Cover feature: Yale Institute of Sacred Music at Fifty Years

The Yale Institute of Sacred Music (ISM) is an interdisciplinary graduate center for the study and practice of sacred music, worship, and the related arts. Its students pursue degrees in choral conducting, organ, and concert voice with the Yale School of Music, or they engage in ministerial or academic studies in liturgy, religion and literature, music, or visual arts with the Yale Divinity School. The ISM is essentially a sequel to the School of Sacred Music at Union Theological Seminary (New York City), which lost its funding in the early 1970s and closed its doors. Robert Baker, then organist and dean of the School of Sacred Music at Union, relocated three faculty and one administrator from the Union school to Yale in New Haven, Connecticut, after securing funding from the Irwin-Sweeney-Miller foundation of Columbus, Indiana. This family foundation was headed by Clementine Miller Tangeman, whose late husband was a musicologist at Union, and her brother J. Irwin Miller, who was serving as senior trustee of the Yale Corporation. With its strong programs in divinity and music, Yale was deemed the perfect place to reconstitute a school or institute of sacred music. In 1973 inaugural director Robert Baker, together with chaplain and liturgical scholar Jeffery Rowthorn, musicologist Richard French, and administrator Mina Belle Packer, migrated to New Haven. After a year of intense preparation, the Yale ISM welcomed its first class of students: five in music and five in divinity. In 2024 the ISM celebrated the fiftieth anniversary of that momentous occasion.

The Yale Institute of Sacred Music is the cover feature in the August 2024 issue of The Diapason: 
https://www.thediapason.com/content/cover-feature-yale-institute-sacred-music-fifty-years

This short video traces the growth and impact of the Yale Institute of Sacred Music throughout its fifty years at Yale University. The Video is created by—and posted with permission from—Yale’s Office of Public Affairs and Communications.

For further information
To explore the many opportunities at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, visit ism.yale.edu. For information about the various degree programs, contact admissions manager Loraine Enlow at [email protected]. For information about long- and short-term fellowships, contact assistant director Eben Graves at [email protected]. 

Andrew Schaeffer holds degrees from St. Olaf College, Yale University, where he was a student of Thomas Murray, and University of Oklahoma. He currently serves as the director of music at Luther Memorial Church in downtown Madison, Wisconsin, and as editor-at-large of The Diapason.

Andrew Schaeffer: Let’s begin by hearing a little bit about your formative years in California.

Thomas Murray: I must begin with the single most important thing, which is that my mother and father were unsparingly supportive of my musical interests. I had piano lessons early and was fortunate to be a member of the Pasadena Boy Choristers when it was still directed by its founder, Dr. John Henry Lyons.

When it came time to think about a career, my parents were fully aware of the risk of trying to make a living in classical music. American culture doesn’t support that at all well! I was a keen organ student during high school years with a dream of being a performer both in concerts and in the church. My family wanted me to have a liberal arts education, in part to act as a safety net in case my passion for playing burned out! Very wise! Fortunately I was admitted to Occidental College in Los Angeles—a perfect choice, because that’s where Clarence Mader taught organ! He was one of the very finest teachers of his time, especially in the West. It’s important to note that, as a liberal arts institution, Occidental was not a place where you had the option of living in a practice room ten hours a day. But I was inseparable from music, and to be honest, I’m not sure if my aptitudes would have led me successfully down any other path. 

Where did you land after your years at Occidental?

When I was preparing to graduate, Mader asked me where I hoped to go to graduate school. I didn’t want to move on directly to graduate study, at least not right away. I yearned to be active in the profession, have a church and develop my ability in choral conducting. I have a feeling he privately shook his head with dismay, because the prevailing thought back in 1965 was that graduate degrees acted as secure passports to great jobs. What we didn’t know at the time was just how saturated the church music field would become with people who had advanced degrees.

The single most important thing was that my parents did not try to prevent me from pursuing my dream. As far as events are concerned, a pivotal one occurred in 1966, when I was awarded first place in what is now referred to as NYACOP. The judges that year were Mildred Andrews of the University of Oklahoma, Vernon de Tar of Julliard, and my future senior teaching colleague at Yale, Dr. Robert Baker. A small world!

Tell me a bit about Clarence Mader as a teacher. Is there any contemporary pedagogue that you know of who embodies his style today?

I studied with him prior to the rise of performance practice as a dominant orthodoxy. Mader stressed making the best musical use of whatever instrument one was playing for those there “in the present” to listen. He was deeply influenced by his teacher, Lynnwood Farnam, but was also “tuned in” to many of the contemporary composers of that time. I am certain he was disappointed in me because I had an aversion to much contemporary music of that period. I can embrace dissonance when it has an expressive purpose, but too much music of the late twentieth century I found acerbic and irritating. Dissonance is wonderful as a “spice,” but not when it becomes the “main course.”

When I studied with Mader he was not performing much, except on Sunday mornings at Immanuel Presbyterian Church. He had discovered that he loved teaching—just loved it—once telling me he had taught ten lessons in a day without a break! He was a gifted and avid composer, and I regret that the 2004 American Guild of Organists national convention in Los Angeles did not make a special effort to feature his music, because that year was the centennial of his birth.

What instruments were available to you during your time at Occidental? Did they make an impact on you?

The Schlicker in Herrick Chapel was installed after I graduated, so my time was spent on the 1930 Skinner organ in Thorne Hall. It was built for a Methodist Church in San Francisco that was forced into bankruptcy during the Great Depression. Occidental acquired it in 1938, installing it with the pipes in the back in a space probably intended for balcony seating and a projection booth. The console was located in an orchestra pit at the front. As you can imagine, it was not a comfortable arrangement, and additionally, reverberation was, and still is, non-existent. That organ, Skinner’s Opus 819, fell into disuse but has now been removed and will be restored for the Episcopal High School in Belaire (Houston), Texas.

