Nunc Dimittis

Dona Lee Brandon died June 16 in Davis, California. She was 81. She began organ study while in high school and earned a bachelor’s degree in music from Park College in Missouri, and a master of sacred music degree from Union Theological Seminary, where she studied organ with Robert Baker. At UTS she met fellow student George Brandon, and married him in 1954. The Brandons taught at Eureka College in Illinois, and William Penn College in Iowa. In 1962 they moved to Davis, California, where Mrs. Brandon worked as an organist and choir director, serving at Davis Community Church (1963–67) and at St. Martin’s Episcopal Church (from 1967 until her retirement in 1995). She was also affiliated with the Music School at the University of California–Davis, accompanying choral groups, teaching organ, and playing recitals and for commencement ceremonies. A longtime member of the Sacramento AGO chapter, she proclaimed her enthusiasm for the music of Bach with her license plate, “JSB FAN.” Dona Lee Brandon was preceded in death by her husband George, and is survived by her daughter and son-in-law, Barbara and Jim, and her sister Melva Ann.

Richard W. Litterst died August 9 at age 83 in Loves Park, Illinois. Born in Decatur, Illinois, February 4, 1926, he attended the University of Louisville, served in the U.S. Navy, and then completed his studies at the University of Illinois and Union Theological Seminary School of Sacred Music. He served as organist, choirmaster, and handbell director at churches in Westfield, New Jersey; Omaha, Nebraska; and Rockford and Freeport, Illinois. In 1959, he was appointed to Second Congregational Church, Rockford. He also conducted the Rockford Pops Orchestra for more than 30 years, and taught at Rockford College, Rock Valley College, and Beloit College.
Litterst served as dean of the Rockford AGO chapter and was a member of the Mendelssohn Club and Rotary. He was an early member of the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers, serving the organization in many capacities, including as president. He was nationally known as a handbell director and for his arrangements and compositions for handbells. Most recently he served as organist for the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Rockford, playing his last service there on July 22.
A memorial service was held August 14 at First Presbyterian Church, Rockford, with a number of organists from the Rockford AGO and the Rockford Pipe Band participating, with alumni of the Martin Ringers of Second Congregational Church playing music by Litterst; other music in the service was by Karg-Elert, Franck, and Widor. Richard W. Litterst is survived by his wife Judy, son, two daughters, and grandson.

Ivan Ronald Olson died June 16 in Sacramento, California. Born in Soldier, Iowa, on March 15, 1928, he played his first church service while in the sixth grade and then took over as organist after confirmation on through high school until he left for college in 1946. He received a BA in music from the University of Iowa in 1950 and taught music at Morehead, Iowa, where he served as choir director at Bethesda Lutheran Church. He then earned a master’s degree from the University of Texas, Austin, and began teaching at Concordia Lutheran College of Austin in 1952, where he continued until 1964. During that tenure he served as organist-choirmaster at First English Lutheran Church and Redeemer Lutheran Church in Austin. He married Danna Foster in July 1956.
Olson took a leave of absence from Concordia to study at Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where he was awarded a Doctor of Sacred Music degree in 1963. In 1964 he joined the faculty at American River College, Sacramento, California, and became the organist-choirmaster at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. He also served as accompanist for many vocal recitals.
Olson moved to Fair Oaks in the summer of 1967 and joined the staff at Pioneer Congregational Church in 1969. He was an active member of the American Guild of Organists and served as dean of the Sacramento chapter. He retired in 1992 from American River College and Pioneer Congregational Church, and then served as interim organist-choirmaster at St. John’s Lutheran Church, where he had been a member since 1967. At St. John’s he worked in adult education, served on the church council, and looked after the concert series for three seasons. He did substitute organist work until grandchildren began to arrive. Ivan Olson belonged to the Rose Society and spent many happy hours tending his many roses and a vegetable garden.

Theodore W. Ripper died on July 2 at age 83. Born on August 1, 1925 in Coraopolis, Pennsylvania, he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh. He served as university organist at the University of South Dakota and then taught at Carnegie Mellon University from 1949 to 1955. He married Gladys McMillan on June 15, 1953 in Coraopolis. They moved to Atlanta in 1955, where he was minister of music for Peachtree Christian Church for 10 years.
Ripper then taught at Millikin University and served at First United Methodist Church in Decatur, Illinois, 1965–75, and was director of music at Grace United Methodist Church in Venice, Florida, 1975–84. He next served as director of music at First United Methodist Church, Carlsbad, New Mexico, for eight years. After retirement, he continued to work in Roswell as music director for St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church.

