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Violinist Stephen Shipps, professor of music at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, is on leave and plans to retire next year amid reports that he committed sexual misconduct over four decades, according to The Detroit News. Shipps also reportedly stepped down as department chair and as faculty director of the String Preparatory Academy precollege musician program. Allegations against Shipps of inappropriate comments, touching and sexual contact with students were first reported by Michigan’s student newspaper, The Daily. One of the women named in that article, Maureen O’Boyle, who is now an associate professor of music the University of Tulsa, told The Detroit News that Shipps invited her to his home when she was a 17-year-old high school student studying with him at the Omaha Symphony, offered her alcohol and marijuana, and had sex with her. Neither Shipps’s attorney nor a public relations firm he hired offered immediate comment. Michigan confirmed that Shipps is on leave but declined further comment. Opera singer David Daniels, another professor of music at Michigan, is currently on leave over sexual assault allegations. Daniels has denied any wrongdoing.
