Desert classic. Performing in arid climes is nothing new for DRI's Ted Hartwell, who has played for orchestras in Texas, New Mexico and Nevada.

DRI Profile: Ted Hartwell

Archaeologist-musician's well-honed fine arts skills add different dimension to DRI

"Art is the beautiful way of doing things. Science is the effective way of doing things.
Business is the economic way of doing things."

—Elbert Hubbard (1856-1915), U.S. author

Since its inception in 1959, DRI has maintained a well-earned reputation for conducting effective world-class science in a businesslike manner. With untenured faculty and the bulk of its revenues coming from contracts and grants won via competitive proposals, DRI is widely lauded not just for its leading-edge research but also for its entrepreneurial spirit. But art, well, that's another matter.

Enter William T. "Ted" Hartwell, DRI associate research archaeologist, co-author of "Reading the stones: The archaeology of Yucca Mountain" and cellist extraordinaire for the Las Vegas Philharmonic Orchestra. His musical career in Las Vegas has seen him play supporting roles for luminaries such as Placido Domingo, Sarah Brightman and Andrea Bocelli.

But don't expect the modest, soft-spoken Hartwell to trumpet these and other brushes with fame. "I've been lucky to have worked with some extremely talented people," he says. Earlier in Texas, Hartwell also shared the spotlight with the likes of popular music legends Henry Mancini, Doc Severinsen and Carmen Dragon.

Hartwell takes time out at a Las Vegas Philharmonic rehearsal for a snapshot with opera legend Andrea Bocelli.

Hartwell's life has always been centered on family, science and music. And, his musical pedigree is impeccable: his father was a voice teacher at Texas Tech for more than 30 years and his mother is pianist for the Spokane (WASH) Symphony. "We always had music in the house, whether classical or popular," he says. Love of music has been a constant in his life since before grade school when he took piano lessons at age 5.

He was "recruited" to the cello in the sixth grade by the beginning-orchestra teacher. "He said something like, 'You've got the hands of a cello player. Wanna try it?' So I did, and it didn't take long for me to get hooked on it." By the time he was a high school senior, Hartwell had joined the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra and soon thereafter began performing regularly in a string quartet made up of some of its top musicians.

At Texas Tech, where he earned a bachelor's and a master's degree in anthropology with an emphasis on archaeology, Hartwell's interest in music remained unabated. He continued working with the Lubbock Symphony and was principal cellist with the Texas Tech University Orchestra. He also occasionally substituted for orchestras in Roswell (N.M), Spokane and Midland (Texas).

Tenor Placido Domingo provides a high note in Hartwell's musical career.

Despite all the musical activity, Hartwell says he decided early on that he didn't want any strings attached when it came to his profession. "Music gives me a great deal of enjoyment, but it's not how I want to make a living," he says.

His passion for science led him to DRI in 1991. He worked on the Yucca Mountain cultural resources project mandated by the National Historic Preservation Act after the U.S. Department of Energy identified the site as a potential repository for long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel.

At Yucca Mountain, Hartwell helped identify and record a wide range of Native American artifacts. He says he was well prepared for the job. As a research assistant at Texas Tech, he conducted similar studies at the Lubbock Lake Landmark—a 350-acre state historic site along a tributary of the Brazos River—containing paleo-Indian deposits dating back 12,000 years.

In 1999, when DRI took over management of the Community Environmental Monitoring Program from EPA, Hartwell was tapped as project manager. CEMP, as it's called, now has 26 locations dotting Nevada and Utah, a network of people and instrument stations working to detect any lingering radioactivity from the Nevada Test Site's nuclear weapons tests.

Stations are located in Las Vegas and smaller Nevada towns like Goldfield, Rachel, Caliente and Alamo; as well as in places like Milford, Cedar City and St. George, in Utah. Station reports are readily available to the public on the Internet.

CEMP was established in 1981 to give residents surrounding the test site a direct role in looking after their own health and well-being.

It's modeled after a similar program launched in Pennsylvania after the 1979 Three Mile Island reactor accident. "CEMP is vitally important in building trust and credibility with citizens around the region," Hartwell says. And, the positive feedback he constantly gets from community members near CEMP stations is music to his ears. "They really appreciate the work we do and want us to know it."

This orchestra shell and waterfall make for a dramatic backdrop at the Las Vegas Philharmonic's annual Fourth of July concert in Summerlin.

At a training session in Brian Head, Utah, last year, Hartwell surprised and delighted CEMP station managers with an impromptu solo performance of some Bach cello suites. He also performed with a string quartet at the grand opening of DRI's Frank H. Rogers Science and Technology Building in October 2003.

Hartwell sees a link between science and music. "I think there's a connection between the two. I know many musicians who are also mathematicians, researchers or surgeons. Musical themes and rhythms are divided into measurable sections. This kind of orderliness seems to appeal to a scientific or mathematical mind," he says.

He says many of his DRI colleagues support his musical interest by attending concerts where he plays. And, if you asked them, they'd probably tell you they're happy and proud to know Hartwell, who brings a most-welcomed dimension to DRI.

-Ron Kalb