Mark P. Schantz died at age 58 on June 13 at his home in Walton Hills, Ohio. The son of Bruce and Grace Putnam Schantz of Orrville, Ohio, he was a graduate of Otterbein College and had a lengthy career with American Greetings of Cleveland, from which he took early retirement to start his own business, Schantz Woods, which designed, fabricated, and restored furniture. He also served on the board of directors of the Schantz Organ Company of Orrville, assisting his brother Victor, the president of the firm. Mark P. Schantz is survived by his wife Lee, children Kate, Jessa, Erick, and John, and siblings Ann Schantz Perlmutter, Victor Schantz, Jill Schantz Frank, Ted Schantz, and Peter Schantz.

Edward D. Berryman died August 22 in Minneapolis at the age of 88. He was born on February 8, 1920, in Omaha, Nebraska, the son of Cecil and Alice Berryman, Paris-trained concert pianists. His musical studies began at the piano with his parents, and his first organ studies were with J. H. Sims at All Saints Episcopal Church in Omaha. In 1942 he received a B.A. with “Distinction in Music” from the University of Omaha, and then went to the University of Minnesota to study organ under Arthur Jennings. Berryman taught at the University of Minnesota from 1943 to 1959. In 1950, after receiving his M.A., he took the position of organist and choirmaster at the Cathedral Church of St. Mark in Minneapolis. Upon Jennings’ retirement in 1956, Berryman became university organist, playing on the 108-rank Aeolian-Skinner organ of Northrop Auditorium. Also in 1956, he married Gladys Reynolds, with whom he shared 35 years of his life.
After earning a doctorate in sacred music from Union Theological Seminary in New York City, Berryman served as organist-choirmaster at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis from 1962 to 1987. He also taught at Macalester College in St. Paul from 1965 to 1985, and at Northwestern College from 1976 to 1991. For many decades Dr. Berryman served as the Minneapolis Civic Organist, presiding at the 124-rank W. W. Kimball organ in the Minneapolis Auditorium.
In retirement, he maintained a large studio of piano and organ students. In 1991, his wife Gladys passed away. The next year, he married Maria Sandness, a childhood friend from Omaha. A memorial service was held at Westminster Presbyterian Church in Minneapolis on September 6, at which several of his organ and piano students performed. Edward Berryman is survived by his wife, Maria, three stepchildren, a brother, and four grandchildren.
—Michael Ferguson

David Straker Bowman, associate professor of music and organ at Alabama State University, died October 4 at the age of 69. He served on the university’s faculty from 1971 until his retirement in August 2008. A native of Chattanooga, Tennessee, he earned a Bachelor of Music degree, cum laude, from the University of Kentucky in 1961. In 1963, he earned the Master of Music from Syracuse University, and was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study with Helmut Walcha in Frankfurt, Germany for two years. He completed the Doctor of Musical Arts in 1970 at the University of Michigan, where he studied with Marilyn Mason and was a teaching fellow in music theory. He also studied with Russell Saunders at the Eastman School of Music, and at Union Theological Seminary and the University of Tennessee.
Bowman served on the faculty of Schoolcraft College in Livonia, Michigan, and as organist-choir director at Metropolitan Methodist Church in Detroit. Prior to his death, he was music director at All Saints Episcopal Church in Montgomery. He performed at the Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina, and at conventions of the American Guild of Organists. Beginning in 1970, he performed Marcel Dupré’s Stations of the Cross, which became his signature piece, in more than 60 venues throughout the United States.
David Bowman is survived by two brothers, three nephews, two nieces, and his long-time partner Malcolm E. Moore (Mike).
—Richard McPherson

Genevieve Cox Collins, 96 years old, died August 18 in Hammond, Louisiana. A life member of the American Guild of Organists and founder of the Baton Rouge AGO chapter with her late husband, Frank Collins, Jr., she earned degrees in organ performance from Louisiana State University. Following her marriage to Frank Collins, her former major professor, the couple traveled to Paris at the height of the Depression; Frank studied with Marcel Dupré and Genevieve with Louis Vierne. Returning to Baton Rouge, Frank continued as LSU professor of organ until his death in 1968, and Genevieve served as organist-choirmaster at Trinity Episcopal Church for 40 years and Temple B’nai Israel for 50 years. She served as dean of the Baton Rouge AGO chapter multiple times, and was an active member of the Philharmonic Club. Genevieve Collins is survived by her son Jimmy, his wife Helen, and two nieces, Mary Lee McCoy and Barbara Gordon.

