Vol. 20, No. 1

Sept. 7, 2000

Musical artists to perform in Organ Inaugural Series

English organ virtuoso Thomas Trotter and a host of renowned local organists will perform in the Jefferson Organ Inaugural Series scheduled to christen the new, custom pipe organ installed this summer in the University of Delaware's recently renovated Bayard Sharp Hall. The series will give the public its first opportunities to hear the grand sounds produced by the 1,234-pipe instrument that was designed and built by Dobson Pipe Organ Builders Ltd., expressly for the balcony of the building that was formerly St. Thomas Episcopal Church. The instrument was a gift to the University from Edward and Naomi Jefferson of Greenville. The series opens at 8 p.m., Friday, Sept. 15, when David Herman, chairperson of the UD Department of Music, presents a concert that will include Spitfire Prelude by William Walton, Prelude and Fugue in C Major, S. 547 by Bach and much more. The concert will be repeated at 3 p.m. on Sunday, Sept. 17. Herman was appointed professor and chairperson of the UD Department of Music in 1987 and also is the organist at the Newark United Methodist Church. As an active recitalist, he has performed on many of the significant organs and carillons of North America, Britain and Germany. He is active in the American Guild of Organists and is the author of The Life and Work of Jan Bender (Chantry Music Press, 1979). His choral and organ works are included in the catalogs of five American publishers. The series continues at 8 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 14, when Trotter, organist for the city of Birmingham, England, will play. A scholar at the Royal College of Music in London, and then organ scholar at King's College in Cambridge, Trotter completed his formal studies with Marie-Claire Alain in Paris. In addition to giving 30 recitals each year in Birmingham Town Hall, Trotter regularly tours North America, Europe, Australia and Japan. He has performed with leading orchestras, including the San Francisco Symphony, the Royal Philharmonic, the London Philharmonic and the Berlin Philharmonic. He records exclusively for Decca, and his Messiaen and Mozart releases were included in Gramophone's Critics Choice lists. His Liszt recording from the Merseburg Cathedral won the 1995 Franz Liszt Grand Prix. The San Francisco Chronicle called his playing "delicate and finely fingered, sensitively voiced and phrased" and the American Organist lauded him as "the servant of a musical intelligence that is both mature and versatile." The last concert in the series for the year 2000 will be held at noon on Wednesday, Dec. 6, when "Carols for the University" will be presented. This free concert celebrates the arrival of the organ with a program of music for the season. It will include traditional carols sung by the audience. The concert series picks up at 8 p.m., Friday, Feb. 23, with a performance by William Owen, organist and choirmaster at Christ Church, Christiana Hundred, in Greenville, and concludes with a concert by Dave & Friends, at 8 p.m. on Friday, April 27. During that concert, Herman and colleagues from the UD faculty will present music for organ and other instruments and voices. With the exception of the concert of carols, tickets for each performance are $10 each. Tickets may be ordered in advance in person at the Bob Carpenter Center and Trabant University Center box offices or by phone through Ticketmaster, (302) 984-2000, where a service charge will apply.