Occidental had a fine reputation for high caliber organ instruction. Not many remember now that David Craighead taught there for several years before his appointment at Eastman in about 1955. It was Craighead who encouraged Occidental to hire Mader to succeed him. When the administration noted Mader’s lack of any college degree, Craighead, to his everlasting credit, told them “that doesn’t matter!”

Speaking of organs, what were some of the first ones you were exposed to in Los Angeles, and did any of them cultivate your love of the symphonic style of building?

O yes! When I was growing up in Los Angeles, there were still fine pre-World War I instruments built by Murray M. Harris, and there were E. M. Skinners, Kimballs, and pre-World War II Casavants as well. Harris’s organs were characterized by English-type ensembles and a few had imported Tuba stops from England. All Saints Church, Pasadena, and Second Church of Christ, Scientist, Los Angeles, are two that I was familiar with.

And there were some romantically trained organists who were really inspiring to watch and hear. I had the pleasure of knowing Anita Priest who played at First Methodist in Pasadena on their four-manual 1923 Skinner. Like many Skinners of his early period, it only had three general pistons, but Anita magically coaxed twelve out of the instrument! How? When she played a service, she could start with three generals for the prelude. (No one in those days would waste a general for the hymns!) During the invocation she reset them to accompany the professional quartet or the choir. Following that, she would reset them during the scripture readings in preparation for the offering, and finally reset them once more for the postlude. Presto! Twelve generals!

The choir occasionally did major choral works, one of which was an abridged version of Elijah. There was no orchestra involved, but Anita manipulated the organ so creatively that the music sounded thoroughly satisfying and natural. In the 1950s and 1960s, I witnessed the tail end of that style of accompanying, and in later years her style nearly became a lost art.

Now back to your career trajectory. After Occidental, where did you go?

Clarence Mader, who had been at Immanuel Presbyterian for nearly forty years, felt increasingly that he wanted to have his Sunday mornings free. I was enormously fortunate that he recommended me to follow him, and fortunate that the church acted on his suggestion. This led to my playing my first service there in January of 1966.

After some years, however, there appeared new incentives to think of a move from California. The first was the discovery—through the Organ Historical Society—of the old nineteenth-century Boston-built organs, especially those of E. & G. G. Hook. I was determined to experience New England first hand and was discouraged by the overdevelopment, congestion, and smog in Los Angeles. The idea of being surrounded with so much history and living in a brisk four-season climate was irresistible.

During my first trip to Boston, I became acquainted with the Hook organs at Immaculate Conception on Harrison Avenue, the Cathedral of the Holy Cross, and others, and I also met Barbara Owen, one of the great advocates of saving these amazing instruments. After that trip, I was convinced that New England, with its four seasons and historical riches, was where I wanted to live.

You recorded on the organ at Immaculate Conception shortly after that trip, correct?

Yes—in 1971, before leaving California. The first was a recording of Franck’s Grand Pièce Symphonique and the Fantaisie in A. Immaculate Conception, which had originally stood in a very Irish neighborhood, was run by the Jesuits who founded Boston College adjoining the church. That organ was so fantastic—almost French in nature, with bright chorus reeds, singing Diapasons, and delicious flutes, all in sumptuous acoustics! It’s in storage now, but all of us who knew it pray it will be heard again in a noble building like the one it left. 

As a complete beginner in the recording field, there was no assurance whatsoever of releasing any recording on a commercial label, so I hired recording engineers Stephen Fassett and David Griesinger, paid for the editing, and afterward marketed it myself to Sheffield Records in California. They had previously released a disc of Anthony Newman’s (it may have been his first), so I figured they were not averse to organ music! Thanks to great good fortune, they liked it and released it to a favorable reception. By the way, I’ve always been grateful to Robert Schuneman, then editor of The Diapason, for a very favorable review of that first disc. One other thing to note—E. Power Biggs had produced a disc on Columbia called The Organ in America with various light pieces by early American composers. But I believe our Franck recording made at Immaculate Conception can claim to be the first commercial recording of any major works on a significant nineteenth-century American organ, and a magnificent instrument it was, too.

So, when did you finally “bite the bullet” and make the move to Boston?

I left Immanuel Presbyterian in 1973 and was appointed interim organist-choirmaster at Saint Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral in Boston. The Dean, the Very Reverend Charles Henry Buck, had re-established a choir of boys and men a few years before. I was appointed interim because the choirmaster was suffering from poor health and recruitment for the choir had lapsed. Developing and maintaining a choir of men and boys with only after-school rehearsal time is work, as anyone who has done it will tell you! But the dean supported the work of rebuilding the choir, and in due time I was appointed to the permanent position. 

Things then changed considerably in the year after Dean Buck retired in 1978, because the new clergy “management” did not want to continue the choir and yet was unwilling to spend money on starting a choir for girls. But during my years there, before conditions became unfavorable, it was a really exhilarating time for us all!

We managed to take the choir on tour in 1978 to England. I wanted them to hear the best English choirs, so we went the last week of July, which afforded the opportunity to hear some fine London choirs for a week before beginning our own residency at Saint Alban’s Cathedral. We also sang services at Saint Paul’s, London, Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford, and, because we were from Boston, we traveled by coach to Boston in Lincolnshire to sing choral Evensong in the splendid medieval parish church there.

We shouldn’t leave this subject without noting that one of the boy trebles in that choir was Jonathan Ambrosino, now very well-known as an organ consultant and writer on all things organistical, and that Jonathan was influenced by the 1952 Aeolian-Skinner organ at Saint Paul’s, Opus 1207, another organ that has now been removed to make room for an elevator. One of the men of the choir on that trip was Stephen Kowalyshyn, inventor of the “Kowalyshyn Servo-Pneumatic Lever” used on large mechanical-action instruments, and another notable name from the organ world is Robert Newton, for decades the head of Andover Organ Company’s restoration department—he was a fine bass with us at Saint Paul’s.