Raymond Canfield Corey died August 6 in Castle Point, New York, at the age of 90. A lifelong resident of Poughkeepsie, he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in organ and choral conducting from the Juilliard School. He served in the U.S. Army Air Corps during World War II. He and his wife Heather Harrison were the proprietors of the Poughkeepsie Music Shop for 39 years. Corey, who built the organs for St. James Methodist Church in Kingston and the First Evangelical Lutheran Church in Poughkeepsie, was a music director and organist for numerous area churches for 75 years. He played in several dance bands, conducted the IBM Chorus, accompanied productions for the Children’s Community Theater in Poughkeepsie, and was the last organist to play the Wurlitzer organ at the Bardavon for silent movies in the 1930s. Raymond Corey is survived by his wife, his daughter Cheryl and son-in-law Christopher Hoffman, their daughter Alicia, son and daughter-in-law Raymond K. and Colleen Corey, and their son, Paul Raymond.

Paul Thomas Hicks, age 70, died April 18 in Bartlett, Tennessee. A Memphis native, he earned a bachelor of music degree from Southwestern at Memphis (now Rhodes College), and a master of music degree from Memphis State University (now the University of Memphis); his teachers included Adolph Steuterman and Harry Gay. Hicks served First United Methodist in Memphis for 34 years; in retirement he served as interim organist at Idlewild Presbyterian Church, where he oversaw the installation of the city’s first carillon, and on which he gave concerts and played the bells on a daily basis until his health declined. A published composer, two of his anthems (Spirit Divine, Attend Our Prayer and Father, in Whom We Live) were sung at his funeral service at Idlewild Presbyterian. He was author of four books on local Methodist churches, and was a member of the West Tennessee Historical Society. An active member of the Memphis AGO chapter since 1964, Hicks was the examination coordinator for 20 years. Paul Hicks is survived by his sisters Mary Overby and Martha Ochsner, and brother George Hicks.

Stan Kann, longtime organist for the Fox Theatre, St. Louis, died September 29 in St. Louis. He was 83. Kann began playing the organ at age 4, and the piano in high school, and majored in classical organ at Washington University. He played the Fabulous Fox Theatre’s mighty Wurlitzer pipe organ from 1953 to 1975, performing between movies and at special events. During those years he also performed at Ruggeri’s Restaurant on the Hill and Stan and Biggie’s restaurant.
As a hobby, he began collecting vacuum cleaners when he was a young man; he owned more than 150 antique sweepers, which he kept in his home in the Holly Hills neighborhood. Television viewers first met Kann in the 1950s, when he served as the musical director for “The Charlotte Peters Show” and “The Noon Show,” both produced by KSD-TV. A lifelong bachelor, Kann moved to the Los Angeles area in 1975; he returned to St. Louis in 1998. In 2005, filmmaker Mike Steinberg released a documentary, “Stan Kann: The Happiest Man in the World.”

Henry Murlin Kelsay,
82, died August 23 in Springfield, Missouri. He was born on February 17, 1923
in Versailles, Missouri. After graduation from high school in Booneville,
Missouri, he enlisted in the Army Air Corps in 1942, rising to the rank of 1st
lieutenant and serving as an air corps navigator. He fought in several World
War II battles and air campaigns in southern France and Italy, and was
decorated with numerous medals and citations. Kelsay graduated from Union
Theological Seminary in New York City, and went on to serve as music director
at several churches in the Little Rock, Arkansas area, including Pulaski
Heights Methodist Church and Christ Episcopal Church. He served as dean of the
Central Arkansas AGO chapter 1954-55 and 1959-61. Later in life he
became interested in interior decorating and was successful in that endeavor.

At the time of his death, Kelsay was a member of St. James
Episcopal Church in Springfield, Missouri. A memorial service took place there
on September 17. He is survived by his sister-in-law and three nephews.

--Virginia Strohmeyer-Miles

Noel Mander, MBE,
FSA, prominent British organbuilder, died September 18 at his home in Suffolk,
England, at the age of 93.

Born on May 19, 1912 in Crouch near Wrotham, Mander was
brought up in South London. Having left school (which he hated), he went to
work for A & C Black, publishers. The office work did not suit him,
however, and through his uncle, Frederick Pike, he met Ivor Davis who had
worked for Hill, Norman & Beard. After working with him for a while, Mander
started on his own in 1936, the first organ being that at St. Peter’s
Bethnal Green opposite St. Peter’s School, which years later was to
become the organ works. Unfortunately, Christ Church Jamaica Street, Stepney, where
he rented workspace, together with the organ he was working on and all his
equipment, were lost in the first air raid on East London 1940.

Shortly after that, he joined the Royal Artillery, seeing
service in North Africa and Italy, where he worked on a number of instruments,
including the organ in Algiers Cathedral, which had been silent for years.
Having been invalided out of active service in Italy, he joined the Army
Welfare Service and during his convalescence he repaired a 17th-century organ
in Trani.

After the war he assisted the London Diocese in getting
organs working again in bomb-damaged churches. He set up a workshop in an old
butcher’s shop in Collier Street before moving in 1946 into the old
buildings of St. Peter’s School in Bethnal Green, where the firm remains
to this day. In 1948 he married Enid Watson with whom he had five children,
living over the workshop in Bethnal Green. Most of his early work revolved
around the rebuilding of organs, many of which survive to this day.

