Raymond Michael Hebel Performing Arts Scholarship

While Ray Hebel was still a student, people discovered that he had a talent for impersonating Elvis Presley, the King of Rock and Roll. Ironically, the discovery was made while Ray was in a state of hypnosis, but it launched a performing career that took on a life of its own. By profession, Ray was a music teacher at Chaparral Middle School and Moorpark High School, having received his bachelor’s degree in music from CLU in 1975. His other life as an Elvis impersonator covered at least 40 years, mostly in Southern California.

In 1993, after Ray and a small group of CLU alumni had been staging benefit Elvis concerts to unprecedented crowds in the CLU gym/auditorium for several years, they and the CLU alumni association decided to use the 1992 concert proceeds to endow a performing arts scholarship in Ray’s name. They wanted the scholarship to be awarded to a student who was the son or daughter of an alumnus and who also exhibited exceptional talent in either music or drama or both. The first awards under these criteria were made in 1993.

As the concerts continued and the scholarship endowment grew, the Elvis committee made the decision to revise the award criteria. Under the new criteria a freshman (preferably but not necessarily the son or daughter of alumni) with musical theatre talent could be chosen to receive the scholarship for all four years. Thus it was that in 2001 the music and theatre arts departments held auditions of incoming freshmen and awarded the Raymond Michael Hebel Performing Arts Scholarship under the new guidelines to four talented students.

The Elvis annual concerts ceased in 2005, but the endowment continued to grow and talented students continue to have the honor of receiving this performing arts scholarship. CLU owes a debt of gratitude to Ray Hebel ’75 for allowing his name to be attached to this fine scholarship.