Most Asbury students know the name Dr. Schell because of the few chapels every semester when a bright voice sings out from the piano bench on stage. Others, namely in Asbury’s music department, also know him as a professor or chair of the department.
Mark Schell is in his 35th year teaching here at Asbury University, but his history at the school runs deeper than those few decades. His parents met here, like many Asburians, but he grew up in West Virginia. His youth group would travel to Wilmore for the Ichthus Music Festival, which gave him opportunities to visit Asbury’s campus more and develop a love for the town. His journey with music started much earlier than spectating Icthus though.
“The story goes that when I was four years old, I was obnoxiously begging my parents to take piano,” Schell recounts. “I don’t remember that, but they said I was relentless. I just wanted to play the piano. So at five years old, they got me started with the piano teacher. I took to it; I loved it.”
In addition to playing the piano, he had some experience with the organ prior to beginning college, as well as a few years on the trumpet.
Though attending Asbury was not in Schell’s initial plan, once he auditioned on the piano for the music department during a trip to Wilmore, his future was set in stone. He came to Asbury and began to study the organ instead of his long-standing instrument, the piano. He later met his wife during his undergraduate years, then moved to Louisville, Ky. to earn his Master’s in Church Music from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary School of Church Music. After graduating, a door opened at Asbury to teach the organ – a door that he initially shut. A week later, he interviewed for the position. The rest is history.
“I don’t think there is another Asbury,” Schell said. “I’ve always said that as long as God wants me here, and I don’t feel like he’s wanting me to go somewhere, and as long as God is seeming to use this institution, I’m willing to be here.”
Some of his current commitments on campus include conducting the Handbell Choir and the Men’s Glee Club, as well as teaching the organ, piano and church music. Outside of Asbury, Schell is the organist at the Wilmore Free Methodist Church, which he and his wife have been members of for many years.
Schell and his wife, Cheryl, have lived in Wilmore for 35 years, and have raised their two children here. They both teach in Asbury’s music department and love the handbells.
One thing that keeps Schell’s love for Asbury alive is the tradition of class hymns for Asburians. As a history that runs deeper than his time in Wilmore, he sees it as one of the most unique and beautiful things about the institution. With each class, he works with the student cabinet to handpick a list of hymns and helps them in their decision to pick one. Class hymns are always tied to their class; at every Asbury reunion, classes of Asburians join back together and sing the hymns that they chose in college.
Dr. Schell is committed to ministering through his teaching, and to always feed into the Asbury, Wilmore, Jessamine County and Central Kentucky communities.
Photo courtesy of Mark Schell.
