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Oberlin Celebrates C.B. Fisk Organ with June Conference
by Marci Janas ’91
Related Links:
The Oberlin Conservatory
of Music will present an international symposium on French Romantic organ
music, Cavaillé-Coll in Oberlin: A Celebration of the C.B. Fisk
Organ, June 12-15, 2002. The symposium is presented in association with
the Westfield Center.
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| Kay Africa Memorial Organ |
This four-day event will bring together outstanding organists, organ builders, and scholars for a series of recitals, lectures, demonstrations, and panel discussions in celebration of Oberlin's Kay Africa Memorial Organ, designed and constructed in the best of the late-Romantic tradition by C.B. Fisk. The organ, based on the symphonic style of the great French organ builder, Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, was inaugurated during a weekend of concerts in Finney Chapel in September 2001. Excerpts from those concerts can be heard on the web site for Pipedreams, the nationally distributed Minnesota Public Radio program hosted by Oberlin graduate Michael Barone.
Seven internationally acclaimed organists will be heard in public concerts on the Fisk instrument during the symposium:
Jean Boyer -- concert and recording artist and winner of the Grand Prix du Disque, professor of organ at the Conservatoire National Supèrieur de Lyon;
Martin Jean -- concert artist, first prize winner in many competitions (including the International Grand Prix de Chartres and the National Young Artists' Competition in organ performance) and associate professor of organ at the Yale School of Music and Institute of Sacred Music;
Hans-Ola Ericsson -- concert and recording artist and four-time winner of the Swedish Gramophone Prize, member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music, professorships at the Swedish National College of Music in Piteå, the University of Luleå, and the Hochschule für Künste in Bremen, Germany;
Susan Ferré -- concert and recording artist, choral director, visiting assistant professor of music and university organist at Pacific Lutheran University (Tacoma, Washington);
Christa Rakich -- concert and recording artist, international prize winner, acclaimed interpreter of music of J.S. Bach, director of music at the Jesuit Urban Center, Church of the Immaculate Conception (Boston);
David Boe -- concert and recording artist, director of music at First Lutheran Church (Lorain, Ohio), professor of organ and harpsichord at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music; and
Haskell Thomson -- concert artist, noted expert in the practical aspects of church music: choir training, service playing, and liturgy; professor of organ and director of the division of keyboard studies at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music.
Tickets for each concert are $10 at the door; there will be no advance sales.
Symposium participants will enjoy lecture-demonstrations by Jean Boyer and Hans-Ola Ericsson, who will address performance practice issues in the works of César Franck and Olivier Messiaen. Papers commissioned from John Near, Paul Peeters, and William Peterson will focus on Cavaillé-Coll, his place in history, and his influence on contemporary organ building and performance. These lectures will provide the basis for panel discussions involving Steven Dieck, Fenner Douglass, Jesse Eschbach, Susan Ferré, David Fuller, Ann Labounsky, Barbara Owen, David Pike, William Porter, Christa Rakich, and Haskell Thomson.
Symposium participants will also have the opportunity to peruse Oberlin's noted collection of archival materials relating to Cavaillé-Coll and his work.
The conference will also include demonstrations of Oberlin's other organs by William Porter, David Boe, and Haskell Thomson. The instrument in Warner Concert Hall was designed and built in the 18th-century northern European style by D.A. Flentrop in 1974, and the Fairchild Chapel organ, built in 1981 by John Brombaugh, is modeled on the late renaissance and early baroque style of north German organs. An organ in the town's First United Methodist Church also will be included.
More information is available at the conference website, by calling Oberlin's Office of Outreach Programs at 440-775-8044, or by e-mailing Anna Hoffmann.
The Westfield Center is the country's preeminent organization for the advancement of classical keyboard music. Founded in 1979, the Westfield Center is recognized for its advocacy on behalf of classical keyboard instruments and for outstanding workshops and symposia, publications, and international tours.
Long recognized as one of the world's leading centers for organ instruction, the Oberlin Conservatory of Music at Oberlin College, founded in 1865, is the oldest continuously operating conservatory in the United States, and the only major music school in the country linked with a preeminent college of arts and sciences.
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