I know that you were making recordings during your time at Saint Paul’s. Tell us about some of those projects.

Soon after moving in the summer of 1973, I made the first of two LPs of Mendelssohn sonatas on the 1854 E. & G. G. Hook organ at the Unitarian Church in Jamaica Plain. Because of the enormous frequency range of organ sound and the power of organ bass, one disc allowed only about twenty-four distortion-free minutes per side in those days. Sonatas 1, 3, and 4 were on that first disc. The acoustics in the church were so dry that we carried out the pew cushions and stacked them in the narthex. I also brought two blankets from home and built a tent on a 2 x 4 framework so they could be draped behind and above the console to keep the clatter of the worn key action out of the recording. It is a fascinating instrument that has recently received fine conservative restoration work by Scot Huntington. 

To complete all six of the sonatas, we recorded a companion album with numbers 2, 5, and 6 on the 1857 William B. D. Simmons organ at Most Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in East Boston, another rare survival among our pre-Civil War organs. The adventure there was dodging the noise from the Boston airport!

So, how were these instruments perceived when the recordings were released? Were they in fashion? Out of fashion? Or simply forgotten?

Most of them had been forgotten except among Organ Historical Society people. And as I said before, the only comparable record had been made by E. Power Biggs with his album of early American keyboard pieces. For that reason, I am confident these early discs of ours broke entirely new ground in establishing the integrity of our American instruments.

Through your recordings and work at St. Paul’s, you were firmly establishing yourself in the New England organ scene. How did your association with Yale come about?

Charles Krigbaum invited me to do a program in Woolsey Hall in about 1976. Not long before, Robert Baker had left the Union Seminary School of Sacred Music to be the first director of the newly established Yale Institute of Sacred Music. I remember devoting that first program to three sonatas, one each by Rheinberger, Hindemith, and Elgar. It must have left a favorable impression with both Charles and Robert, because late in 1980, Charles called me to say that Yale was creating a junior instructor position in organ and that the search committee would welcome an application! 

So I applied and was interviewed for that in the spring of 1981, playing a lecture-recital on the Beckerath organ in Dwight Chapel. I was enormously fortunate, yet again, that the audition was well received, resulting in the invitation to teach at Yale in the fall of that year. In retrospect, I suspect the new junior position was planned in preparation for Robert Baker’s retirement, because he taught only a few years after that.

When I started, my job consisted of teaching a few organ students, directing the Marquand Chapel Choir at the Divinity School and playing some weekday services there. A little later on Charles Krigbaum stepped away from playing at the University Church (Battell Chapel), and I assumed those responsibilities as well. Around the same time, Fenno Heath, the revered long-time director of the Yale Glee Club decided to give up the Battell Choir so I took that on for about five years. When Charles Krigbaum decided to retire from Yale in 1995, I left all choral commitments to focus on the organ department.

I remain enormously grateful, not only to Charles Krigbaum and Robert Baker, but to Martin Jean, who came to join me on the faculty in 1997. Martin, now director of the Institute of Sacred Music, though under great pressure in his administrative role, has been a cherished colleague, an outstanding coach for his students, an excellent advocate for the organ here, and a dear friend. 

When you arrived in 1981, the Romantic School of organbuilding and playing was still largely out of fashion, and I recall hearing that the organ in Woolsey Hall was not universally appreciated. Could you provide some insight into that? 

That’s true. For several decades, especially after the arrival of the Holtkamp organ in Battell Chapel in 1951, the organ in Woolsey, properly known as the Newberry Memorial Organ, was dismissed by many as a decadent, categorically flawed instrument from a “bad period.” Some give me credit for raising awareness of the worth of this wonderful instrument, but it was really Charles Krigbaum who laid the groundwork for its return to favor. Though he played a wide variety of literature and believed in being a “universalist” about repertoire, Charles had a particular fondness for Widor and the music of Messiaen. He recognized the organ in Woolsey as a persuasive vehicle for that music, and he recorded much of it there—including all ten Widor symphonies!

So, interest was already brewing by the time I arrived. We should all be thankful that during the “dark years” when there was a lack of interest among the students, the organ was conserved in its original form by Aubrey Thompson-Allen, the Yale Curator of Organs. Our current senior curators Nick Thompson-Allen and Joseph Dzeda, and now the younger members of their staff, Nate and Zach Ventrella, keep that legacy alive. Interestingly, as a student at Kent State University, Joe Dzeda had a framed photo of the Woolsey instrument in his dorm room!

Little did he know that his name would eventually be synonymous with its care!

Exactly! He’s admitted that during college, he wondered if he’d ever get the opportunity to see the instrument in person! Not only has he spent his career in it, but upon his demise, he will rest in the Grove Street Cemetery across the street, as he says, “to keep an eye on ‘The Newberry’!”

Speaking of Woolsey’s care, it must be gratifying, at the end of your time at Yale, to see the organ completely restored. Tell us about that process.

Yes, over many decades, the curators made timely repairs to the instrument to keep it in reliable working condition. But as years passed by repairs became more frequent and more urgent. In 2006, Martin Jean and I decided that the time was right to press for the first-ever comprehensive restoration, to be funded entirely by the Institute of Sacred Music. Readers may be surprised to learn that, until recent years, many of the 1915 Steere chests and 1928 Skinner chests were still operating on original leather! Due to the magnitude of the project, it was decided to undertake the work in stages over seven years, a division at a time during the summer months, to keep the organ in use during the academic year. The result is magnificent, and we are greatly relieved now that Skinner Opus 722 is poised for another century of service.

Back to recordings. So far, we’ve focused on your early work, recording historic instruments in Boston. I’d like to hear more about your recordings of orchestral transcriptions. I think its safe to say that you were one of the first to champion transcription playing.

