists on a music and dance collaboration piece. Simoens commissioned this work from graduate composer Brian Spicklemire for a performance at a student choreography showcase next year, but it will be premiered on Saturday at Spicklemire’s composition recital. The dance is also on tomorrow’s Composers’ Orchestra concert  but without Simoens.

Using  Laban scales as a foundation, Simoens said she plans to weave her movements through the sounds of the instrumentalists, picking out musical “asides” to emphasize in order to avoid repetitive flowing movements. She has also developed a thematic movement, crossing all spatial axes, that will tie the piece together.

Thursday 11:22 p.m.

The second — floor music practice rooms are largely empty. Viola, piano and trumpet music floats down the corridors from various directions. A music student is asleep in the old lobby.

Friday 12:55 a.m.

After rehearsal, a group of theater students watch an episode of AMC’s television show “The Walking Dead” in the theater design lab.

Friday 2:22 a.m.

The last musician leaves her practice room and heads home for the night. The fluorescent lights in the hallways buzz, awaiting the sunrise and the influx of students for morning classes.

The metal door locked behind me, and the crisp air enveloped me as I left the building in the small hours of Friday morning, surprised and inspired by the mix of diligence and light-heartedness that is Lilly Hall after dark.