Local Artist A S HOLDENIGHT TO BE By Michael Wagner
Above | Renaissance man: Holden Thorp is an academic, scientist and musician. Top | The Fayetteville native is chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Below | Thorp plays with his band, Equinox, in Carrboro.
North Carolina at Chapel Hill sat behind the synthesizer wearing his trademark Tar Heel blue shirt and cap, khaki shorts and white tennis shoes. Behind him, girls in flowing skirts spun hula hoops around their hips while families picnicked on the lawn, and a man in a yellow T-shirt with flowers in his hair danced with unabashed enthusiasm. A jazz band playing in the park on
C 22|August/September • 2009
a summer Sunday morning wasn’t so unusual for the Weaver Street Market
ARRBORO – “And on the keyboard .... “ Pause. “Holden Thorp.” A handful of heads
jerked up. The chancellor of the University of
co-op. But the chancellor of the nation’s oldest public university jamming on a keyboard, well, that was a bit unusual, even for Carrboro. But for the sixth straight year, Thorp’s band, Equinox, did just that, and Thorp was just another member of the group, setting up speakers and amps and running through the music. In another part of his life, Thorp is busy reviewing budgets, managing deans, talking to trustees, faculty and students, and putting out any number of fires at the well-known school just up the road. But for two straight hours on this muggy Sunday morning, Thorp could let everything go and just play. For a man with a hectic day job, music
is his solace.