Well yes—and you could say I took risks in doing that, but I don’t think I could have resisted the temptation! There are responsibilities we can’t ignore when playing original literature, particularly where composers are specific about registration. With transcriptions, it’s not that way. The philosophical question a player faces is whether to be faithful to arrangements as devised and published by a transcriber or to be as faithful as possible in translating the original score. I take the second approach, in part because the organs we have now offer flexibility and versatility not dreamed of in Edwin H. Lemare’s day. So I don’t take published transcriptions, even those written by Lemare, to be “holy writ,” though existing arrangements can often be useful as a “working score.”

Over the years, I’ve adapted several piano pieces for the organ. I really enjoy trying to get into the mind of the composer and posing the question: if I were Liszt, how would I orchestrate this piece? Do the figurations on the keyboard suggest an orchestral color? There may be no single right or wrong answer, but we must make a piece sound as convincing as possible in the new medium, the organ. There are two CD anthologies of transcriptions from Woolsey Hall: The Symphonic Organist and The Transcriber’s Art. One is on the Gothic label and the other on Priory. It’s the style of playing that I love, more than the fact that such pieces are transcribed ones. Of course, there is original organ music that invites the same approach as well.

Do you generally write your own transcriptions?

I’ve done only one transcription “from scratch” worth mentioning. Elgar wrote a major piece in the late 1920s, commissioned as a band competition piece called Severn Suite. No surprise that it’s in B-flat major! He must have sanctioned a proposed organ version by Ivor Atkins, his friend and Worcester Cathedral organist. That was published as the Second Sonata but, regrettably, Atkins eliminated a whole movement—the “Minuet”—adding an entire page of his own music in its place! 

Later on Elgar rewrote the piece for full orchestra and transposed it to C major. I decided that I wanted to play this version—the definitive one—in the worst way! It is a superb multi-movement work and every bit as wonderful as Elgar’s original Organ Sonata, opus 28. It was released by Joe Vitacco on JAV Recordings, no longer available on a “physical” CD, but can be downloaded from i-Tunes. Just look for Elgar’s Severn Suite, and you can have it for 99 cents per movement!

In addition to your work as an educator and recording artist, you’ve been a prolific recitalist all across the globe. Care to share some highlights?

I’ve been grateful for many invitations to play programs over the years, many for American Guild of Organists and Organ Historical Society conventions. In fact, there was a time when I was receiving an OHS invitation nearly every year, which led me to worry about folks becoming weary of me! There is such a thing as “too much of a good thing!”

I’ve been fortunate to do many performances in North America and Western Europe. An especially memorable tour was to Buenos Aires, organized by my former student Ezequiel Menéndez. From Australia came an invitation to play one recital in Sydney and two in Melbourne, and there was a recital at Suntory Hall in Tokyo when their Rieger organ was new.

My recital activity has been far from all consuming, though, and entering retirement, I’m happy to retreat a bit from that aspect of my activity. There are so many talented students I’ve had the pleasure of coaching. Not all have their heart set on concert playing, but for those who do I’d like to see them getting opportunities I had earlier.

Though you’ve stepped away somewhat from your recital career, you continue to serve as a church musician. Tell us about your responsibilities at Christ Church, New Haven.

For twelve years now I have been artist in residence and principal organist there, enjoying the spacious acoustics and playing a very satisfying English-sounding instrument. I’ve also mentored organ students from the Institute of Sacred Music who serve as organ scholars. Christ Church adjoins Yale’s campus and is one of America’s finest examples of Gothic Revival architecture anywhere. In my time we have had two fine rectors and a very appreciative congregation. It is a very happy association.

One final question. As you look at the profession, what are the challenges, concerns, and opportunities you see moving forward.

While there is certainly reason to be pessimistic about many trends we see in church music, I remain hopeful for a future that continues to support the music we love, music that nourishes because it is enduring! Churches supporting organ and choral music will not disappear, but they are becoming fewer and resources are diminishing. Too many think of “traditional” music and ceremonial as something stuck in the past. “Museum Church” they sometimes call it. People need to see that it really means being in the tradition—being a part of an ever-continuing creation of music and art that enriches the human spirit. My advice to students is to make sure they spare no effort to become as fine a musician as possible. If you’re among the best, you will have a far greater chance for success. 

Also, if you’re an Episcopalian or Roman Catholic, don’t be lured into thinking that the best jobs are in cathedrals! Good parishes are often better motivated and better equipped to support robust music programs.

Beyond that, we must learn to be far more effective at being advocates for what we do, for its enormous worth in society. I wish more academic professional programs would provide students with the strategies—the tools for advocacy! Every branch of music education, especially the “classical” branch, must rise to meet this need in our time.

Thank you so much for your time, and best wishes for a tranquil retirement!

Hearty thanks to you for this opportunity—my pleasure! But “tranquil?” I don’t anticipate that! It’s more a transition from employment to “self-employment,” happily with more freedom to enjoy many things, extra-musical and musical alike.

Photo: Thomas Murray, Luther Noss, and Charles Krigbaum in front of Woolsey Hall, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut

Thomas Murray, now Professor Emeritus of organ at Yale, taught alongside Charles Krigbaum from 1981 to 1995 and succeeded him as the designated Yale University Organist.

On April 30, 2020, Yale Professor Emeritus Charles Russell Krigbaum died at the age of 91 in Beverly, Massachusetts. To generations of Yale University students he was a much-beloved teacher. His thirty-six years of service on the School of Music faculty spanned the regimes of four deans and five Yale University presidents. His performances, lectures, and masterclasses took him throughout the United States, to Europe, Japan, and the Far East.

Charles Krigbaum was born on March 31, 1929, in Seattle, Washington, and spent his youthful years in New Jersey, where he studied piano with Margaret Maass and organ with Margaret McPherson Dubocq. He earned his Bachelor of Arts (1950) and his Master of Fine Arts (1952) degrees from Princeton University, where he was a pupil of Carl Weinrich. Following his completion of Naval Officer Candidate School and three and a half years active duty he received a Fulbright grant to study at the Hochschule für Musik and the Goethe University in Frankfurt during 1956–1958; Helmut Walcha and André Marchal were his European teachers for organ.