He always had an affection for historic instruments and
restored a number of antique chamber organs, setting new standards for the time
with his sympathetic appreciation and restoration of them. Of particular note
was the restoration of the 17th-century organ at Adlington Hall in Cheshire in
1958-59, which was in a completely desolate state. It had not been
playable for perhaps a century, 
but with painstaking care the organ was restored and remains one of the
most important survivors in England.

In the 1960s he became aware that interest was growing in
tracker-action organs in the rest of Europe, and this encouraged him to
investigate this form of action himself, initially in the restoration of
instruments (which otherwise might have been electrified) and then in new
organs. Ultimately a number of such instruments were built including the export
of some to places such as Bermuda and the Sir Winston Churchill Memorial
Foundation in Fulton, Missouri.

Having been involved with the rebuilding of a number of
large organs, he was awarded the contract to rebuild the organ in St.
Paul’s Cathedral in London during the 1970s. This project, lasting almost
five years, was perhaps his greatest pride and was completed just in time for
the Queen’s Silver Jubilee celebrations at St. Paul’s. In 1978 H.M.
Queen Elizabeth made him a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE). He
retired in 1983 to his home in Suffolk, but retained an interest in what the
firm was doing right to the end. The 60th anniversary of the Mander firm was
marked in 1996 by publication of a collection of essays in his honor entitled
Fanfare for an Organ Builder.

Noel Mander’s interests were by no means restricted to
organs. He was a keen historian and an avid bookworm. He was a Fellow of the
Society of Antiquaries and very active in the Council of Christians and Jews
for many years. He became a very popular member of the Earl Soham community in
Suffolk, where he retired to in 1983. He was also the British representative
for the Sir Winston Churchill Foundation in Missouri and secured a number of
significant pieces of antique furniture for the Wren church rebuilt there,
including, during the last year of his life, a fine 18th-century pulpit that
had once stood in a City church.

Philip Marshall, who
served as organist at both Ripon and Lincoln cathedrals, died on July 16. Born
in Brighouse in 1921, his early studies were with Whiteley Singleton, a pupil
of Edward Bairstow. He gained an Associateship of the Royal College of Music,
and in 1946 won three prizes in the Fellowship examination of the Royal College
of Organists. He earned his BMus at Durham in 1950, by which time he was
assistant to Melville Cook at Leeds Parish Church. He also served as organist
at All Souls, Haley Hill, Halifax, where he met Margaret Bradbury, whom he
married in 1951, and who survives him. The Marshalls moved that year to Boston,
working at the Parish Church and Grammar School. By 1957,
style="mso-spacerun: yes">  Philip Marshall had completed his
doctorate at Durham, studying with Bairstow’s York successor, Francis
Jackson, and was appointed organist at Ripon Cathedral. Founding the choir
school, rebuilding the cathedral instrument and producing a chant book were
highlights of his tenure at Ripon.

An accomplished model engineer, organbuilder and composer as
well as an outstanding organist, accompanist and teacher, Dr. Marshall served
as organist and master of the choristers at Lincoln Cathedral for 20 years
until retirement in 1986. The Dean and Chapter named him Organist Emeritus in
the early 1990s.

Dorothy Hildegard Nordblad died of congestive heart failure on September 9 at the Moorings, a
retirement community in Arlington Heights, Illinois. She was 93. A lifelong
member of Ebenezer Lutheran Church in Chicago, she served for 37 years as
organist and director of junior choirs at Edison Park Lutheran Church, where
she directed 60 children in three choirs. Nordblad also taught history, math
and music to hundreds of children, serving the Chicago public schools for 40
years.

The daughter of Swedish immigrants, she was born in Chicago
in 1911 and graduated from Senn High School before attending Northwestern
University, where she received her bachelor’s degree in education in 1932
and a master’s degree in education in 1946.

Her teaching career began at Stewart School, and in the late
1950s Nordblad moved to Beaubien Elementary School on the Northwest Side. In
addition to teaching, she was assistant principal, a position she held until
her retirement in the 1970s. After she moved to the Moorings retirement home,
she organized and directed the choir there, continuing as its director for more
than seven years. Funeral services were held on September 14 at Ebenezer
Lutheran Church, Chicago.

Donald W. Williams,
of Ann Arbor, died September 22 at the Chelsea Retirement Center, Chelsea,
Michigan, following a seven-month battle with cancer. He was 66.

Williams received his bachelor’s degree (1961) and
master’s degree (1962) from Peabody College in Nashville, Tennessee,
where he studied with Scott Withrow. In 1979 he received the DMA from the
University of Michigan, where he studied with Marilyn Mason. At Michigan, he
was given the Palmer Christian Award by the Organ Department of the School of
Music in recognition of his accomplishments in teaching, performing, and choral
conducting.

