Amherst, MA – Jane Danforth Fisher Thurber (“Janie”), age 82, died peacefully at Hospice of the Fisher Home in Amherst, Massachusetts, on February 11, 2026, after a lengthy, valiant struggle with gastrointestinal decline. At the moment of Janie’s death, Joan Baez (CD) was singing “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” – a poignant close to a long and fruitful life as daughter and sister, musician and teacher, social advocate and adventurous traveler, as well as loving wife, mother, and grandmother.
Janie was born May 24, 1943, in Rochester, New York, the daughter of Robert George Fisher and Katherine Danforth Fisher and the younger sister of Judy Fisher Ward Gordon. Janie grew up in suburban Pittsford where she attended public schools as well as the independent Columbia School. Encouraged by her mother, a pianist and composer, throughout her youth Janie took piano lessons in the community program of the Eastman School of Music. She majored in music at Smith College (Class of 1964) and earned an M.A.T. (Master of Arts in Teaching) in music at Yale. Music was Janie’s passion, and teaching music was her vocation. Janie began teaching music in public schools in suburban North Haven, Connecticut; however, amid the ferment of the 1960s she soon chose to teach music in an inner city elementary school in New Haven. Upon learning about the Kodály program of music education in Hungary, Janie was one of the first Americans to participate in a new three-year Kodály training program (1969-1972): the first year studying Kodály pedagogy and Hungarian language at the Kodály Institute in Wellesley, Massachusetts; the second year observing and practice teaching Kodály classes in Hungary; and the third year introducing Kodály pedagogy while teaching music in public elementary schools in South Hadley, Massachusetts. In 1972 Janie was engaged to teach music à la Kodály in the public schools of Bloomfield, Connecticut, where she would teach music for the next 35 years until her retirement in 2008. Janie married Bert Thurber in New Haven, Connecticut, May 23, 1970, weeks before departing together for a year in Hungary.
While Janie taught music in the public schools of Bloomfield, she resided at the private Loomis Chaffee School in nearby Windsor, where her husband taught history and where they raised three children: Christopher born 1975, Alison born 1980, and Karin born 1982. In 1975 Janie and Bert acquired a house of their own on a hilltop above Rochester, Vermont, where the family retreated and whence they explored for almost twenty years. In 1993 they exchanged their Vermont retreat for an off-campus home in Windsor where the family lived for another dozen years. In 2007 Janie and Bert moved to Easthampton, Massachusetts, not far from Janie’s alma mater, and in 2019 they moved to the 55+ Lathrop Community in Easthampton.
Janie was an enthusiastic traveler. Before marriage she lived summer weeks with families in California and Germany, tripped solo around Ireland, and drove with a girlfriend through the U.S. South. Beyond Janie’s first year of marriage in Hungary, thirteen years and three children later her family of five resided 1983-84 in Cuernavaca, Mexico, where Janie taught music in a private, bi-lingual school. Thus introduced to Spanish language as well as Latino culture, Janie and Bert later traveled to Puerto Rico and Cuba, and after retiring they volunteered several summers, Janie as music teacher, at a rural school in the Dominican Republic.
Retirement offered more opportunity for travel: driving around Ireland, touring Turkey, Peru, Spain, and Vietnam, and cruising rivers in Germany, Austria, Hungary, and Russia. One last cruise together, in 2024, navigated the North and Baltic Seas to visit countries of Scandinavia as well as sites in Germany and Poland.
Janie is survived by her husband of 55 years, Bert Thurber, and by their three children: Christopher and his wife Jaime, Alison and her former husband Jason Lewis, and Karin. Janie is further survived by five grandchildren: Ainsley, Elias, and Isla Thurber as well as Rylan and Oakley Thurber-Lewis. Janie is also survived by her sister, Judy Fisher Ward Gordon, along with numerous nephews, nieces, and cousins.
While teaching music for decades in public schools in Bloomfield, Janie created and for many years conducted a chorus, The Island Girls, which drew young singers from public and private schools. The chorus regularly practiced in the chapel of the Loomis Chaffee School in Windsor and periodically performed there and elsewhere. Janie hoped her own memorial service would be held where she had led her Island Girls. “A Celebration of Janie Fisher Thurber, A Life in Music” will take place 11 am on Friday, June 26, 2026, in the Loomis Chaffee School Chapel, 4 Batchelder Rd., Windsor, Connecticut. In lieu of flowers, contributions to honor Janie Thurber may be made to the International Rescue Committee <www.rescue.org>, the Easthampton Community Center <easthamptoncommunitycenter.org>, or a philanthropy of choice.
Carmon Funeral Home has care of arrangements. To leave on-line condolences please visit www.carmonfuneralhome.com
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