Music Career
In fall of 1968, she landed in West Hartford, New Jersey, which is where an international harp competition would be taking place the next spring. A family near the University of Hartford gave her free room and board, and she would practice every day in preparation for the competition. She'd spend every waking minute practicing on her harp so that she did well in the competition. These months of training paid off, as she earned a bronze medal that March! In the meantime, the University of Hartford had asked Alice to become a part of their orchestra, and she happily agreed. Her association with the school had opened up freelancing opportunities, where at one gig she met her ex-husband. He was American, and they met because he was conducting a requiem she performed. After meeting, they dated and spent every day with each other. By the time it was time for Alice to go back to Hungary in June of 1969, he had proposed to her, and she decided to stay in America with him. Afterwards, she was able to go back home in Hungary and visit her family every year. Luckily, her husband was high up in the music industry, so he opened up opportunities for her in the Boston Symphony Harpists Associated in the New England Conservatory. She was accepted into their two-year program, ready to start the next fall.
Over that summer, she was also accepted into a music program at the Berkshire Music Center in Lenox, MA. Since she was an immigrant and travelled to the US with no money to play music, all of the programs she got into had given her a full scholarship; her journey to the US had been enough payment. During and after her education in MA for the next ten years, she took freelancing positions all over Boston for musicals, churches, symphonies, ballets, etc. During these ten years, although her passion for music never faltered, the difficulty of playing the harp sporadically in different locations every time got to her. She had gotten sick of living paycheck to paycheck waiting for when her next gig would be. Not only this, but she had to hire people to transport her harp to each place she played at. The inconvenience of having such a large instrument as well as the lack of a consistent job led her to the conclusion that as much as she loved music, it may not have been a good full time job. If she had one concert hall to play at where her harp was there permanently, it would have been easier for her to make a living off of. As a result, she took her life in a different direction and went back to school.