Dr. Williams served as organist and choirmaster at Zion
Lutheran Church in Ann Arbor from 1963 until 1995, when he became
organist-choirmaster at Chelsea First United Methodist Church, a position he
held until his death. He was a member of the organ faculty of the National
Music Camp in Interlochen, Michigan, from 1966 to 1970, and was adjunct
lecturer in organ at the University of Michigan in the early 1970s. He taught
organ performance and church music at Concordia University in Ann Arbor (1976-95,
1999 until his death). He was co-founder of the Ann Arbor Youth Chorale, which
he directed with Richard Ingram and Ruth Datz from 1987 to 2001, and was
founder and conductor of the American Chorale of Sacred Music.

Williams performed at churches and cathedrals in this
country and abroad, including the National Cathedral and the Shrine of the
Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C., St. Thomas Episcopal Church in New
York City, St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal, and various European venues.
From 1981 to 1985 he performed as a member of Principal VI, a group of
organists from the greater Ann Arbor area. In 1986, he gave the world premiere
of Vincent Persichetti’s last composition, Give Peace, O God.

In addition to the various positions he held in the Ann
Arbor chapter of the American Guild of Organists, Williams was chair of worship
standards and repertoire of the American Choral Directors’ Association
(1995-2001), and a member of the board of the Boy Choir of Ann Arbor from
2000 until his death. He was a life member of Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia.

Funeral services were held on September 26 at First
Presbyterian Church of Ann Arbor. Williams is survived by his 97-year-old
father, Joel Williams, of Marietta, Georgia.

Virginia French Mackie died in her sleep at home in Santa Fe, New Mexico on June 20. Born August 15, 1900, in Lancaster, Missouri, she moved in early childhood with her family to Hutchinson, Kansas.

Music was a vital part of her life from the age of three, when she began piano lessons with her mother. She began playing the organ for church before her feet could reach the pedals. By the time she graduated from high school, she had composed the Hutchinson school song, still performed to this day.

At 17 she entered Wellesley College, where she was elected to Phi Beta Kappa during her junior year, and, as a senior, won the Billings Prize for excellence in music. Conducting the orchestra was one of her many musical contributions to the school. Socially conscious, she remembered marching five miles in high heels, as a supporter of the Constitutional amendment giving women the right to vote! Following her graduation from Wellesley in 1921, Virginia entered Columbia University, where she was awarded the MM degree as one of only two women in her class.

She began her career as a junior college teacher in Kansas City, where she met David C. Mackie, a banker whom she married in 1928. The couple moved to New Haven, Connecticut, where David enrolled in the Yale School of Architecture, while Virginia commuted to Northampton to teach music at Smith College.

Summers were spent in England and France. Virginia studied with Tobias Matthay in London, and with Nadia Boulanger at Fontainebleau, where Mrs. Mackie was awarded one of only two diplomas given to women at the École de Musique.

In 1934 the Mackies returned to Kansas City. David began his architectural practice and Virginia joined the faculty of the University of Missouri at Kansas City, where she taught as a distinguished professor for 25 years. During that time she maintained an affiliation with the Yale School of Music, teaching there in 18 summer sessions.

In 1963 the Mackies moved to Tucson, Arizona, and Virginia was invited to join the faculty of the University of Arizona, where she taught for 12 years. Arizona awarded her an honorary degree in recognition of her contributions to the musical life of the community.

After David's death in 1975, Mrs. Mackie moved to New Mexico, where she was named a Living Treasure of Santa Fe in 1994. She was invited back to Kansas City to present a series of lectures and performances of works by Franz Joseph Haydn, one of her favorite composers, and to receive an honorary doctor of music degree from the University of Missouri, Kansas City in 1989, joining Count Basie as only the second musician to be so recognized by the school. Virginia Mackie continued to teach harpsichord and piano in Santa Fe well past her 100th birthday in 2000.

--Larry Palmer (Based on an obituary [22 June 2005] in The Santa Fe New Mexican)

Theatre organist Billy Nalle of Fort Myers, Florida, died on June 7. Born in Fort Myers April 24, 1921, he was a piano prodigy at age three, when he started picking out melodies, and began playing in public at age four. He graduated from Fort Myers High School in 1939, receiving the American Legion Honor Award. From 1933–39 he was pianist of the Al Linquist Jazz Orchestra of Fort Myers and perfomed solo organ work on station WINK. During these years Billy studied under Eddie Ford, organist at the Tampa Theatre, and became Eddie's assistant. Later, he performed a stint at the Florida Theatre, Jacksonville.

