Donor Spotlight: Martha Darling and Gil Omenn

By UMS

Martha Darling and Gil Omenn

Martha Darling and Gil Omenn have lived in Ann Arbor for more than 25 years and have been avid arts supporters in our community, serving on the boards of UMS and the Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra and a fixture at performances. Their 25/26 season support includes a performance sponsorship of the Fauré Piano Quartets on Thursday, February 12, featuring violinist James Ehnes, violist Jonathan Vinocour, cellist Raphael Bell, and pianist Inon Barnatan. We spoke to Martha and Gil about their background in the arts and many years of friendship with James Ehnes, who they affectionately know as “Jimmy.”

What were early performing arts experiences that helped form your love for the arts today?

Martha Darling (MD): I grew up in Los Angeles, where the year-round weather allowed kids to be outside playing games and sports. But I do remember going to downtown Los Angeles for the Civic Light Opera to see Broadway shows from the time that I was about 12. Touring and remounting shows then was a big deal, and we went to 6-8 shows a year. I think my first show was Peter Pan with Mary Martin, and we also saw first-class runs with the stars of the day: Damn Yankees with Jerry Lewis, a lot of Rogers and Hammerstein, including South Pacific with Mary Martin, and Lerner and Lowe. It was live music, and looking back I realize how terrifically lucky I was to have these experiences. I took the “statutory” three years of piano when I was a kid, but I was a swimmer and not really interested in music until I got to Reed College, where friends introduced me to Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, and so on, opening my eyes to discovery.

Gil Omenn (GO): I came to music much earlier. I started with piano from both of my parents, then clarinet, oboe and alto sax throughout school. In high school, I played oboe in the Youth Orchestra connected to The Philadelphia Orchestra and alto sax in the Bands of Tomorrow Competition of Greater Philadelphia. I played clarinet in the Princeton Marching Band and even made the cover of Sports Illustrated! Then I played piano for the Second Year Show at Harvard Medical School. I served on the boards of the Seattle Symphony and the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra. After coming to Ann Arbor in 1997 as Executive Vice President for Medical Affairs and CEO of the University of Michigan Health System, I helped start the Life Sciences Orchestra, which just played its 25th anniversary concert in Hill Auditorium.

Martha, you met violinist James Ehnes when you lived in Seattle. How did you end up there?

MD: After college in Oregon, I did graduate work at Princeton in international economics. After a brief stint working as a field organizer for Movement for a New Congress, I spent four years in Paris doing consulting work for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, an outgrowth of the Organization for European Economic Cooperation, which managed European reconstruction through the Marshall Plan. One of the things I explored as part of that work was the policy implications of the role of women in the economy. After four years, I was ready to return to the United States and took a position at a think tank in Seattle. A few months before I left Paris, a friend made a connection to a friend of his from Seattle who was passing through Paris as part of his White House fellowship. That was how I met Gil over 50 years ago. We were in Seattle for a few years, then moved to DC, and then back to Seattle in 1982 for 15 years before we came to Ann Arbor.

And James Ehnes?

We’ve known him so long we call him “Jimmy.” When he was 19, he came to the Seattle Chamber Music Festival (SCMF), which was founded by a good friend of ours, Toby Saks, a cellist who had been with the New York Philharmonic. Toby had a vision to create a chamber music festival and invite young musicians who had just graduated from the country’s leading music schools. Jimmy made his first appearance in 1995.

The festival continues to be terrific for both the musicians and the audiences. So many artists we’ve seen at UMS were people we first saw at the Seattle Chamber Music Festival — Inon Barnatan, Anton Nel, Richard O’Neill (now with the Takács Quartet), and many others. Jimmy became the artistic director of the Festival eight years ago, and we still spend every July in Seattle for it.

James Ehnes performing with pianist Inon Barnatan:

Do you have a favorite memory of James Ehnes, whether in concert or personally?

We used to play softball together — Jimmy is a great baseball fan! Last summer, the SCMF put together a small ensemble to play the National Anthem at a Seattle Mariners game, and Jimmy got to throw the first pitch — a dream come true for him! Just like with music, he practiced a lot to ensure that his throw made it to the catcher without bouncing. We were thrilled for him. He recently joined the faculty at Indiana University as a violin professor.

Those of us who were in the audience for James Ehnes’s concert in Rackham a couple of years ago remember how delightful and engaging he was in introducing each piece and really developing a great rapport with the audience.

I think you’ll see that in their performance this month, too. The four members of this quartet all know each other from Seattle.

Funny that you mention that — Inon Barnatan told us that they first performed one of the Fauré quartets together there, and they had such a great time that they decided to take the concert on the road. It’s not part of a larger tour, so we were thrilled to be able to find a date when all four of their calendars aligned.

They are always interested in exploring the works of new and lesser-known composers and know how to spread the joy about music. Each year, Jimmy commissions a new work for the festival — the last one was a duo for violin and mandolin with Chris Thile — and he loves to introduce people to pieces they haven’t heard before. Our horizons have been stretched throughout the past 40 years because of a range of outstanding composers that have appeared on the SCMF and UMS programs.

All of us at UMS thank Martha Darling and Gil Omenn for their ongoing support of great music in our community. We invite you join them (and Jimmy!) in our wonderful presentation of French masterworks by Fauré on Friday, March 13, 2026.

More Info & Tickets