He joined the Yale faculty in 1958 when there was a need for a junior instructor in organ and a desire to have professional leadership for music in Marquand Chapel at the Divinity School. The choir flowered under his well-organized management; with membership established at twenty-four voices, there was soon a waiting list. Concerts in churches where alumni were ministers gave added interest to the work of the singers, and within a few years his success led to an appointment as conductor of the University Choir in Battell Chapel, a position he held from 1961 to 1973, when the Institute of Sacred Music came to Yale, bringing Robert Fountain as the head of an entirely new choral program. 

Charles’s time with the University Choir extended into the period when Yale became coeducational, necessitating the building of a new choral library, an important responsibility that he undertook with keen personal interest. William Sloane Coffin, then university chaplain, was a great lover of fine music and supported the University Choir in performing the Saint John Passion of J. S. Bach one year on Good Friday. Works commissioned during Charles’s regime included a choral Mass by Richard Donovan for unison men’s voices, with optional trumpet and tympani. “A very fine piece,” Charles recalled. Donovan’s Magnificat (TTBB voices) and his organ piece Antiphon and Chorale were later recorded in Battell Chapel for CRI.

Professor Krigbaum was instrumental in the design of the H. Frank Bozyan Memorial Organ, a significant legacy from his tenure at Yale. Bozyan (”Uncle Frank”) was university organist and a long-time member of the organ faculty who retired in June of 1965. Within a few years gifts from Bozyan’s family, colleagues, and admirers made it possible to commission the Rudolf von Beckerath organ in Dwight Memorial Chapel, a distinctive addition to Yale’s collection that has had a notable influence on Yale students for nearly a half century. Charles recalled the arrival of the organ: “Beckerath had suffered through a very difficult time installing an organ in New York City only a few months earlier. I was determined to make everything as happy for him and his crew as possible, and I believe it shows in the result. We gave them feasts of corn-on-the-cob, blackberry cobbler, plenty of beer, and some trips to the seashore near Newport. John Mander, who now presides over the London firm established by his father Noel, was an apprentice with Beckerath at the time and part of the installation team.” (Mr. Mander is now retired.)

Charles played the dedication recital and five all-Bach programs. During its first year the organ was played by a number of well-known visitors, but later the funding for guest performers dried up. Charles, ever eager to bring stimulating artists to Yale, was known to offer his services gratis to organists at other universities in exchange for their appearance in New Haven. This circumstance accounts for a memorable comment from Aubrey Thompson-Allen, curator of organs during those years, who was overheard one day making the wry observation: “Krig pro quo!”

Many events are recalled with pleasure—symposia on the Romantic organ, on Buxtehude, Widor, and Guilmant, not to mention the 1985 premiere (shared with John Ferris of Harvard) of Bach’s youthful chorale preludes in the Neumeister Collection. Among lighter moments was the visit of the Dalai Lama, when Charles had to locate a copy of the Tibetan national anthem. He obtained one from John Fenstermaker at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco (where the Dalai Lama had appeared some time previously). In Charles’s words: “the written music is indeed something to see—a melody for the right hand and a drone note for the left. I played the right hand on the Schalmei with a few other odds and ends. It seemed the sound of an exotic wooden instrument might work best. But, of course, there are only the two notes at a time, and the lower one never moves!” At the end, the Dalai Lama returned his appreciation with a reverential bow directed to Krigbaum in the gallery. Charles hastily faced him and returned the courtesy. It was the cause of some good-natured chuckles.

In teaching, Charles always sought to foster well-roundedness. “Universality” was his word for it. “A student who knows the Romantics should also be well acquainted with Scheidt and Couperin. If the earlier repertoire is what they bring from their past experience, they should come to love Widor and Messiaen just as much.” It is well known that Widor and Messiaen were two of Charles’s keenest interests. He became a staunch advocate for the renowned Newberry Memorial Organ in Yale’s Woolsey Hall as a persuasive vehicle for their music, recording much of Messaien’s organ music on LPs and later recording the complete organ works of Charles-Marie Widor for AFKA. An unedited recording of his live performance at the Organ Historical Society’s 1975 convention was issued on a two-disc set, An Evening at Woolsey Hall.

Charles Krigbaum retired from Yale in 1995. In 2007 a new three-manual Taylor & Boody instrument in the gallery of Marquand Chapel, commissioned by the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, was inaugurated and named the Krigbaum Organ in his honor. 

In contemplating deep musical questions, he mused: “You know, the art of organ playing requires total commitment. Artistic growth is difficult to achieve without that.” Along with many, he had great concern about the direction of church music. “We are seeing so much democratization. Democratization in itself—certainly the ideal of simplicity—is not bad. But for better or worse America sets the fashion in popular culture—in music, clothing, movies. And when we see a popular, market-driven style of music taking over in the church, especially where there is carelessness and a casual approach, it makes me wonder: how deep is the faith? How much of this is the work of a true artist with deep belief?”

Charles Krigbaum is survived by his children Ruth (Herb) Rich and Mary Krigbaum of Beverly, and John Krigbaum (Denise), of Gainesville, Florida. He is also survived by four grandchildren Sam Rich, of Brooklyn, New York, Ben Rich, of Boston, Massachusetts, Jennie Krigbaum of Beverly, and Clara Krigbaum, of Gainesville.

Photo: Charles Krigbaum at the Newberry Memorial Organ, Woolsey Hall, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut (photo courtesy: Yale Institute of Sacred Music)

Thomas H. Anderson

Thomas H. Anderson, 86, of North Easton, Massachusetts, died December 30, 2023. Born May 25, 1937, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he met his late wife Susan in Belfast, where they grew up on the same street.