He studied piano and organ at the Juilliard School of Music; principal teachers were the organ and piano virtuoso Gaston Dethier and Teddy Wilson, pianist of the Benny Goodman Orchestra. During this same time, Billy had organ engagements at the Manhattan Beacon Theatre, Brooklyn Paramount, and the Waldorf-Astoria ballroom.

Nalle served in the U.S. Navy 1943–46 and during his last year of service was assigned to the U.S.N. Entertainment Unit, where he, Lawrence Welk, vocalist Bobby Beers, and noted choreographer Bob Fosse toured the Pacific Ocean military bases. During 1947 and 1948, he did postgraduate studies at The Juilliard School, and then began a 26-year career in New York City providing music for more than 200 television shows on CBS, NBC and ABC. Billy appeared on over 5,000 telecasts, an unparalleled record for an organ soloist. As well as solo appearances on major television programs such as "Kraft Theatre" and the "Downbeat Show," Billy had the distinction of appearing as an organ soloist on the "Ed Sullivan Show" the same evening that Elvis Presley appeared for the first time. Throughout his theatre organ performing career, he was featured in concerts at countless public venues throughout the country and for several national conventions of the American Theatre Organ Society.

In 1957, Billy's recording career began when RCA tapped him to record "Swingin' Pipe Organ," an LP commemorating the work of trombonist Tommy Dorsey. Nalle recorded this at the Times Square Paramount Wurlitzer with George Shearing's drummer, Ray Mosca, and it is still considered a landmark recording in theatre organ circles. Numerous commercial recordings followed on Wurlitzer organs installed at the Century II Center (Wichita), Brooklyn Paramount Theatre (aka: Long Island University), Senate Theatre (Detroit) and Auditorium Theatre (Rochester, New York). Currently, Wichita Theatre Organ is in the process of producing a series of recordings drawn from his many live concerts performed on the Wichita Wurlitzer, scheduled for release later this year.

Billy's concert career did not actually start until age 45, when he performed for a national convention of the American Guild of Organists at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, Georgia in 1966. It was the first formal theatre organ concert in the group's history, and received a rave review in Audio magazine, the Atlanta Constitution and the New York Times. The latter newspaper featured his career in three major articles, and sometime later Billy's life was the object of a feature in the Wichitan magazine. A writer himself, Billy supplied reviews and articles to national publications, including a four-year news column in the AGO-RCCO publication, Music.

As a composer member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), Billy had numerous compositions to his credit. However, he may be best remembered by church musicians and theatre organists alike with his published arrangement of Jerome Kern's "All The Things You Are" in the form of a Bach trio sonata, entitled Alles was du bist. Billy once remarked that he did better financially on the rights gleaned from this arrangement than any other single thing he ever did.

In 1975, Billy accepted the position of Artist-in-Residence at the Century II Center in Wichita, Kansas, where the 4-manual, 36-rank Wurlitzer from the Times Square Paramount Theatre had been relocated. For eleven years, he played concerts in the Wichita Pops series, made numerous recordings and continued to concertize nationally. In 1993, the American Theatre Organ Society voted him into their Hall of Fame. In 1995, Nalle ended a full-time career and returned to Fort Myers, Florida, where he lived until his death.

He always prided himself on his ever-growing list of "firsts," including the first theatre organ concert to be performed at The Church of St. John The Divine, New York City. In a relatively brief period of twenty years, Billy performed twenty-five national and international music firsts on a theatre organ.

Billy was a man of strong convictions and deep religious faith. In the years just prior to leaving Wichita, he was active in the formation of St. Joseph of Glastonbury Anglican Catholic Church, the city's first Anglican place of worship. In his tiny efficiency apartment, he managed to find space for an altar and several religious icons. In fact, his living space was much like his playing: filled to the hilt with interesting "stuff" without feeling the least bit cluttered.

He was always full of stories about the great concerts he attended while living in New York and the personalities he encountered. One of his favorites was about his friendship with organist Virgil Fox, who lived only a short distance away from his apartment. Fox had been contracted by Wichita Theatre Organ to perform a concert at Centuy II (eventually released by RCA on LP as "The Entertainer") and sought Billy's advice on how to handle the Wurlitzer, just prior to Billy's move there. Fox wanted to stick to the classics, but Billy suggested that, as an encore piece, he should choose a simple, well-known melody and improvise on it. Fox out-and-out refused. "Why not?" said the ever-inquisitive Billy. Fox leaned over the dinner table, looked Billy straight in the eye and whispered, "I'll tell you why: too hard . . . that's why!"

To the end, Billy was a complete original, always encouraging young musicians to be themselves, and not to get caught up in what was stylistically popular at the moment. He was inexhaustible as a resource. Right to the end of his career, he was a developing musician, never casting anything completely in stone. Kind, thoughtful, sensitive, highly intelligent and a fine conversationalist--all will remember Billy as the consummate southern gentleman.

