Two Women by Angela Rieck

For Women’s History month I am going to highlight two modern women with very different gifts. The first is Dr. Ruth Gottesman, a Baltimore woman who donated $1 billion dollars (yes that is billion with a B) to pay for the tuition for all medical students at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in the Bronx for the foreseeable future.

By paying tuition for almost 1200 medical students, she has made a donation that may make a small dent in the healthcare problem. True to her philanthropic philosophy, she has insisted that the college NOT be named after her nor does she want any buildings bearing her name. Instead she wants to allow medical students to select their specialty based on their interests and not on eliminating debt. The hope is that those who are interested in lower-paying primary care roles such as pediatrician, family medicine, and general practitioner will be able to select these crucial careers without worrying about paying off debt.

The cost of medical school (over half of students graduate from medical school with over $200,000 in debt) may be a factor in the doctor shortage and another contributor to the high cost of medical care. The greatest need is in family medicine, where pay is much lower. Last year, 217 residency spots in family medicine went unfilled. Yet, there were no vacancies in plastic surgery residencies.

This diminutive, modest woman has paved the way for philanthropy in the future.

The other woman I would like to highlight is the musician and artist Joni Mitchell. Mitchell has provided joy to many listeners. Her music is innovative and unique. Yet, Mitchell goes to the beat of her own drum. She is cantankerous, denies being a feminist, moved to a genre where she lost most of her audience, and has criticized her primary audience (baby boomers).

Joni Mitchell was able to produce her unique sound with memorable tunes and poetic lyrics.

“And the sun poured in like butterscotch
And stuck to all my senses…”

She is a gifted musician and poet. Yet during her career, many influential critics insisted that women were not as talented as men. John Belushi and Christopher Hitchens famously maintained that women are not funny and should not be writing comedy. Belushi went out of his way to mock women writers.

Women were equally dismissed in music. It was recently revealed that a co-founder of The Rolling Stone has never cared for the work of women or African American artists.

Despite this bias, Mitchell is credited with a number of innovations. She has recently been ranked as the 9^th best guitarist of all time. Her Blue album has been rated as the third-best album ever produced (the first by a woman artist). The New York Times chose the Blue album as a turning point in 20th century popular music.

Mitchell is a gifted musician in many instruments. Many of her songs were composed on the piano. But she is best known for her guitar work. She innovatively used open, non-standard tuning for guitars. Nonstandard tuning is when the guitar is not tuned to the conventional EADGBE tuning. The use of alternative tunings allowed her to produce accompaniment with more varied and wider-ranging textures. She has written songs in 50 different tunings.

I recently had the pleasure of listening to Jillian Todd perform Joni Mitchell’s music. Todd used 10 guitars onstage specifically tuned for 10 different songs.

Mitchell is also credited with creating innovative harmonics, and poetic lyrics, especially in her early work. At the height of her popularity, she moved to jazz music with the album The Hissing of Summer Lawns (what a great title!) and over time lost most of her audience, including me. But she was unconcerned; she continued to make the music she felt compelled to make.

That is what makes both of these women special. Joni Mitchell is an incredible talent and musical pioneer who refuses to be put in any kind of box. Dr. Gottesman sees a way to help medical students and the medical profession without the need for personal aggrandizement.

Angela Rieck, a Caroline County native, received her PhD in Mathematical Psychology from the University of Maryland and worked as a scientist at Bell Labs, and other high-tech companies in New Jersey before retiring as a corporate executive. Angela and her dogs divide their time between St Michaels and Key West Florida. Her daughter lives and works in New York City.