Anderson started working at age 14 as an apprentice pipe maker at an organ pipe manufacturer in Belfast. At age 19, he emigrated to the United States, where he worked at the Aeolian-Skinner Organ Company, Boston, Massachusetts, as a pipe maker. Later he started his own company, Thomas H. Anderson Organ Pipe Company. He traveled around the country working on various projects including the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C. In his later years, he traveled to teach others to make organ pipes.

Anderson’s wife Susan died December 31, 1996, almost 27 years before the date of his death; they were married 38 years. They raised four children who survive him: Gail McGill and her husband Mark of Raynham, Massachusetts; Thomas Anderson of Lake Wylie, South Carolina; Cheryl Dekeon of Haverhill, Massachusetts; and Elizabeth Lehr and her husband Donald of Berryville, Virginia. He is also survived by six grandchildren, two step-grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.

The funeral for Thomas H. Anderson, Jr., was held January 6 at Southeast Funeral and Cremation Services, Easton, Massachusetts, with burial following at South Easton Cemetery. Memorial gifts may be made to Old Colony Hospice and Palliative Care (oldcolonyhospice.org).

Harold Gilchrest Andrews, Jr.

Harold Gilchrest Andrews, Jr., of High Point, North Carolina, died December 3, 2023. He was born March 31, 1932, in Framingham, Massachusetts, and grew up in Centerville on Cape Cod. At the age of eight, under the tutelage of Virginia Fuller, his first piano teacher, Andrews played services at the local Unitarian church. After his 1949 high school graduation, he attended Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Oberlin, Ohio, where he earned a Bachelor of Music degree in organ performance. After college, he served in the United States Army for two years as an organist at West Point. He then moved to Greensboro, North Carolina, playing first at First Friends Meeting House and then at Guilford Park Presbyterian Church. During this same period, he began his long tenure as a professor of organ at Greensboro College, where he remained until 1988. The C. B. Fisk, Inc., organ, Opus 102 (1993), at Finch Memorial Chapel of Greensboro College was donated and installed through his efforts. He also co-founded the Greensboro Chapter of the American Guild of Organists.

Leaving Guilford Park Church, Andrews took the position as organist and master of choristers at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, High Point, where he would spend the next 55 years. While working at St. Mary’s, Andrews completed a Master of Music degree in organ and church music at Oberlin Conservatory and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Boston University.

Andrews founded and owned Organ Craft, a local organbuilding company. He built and installed pipe organs all over the east coast, including part of the organ at Christ United Methodist Church in Charlotte and the organ at Guilford Park Presbyterian Church in Greensboro. The organ at St. Mary’s in High Point was also significantly altered over the years by Andrews.

As an organist, he offered recitals in Europe, including at Canterbury Cathedral; St. Paul’s Cathedral, London; Saint-Sulpice, Paris; and Chartres Cathedral. In his retirement, he finished his manuscript for a study of music in the works of William Shakespeare.

Harold Gilchrest Andrews, Jr., is survived by one brother, Robert Francis Andrews. His funeral featuring Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem was held at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, High Point, on January 27. Interment in the church columbarium followed. Memorials may be directed to the music endowment at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, 108 West Farriss Avenue, High Point, North Carolina 27262.

Charles Edmund Callahan, Jr.

Charles Edmund Callahan, Jr., 72, died December 25, 2023, in Burlington, Vermont. He was born September 27, 1951, in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Callahan was a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and earned graduate degrees from The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C. He held the Associate and Choirmaster certificates of the American Guild of Organists. In 2014 he was honored with the Distinguished Artist Award of the guild.

Callahan taught at Catholic University; Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vermont; Baylor University, Waco, Texas; Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida; and the Bermuda School of Music, Hamilton, Bermuda. He served as organist and music director for churches in Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., New York, Vermont, and his native Massachusetts. Callahan moved to Orwell, Vermont, in 1988.

He was consulted often on the design of new organs and restorations and improvements of existing instruments. His two books on American organbuilding history, The American Classic Organ and Aeolian-Skinner Remembered, became standard reference works on 20th-century American organ history.

Callahan was a prolific composer; his compositions include commissions for Papal visitations to the United States and from Harvard University. His four-movement orchestral work, Mosaics, was premiered at the Cathedral Basilica of St. Louis, Missouri, and other works have been performed at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton universities.

Charles Callahan was laid to rest with his parents in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Memorial contributions in his memory may be made to the music programs at St. Mary’s Catholic Church, 326 College Street, Middlebury, Vermont 05753, or Cornwall Congregational Church, 2598 Route 30, Cornwall, Vermont 05753.

James P. Callahan

James P. Callahan of St. Paul, Minnesota, died December 28, 2023. Born in North Dakota and raised in Albany, Minnesota, he earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in 1964 from St. John’s University, Collegeville, Minnesota, and his Master of Fine Arts degree in piano and a Ph.D. in music theory and composition from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis. In addition, he studied at the Mozarteum University, Salzburg, Austria, and Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien, Vienna, Austria. His teachers included Anton Heiller, organ; Willem Ibes and Duncan McNab, piano; and Paul Fetler, composition.

Callahan was Professor Emeritus at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota, where he taught piano, organ, composition, music theory, and piano literature over a 38-year period, retiring in 2006. As an organist, Callahan performed recitals in the upper Midwest, New York, and Austria. His performances appeared on the nationally broadcast radio program Pipedreams. He was instrumental in overseeing the commissioning of the organ for the chapel at the University of St. Thomas, Gabriel Kney Opus 105, completed in 1987. On this instrument he recorded a disc for Centaur, James Callahan: Oberdoerffer, Reger, Rheinberger, Schmidt. He also performed solo piano recitals and made concerto appearances. In addition to his solo performances, he was a member of the Callahan and Faricy Duo piano team, performing throughout the upper Midwest.