Paraphrasing his first Wichita LP seems to say it all: There (was) only one Billy Nalle.

--Scott Smith

Lansing, Michigan

The Rev. William F. Parker, of Atlantic City and Philadelphia, died on April 16. Born in Philadelphia and raised in Margate, he graduated from Temple University and the Temple University Theological Seminary, and earned his Master of Divinity degree from Princeton University. An ordained Presbyterian minister, he was pastor at Lower Bank Methodist Circuit, New Jersey, Mizpah Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, and Leeds Point Presbyterian Church. For 24 years he served as pastor at Olivet Presbyterian Church in Atlantic City. He was also an experienced organist, serving for a number of churches and synagogues in the Philadelphia area, and was organist for St. James Episcopal Church in Atlantic City and Old St. George's Methodist Church in Philadelphia.

William Parker is survived by his sister, Helen Holmes Parker. A memorial organ recital will take place on October 15 at First Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia, with Joseph Jackson as organist.

Martha Novak Clinkscale, American musicologist and researcher in the history of the early piano, died in Dallas on April 24 from injuries sustained in an automobile accident. Born in Akron, Ohio (June 16, 1933), Dr. Clinkscale held piano performance degrees from the University of Louisville (Kentucky) and Yale University, and the PhD in musicology from the University of Minnesota. Her two-volume study Makers of the Piano 1700–1820 and Makers of the Piano 1820–1860 (both published by Oxford University Press) comprises nearly a thousand pages of carefully detailed information about extant instruments: an invaluable and oft-quoted source.
The introductory essays to these books immediately reveal both a mastery of vocabulary and the wide-ranging extent and geographical distribution of the many colleagues who contributed information about the instruments listed. Two short examples from the second volume: “Those musicians who preferred the caress of the clavichord’s tangent found in the early square pianoforte a felicitous addition to their musical experience” (p. ix); “[This book] is not intended to be a frivolous addition to its owners’ libraries. It seeks to inform . . .” (p. x).
Precise and carefully crafted prose as well as the avowed intent to maintain a consistency of style were also hallmarks of the author’s approach to life. John Watson, creator of the technical drawings accompanying the second volume and primary collaborator in a related online database Early Pianos 1720–1860, summed it up succinctly: “She was an elegant woman.”
Martha Clinkscale served the American musical community in many capacities, including as editor of the Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society (1993–6) and as treasurer of the Southeastern Historical Keyboard Society (2004–8). She taught at the University of California, Riverside (1979–96) and the Meadows School of the Arts at Southern Methodist University (1998–2004), where she was also a member of the organ department’s examining juries each semester of her years in Dallas.
Survivors include daughter Lise Loeffler-Welton and son Thor Loeffler, as well as professional colleagues and friends on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean.
—Larry Palmer

Anna G. Fiore-Smith died in Fall River, Rhode Island, on November 11, 2009, at the age of 81. She studied piano at the New England Conservatory and the Juilliard School, and studied organ with Homer Humphrey and later with George Faxon at the New England Conservatory; she also studied with Nadia Boulanger at Fontainebleau, France, winning first prizes in piano, organ, chamber music, and solfège. Fiore-Smith served as organist and choir director at St. Stephen’s Church, the Church of the Ascension, and Temple Beth El, all in Providence, R.I., and later at the Barrington Congregational Church; she also taught organ at Barrington College. A former dean of the Rhode Island AGO chapter, her name was given to a chapter award that is bestowed on a member organist who typifies her devotion to the organ. She was also active in the Greater Fall River Symphony Society, and was a member of its first executive board. Anna G. Fiore-Smith was preceded in death by her husband, Harold N. Smith; she is survived by her brother and sister-in-law, Faust D. and Susanne Fiore, and many nieces and nephews.

Martin Owen Gemoets died on February 3 in Galveston, Texas. He was 42. He earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of Houston, and a master’s degree in organ from the University of North Texas at Denton in 1996. A member of the Dallas and later Fort Worth AGO chapter, Gemoets held the AAGO and ChM certifications and promoted interest in the certification exams, writing articles on music history for the Fort Worth chapter’s newsletter. He was working toward his FAGO certification. He had recently relocated to Galveston. Martin Owen Gemoets was interred next to his father in Houston during a private graveside service.