James Callahan composed over 150 works for piano, organ, orchestra, band, opera, and chamber ensembles. Cantata for two choirs, brass, percussion, and organ premiered at St. John’s Abbey Church and was performed at the Cathedral of St. Paul in 1975. His Requiem was premiered by Leonard Raver in 1990 at the University of St. Thomas. Callahan’s music was published by McLaughlin-Reilly, GIA, Paraclete Press, Abingdon Press, and Beautiful Star Publishing. Awards included a study grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities and a Bush Artist Fellowship.

Quentin Faulkner

Quentin Faulkner, 80, died December 30, 2023, in Houston, Texas. He was Larson Professor of organ and music theory/history (emeritus) at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, a writer of scholarly books in the areas of church music and J. S. Bach performance practice, the translator of German treatises of the 17th and 18th centuries, and an organ recitalist.

Faulkner earned his undergraduate degree in organ and church music from Westminster Choir College, Princeton, New Jersey, where he studied organ with George Markey and Alexander McCurdy. He received graduate degrees in sacred music and theology from Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas, where he studied conducting with Lloyd Pfautsch, organ with George Klump, and liturgics with James White. Faulkner completed his doctoral studies at the School of Sacred Music, Union Theological Seminary, New York City, where he studied organ with Alec Wyton. Each of these schools subsequently awarded him its distinguished alumni award for his contributions to the field of church music. While a student in New York City, he served for three years as assistant organist at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine, during which time he led the musical celebration honoring Wyton at his retirement and was the organist for Duke Ellington’s funeral.

For 32 years Faulkner served on the faculty at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, where he developed a comprehensive cycle of courses in church music and received numerous teaching awards. He and his colleague George Ritchie were co-coordinators of a distinguished series of organ conferences at the university, each conference with a distinct topic of scholarly investigation and culminating in the first conference held in Naumburg, Germany, at the newly restored 1746 Hildebrandt organ in St. Wenzel’s Church. In 1998 Faulkner was awarded a Fulbright grant to teach as guest professor at the Evangelische Hochschule für Kirchenmusik in Halle, Germany, a position to which he returned for the academic year 2006–2007 following his retirement from the University of Nebraska.

Faulkner’s professional career included both academic and practical pursuits. He was equally respected for his scholarly investigation in the field of church music (Wiser than Despair: The Evolution of Ideas in the Relationship of Music and the Christian Church, Greenwood Press, 1996) and in historical performance practice of the organ works of Bach (J. S. Bach’s Keyboard Technique: A Historical Introduction, Concordia, 1984; The Registration of J. S. Bach’s Organ Works, Wayne Leupold Editions, 2008; Johann Sebastian Bach, The Complete Organ Works, Series II, Volume I, The Performance of the Organ works: Source Readings, Leupold Editions, 2020). He translated historic German treatises into English, and then edited and annotated the translations to make them accessible to contemporary students and scholars (Jacob Adlung, Musica mechanica organoedi, Parts 1, 2, and 3, Zea E-Books, 2011; Michael Praetorius, Syntagma Musicum II: De Organographia, Parts III–V, Zea E-Books, 2014).

Faulkner reveled in working at the intersections of various disciplines, particularly enjoying the interplay of the scholarly and the performing musician and extensively studying the relationships between and among religion, culture, and the arts. He served as a member of the advisory board for the Encyclopedia of Keyboard Instruments for Garland Publishing Co., as consultant for the J. S. Bach Tercentenary publishing project of Concordia Publishing House, as editor for performance issues for the Leupold Edition of J. S. Bach’s organ works, and as a member of the advisory board of the Institute of Sacred Music at Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut. He also led multiple tours of Bach’s Organ World in eastern Germany, sharing his passion and knowledge with participants as they studied, played, and listened to instruments with direct connections to J. S. Bach.

Throughout his career and in retirement, Faulkner remained a performing musician, presenting organ recitals, workshops, and lectures. He and his wife served as church musicians in Dothan, Alabama; New York City; Lincoln, Nebraska; and Greenfield, Massachusetts. He was particularly concerned with music in small churches and wrote numerous practical articles for professional journals, composed anthems for small choirs, and served as a clinician for more than fifty church music workshops in Nebraska. He served the American Guild of Organists on various local and national committees and as its national councilor for education. He was an honorary lifetime member of the Lincoln Chapter of the AGO.

Quentin Faulkner is survived by his wife of 56 years, Mary Murrell (Bennett) Faulkner, three brothers, a daughter and son-in-law, a son and daughter-in-law, and four grandchildren. A memorial service will be held April 20 at Christ Church Cathedral, Houston, Texas. Memorial contributions may be made to the Alzheimer’s Association (Attention: Donor Services, 225 North Michigan Avenue, Floor 17, Chicago, Illinois 60601; alz.org/donate), Church Music Institute (5923 Royal Lane, Dallas, Texas 75230; churchmusicinstitute.org/donate), or the charity of one’s choice.

Brian E. Jones

Brian E. Jones, 80, organist and choir director, died November 17, 2023. A native of Duxbury, Massachusetts, he began piano studies at age eight and discovered the pipe organ soon thereafter. During his first visit to Trinity Church, Copley Square, Boston, Massachusetts, as an eager ten-year-old, he was said to have exclaimed, “I want to be the organist here someday!” Some three decades later, his dream became a reality.

After earning an undergraduate degree from Oberlin Conservatory of Music, Jones landed a teaching position at Noble and Greenough School, Dedham, a post he would hold for the next twenty years. Concurrently he completed the Master of Music program at Boston University. While at Noble and Greenough he conducted numerous choral groups and expanded the music program to include the production of a wide variety of musicals.

Soon after commencing his teaching career, Jones was appointed music director of the Dedham Choral Society, a position he held for 27 years. During his tenure, the group grew in size from 25 to 150 members, expanding their audiences by performing in Symphony Hall and Jordan Hall in Boston. In 1984 Jones fulfilled his childhood dream when he was appointed director of music at Trinity Church, Boston. Over the next two decades he and his choirs produced five recordings, including the Christmas CD, Candlelight Carols. In addition to his work as a choral conductor, Jones enjoyed a solo organ career, performing concerts and dedicatory recitals in churches and cathedrals throughout the United States and England. Upon assuming the mantle Emeritus Director of Music and Organist at Trinity Church in 2004, Jones accepted interim positions from as far afield as Albuquerque, New Mexico. In 2007 a number of former Trinity choir members coalesced to form The Copley Singers under Jones’s direction. This semi-professional group of musicians began performing together several times each year, most notably during the holiday season.

Brian E. Jones is survived by his husband, Michael Rocha, with whom he shared the past 35 years, as well as two children, Eliza Beaulac and her husband, Joe, and Nat Jones and his wife, Kiera; four grandchildren and one great-grandson. A celebration of life is planned for spring. Memorial gifts in memory of Brian Jones may be made to the Parkinson’s Foundation (parkinson.org).

Uwe Pape

Uwe Pape, 87, died August 13, 2023, in Berlin, Germany. He was born May 5, 1936, in Bremen, Germany. In his early life, he studied mathematics, physics, pedagogy, and philosophy at Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen, graduating in 1959, earning a doctorate in computing technology at Technische Universität Braunschweig in 1971.

From 1971 to 2001 Pape was professor of business informatics at the Technische Universität Berlin. He was visiting professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1974 and in 1984–1985; at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1975; at the University of Texas at Austin in 1976; and at the University of Szczecin, Poland, from 1988 until 1998.

Pape was recognized worldwide for his expertise in pipe organs, especially historic mechanical-action instruments. Pape had his first contact with organbuilding in 1953 at the Liebfrauenkirche, Bremen, where he studied with Harald Wolff and had contact with the organ builder Paul Ott. Pape began to document the organs of the Braunschweig Lutheran Church in 1959. In 1962 he founded a publishing house for works on organbuilding history, which exists today as Pape Verlag Berlin. He became a freelance organ expert for regional churches and foundations in Berlin, Bremen, Lower Saxony, and Saxony. From 1985 to 2016 he led a research project on organ documentation that resulted in an organ database at the Technische Universität Berlin. With Paul Peeters of Gothenburg and Karl Schütz of Vienna, Pape was one of the founders of the International Association for Organ Documentation (IAOD) in 1990. He made significant contributions to the documentation of historic north German organs. Among his many book-length publications is The Tracker Organ Revival in America/Die Orgelbewegung in Amerika, first published in 1978. One of his most recent publications is Organographia Historica Hildesiensis: Orgeln und Orgelbauer in Hildesheim, printed in 2014. For The Diapason, he wrote “Documentation of Restorations,” which appeared in the December 2006 issue, pages 20–22.

Alice Stuart Parker

Alice Stuart Parker, 98, born December 16, 1925, in Boston, Massachusetts, died December 24, 2023, in Hawley, Massachusetts. Having grown up in Winchester, Massachusetts, she graduated from Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, in 1947, having studied organ and composition. After earning a Master of Music degree in choral conducting from The Juilliard School in New York City two years later, she began teaching in a high school. Parker would then study and begin a long collaboration with Robert Shaw and the Robert Shaw Chorale. She would meet and marry one of the chorale’s singers, Thomas F. Pyle, in 1954.

As a composer she would pen more than 500 choral works and arrangements, from choral anthems to cantatas and operas. In 1985 Parker founded Melodious Accord, which presents choral concerts, singing workshops, and other events. The Musicians of Melodious Accord, a 16-member chorus, made several recordings with her. Parker authored books including The Anatomy of Melody in 2006 and The Melodious Accord Hymnal in 2010, both available from GIA Publications. She conducted masterclasses and seminars widely.

Alice Stuart Parker was predeceased by her husband in 1976. Survivors include her sons David Pyle and Timothy Pyle; daughters Katharine Bryda, Mary Stejskal, and Elizabeth Pyle; 11 grandchildren; and six great-grandchildren.

Michael Radulescu

Michael Radulescu, 80, born June 19, 1943, in Bucharest, Romania, died December 23, 2023. He studied organ and conducting with Anton Heiller and Hans Swarowsky in Vienna, Austria, at the Academy (now University) of Music and Performing Arts, where he taught as professor of organ from 1968 to 2008. His career encompassed work as a composer, organist, and conductor. With his debut in 1959 he presented concerts throughout Europe, North America, Australia, South Korea, and Japan. He regularly presented guest lectures and masterclasses in Europe and overseas, focusing mainly on the interpretation of Bach’s organ and major choral works.

As a composer, Radulescu wrote sacred music, works for organ, voice and organ, choral and chamber music, and orchestral works. He was frequently engaged as a jury member in international organ and composition competitions and as an editor of early organ music. Radulescu conducted international vocal and instrumental ensembles in performances of major choral works. As an organist, he recorded among other items Bach’s complete works for organ, without any technical manipulation.

For his musical and pedagogical contributions, Radulescu was awarded the Goldene Verdienstzeichen des Landes Wien in 2005. In 2007 he received the Würdigungspreis für Musik from the Austrian Ministry of Education and Art. In December 2013 Michael Radulescu’s book on J. S. Bach’s spiritual musical language, Bey einer andächtig Musiq: Schritte zur Interpretation von Johann Sebastian Bachs geistlicher Klangrede anhand seiner Passionen und der h-Moll-Messe, focusing on the two passions and the B-Minor Mass, was published. For The Diapason, his article, “J. S. Bach’s Organ Music and Lutheran Theology: The Clavier-Übung Third Part,” was printed in the July 2019 issue, pages 16–21.