Donald M. Gillett died April 3 in Hagerstown, Maryland, at the age of 90. He was the last president of the Aeolian-Skinner Organ Company of Boston, Massachusetts, which closed in 1972. Born April 8, 1919, in Southwick, Massachusetts, he earned a degree in business administration from the University of Maryland. He served four years in the Army Air Corps, stationed in Midland, Texas, as a chaplain’s assistant.
Don’s musical interest started when he was four years old, his parents having taken him to a number of organ recitals at the Municipal Auditorium in Springfield, Massachusetts. He started piano lessons at age six with Dorothy Mulroney, the Municipal Auditorium organist. After moving to Washington, D.C., he studied piano and organ with Lewis Atwater, organist at All Souls Unitarian Church and also Washington Hebrew Congregation. Don’s interest in organbuilding also started with the study of the organ.
His first organbuilding job was with Lewis & Hitchcock in Washington, D.C. Four years later in 1951, with a desire to learn voicing and tonal finishing, he was hired at Aeolian-Skinner, working under G. Donald Harrison and reed voicer Herbert Pratt. In later years, Don became a vice president and head tonal finisher. Upon the retirement of Joseph Whiteford in 1968, Don was offered the opportunity to buy up controlling interest in Aeolian-Skinner, and then became president and tonal director.
In the early 1970s, Aeolian-Skinner was building its last three instruments: St. Bartholomew’s NYC, Trinity Wall Street, and the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. The company was in the final stages of Chapter 11 and eventual closing. Don’s last finishing for Aeolian-Skinner was the Kennedy Center.
In March 1972, Riley Daniels, president of the M. P. Möller Organ Company in Hagerstown, offered Don a job at Möller as head flue pipe voicer. After the death of John Hose, Möller’s tonal director, Don became tonal director, and eventually vice president. He retired from Möller in 1991.
Also an avid art collector, he served on the Board of Directors of the Washington County (Maryland) Museum of Fine Arts. Donald M. Gillett is survived by his companion of 40 years, Warren S. Goding of Hagerstown; sister-in-law, Jane Mace of Palm City, Florida; and cousin, Mary Davis of Fort Lee, New Jersey.
—Irv Lawless
Hagerstown, Maryland

Frances M. Heusinkveld, 83 years old, died February 22 in Forest City, Iowa. She attended Northwestern Junior College in Orange City, Iowa, and Central College in Pella, where she studied piano and began organ lessons. She pursued a master’s degree in piano at the University of Iowa and later eared a Ph.D. in organ literature there. Heusinkveld taught in various schools in Iowa, including Upper Iowa University and for 33 years at Buena Vista College in Storm Lake, where she taught theory, music appreciation, piano, and organ. She was also organist of the United Methodist Church in Storm Lake, where she helped the church install a Bedient organ in 2002. Heusinkveld earned the Service Playing, Colleague, and AAGO certifications, and served as dean of the Buena Vista AGO chapter; she also played the cello and was a member of the Cherokee Symphony Orchestra. She enjoyed the study of foreign languages and traveled extensively. Frances M. Heusinkveld is survived by two brothers and many nieces and nephews.

Richard Dunn Howell died January 26 in Dallas. He was 78. Born in Great Bend, Kansas, he began playing for church services at Grace Presbyterian Church in Wichita at the age of 13. He graduated from Wichita University in 1954 and Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in 1957; he received a master of sacred music degree from Southern Methodist University in 1966. Howell taught elementary music in Richardson and Dallas, and played for many children’s, youth, and adult choirs. He also directed various handbell ensembles. In the course of his activities, he worked with Austin Lovelace and Lloyd Pfautsch. Richard Dunn Howell is survived by his wife of 52 years, Bradley Sue, three children, and three grandchildren.

Austin C. Lovelace, composer and church organist, and Minister of Music, Emeritus, at Wellshire Presbyterian Church in Denver, died April 25 at the age of 91. Born March 26, 1919, in Rutherfordton, North Carolina, he began serving as a church organist when he was 15 and went on to do workshops and recitals in 45 states and six countries. He earned his bachelor’s degree in music at High Point College in North Carolina in 1939 and his master’s (1941) and doctorate (1950) in sacred music from Union Theological Seminary in New York City.
Lovelace was a chaplain’s assistant in the Navy and served as minister of music at a number of churches, including First Baptist Church and First Methodist in High Point, North Carolina; Holy Trinity Episcopal, Lincoln, Nebraska; Myers Park Presbyterian Church and Myers Park Baptist, Charlotte, North Carolina; First Presbyterian Church, Greensboro; First Methodist, Evanston, Illinois; Christ Methodist, New York City; Lover’s Lane Methodist in Dallas, and Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church and Wellshire Presbyterian in Denver.
He was still filling in as organist at area churches when he was 87. He taught at several colleges, including Queen’s College and Davidson College in North Carolina, Union Theological Seminary, Iliff School of Theology in Denver, and Garrett Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois.
Lovelace was fond of jazz. Twice, he had Dave Brubeck and Duke Ellington, both with their bands, join the choir at Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church for performances. Lovelace, known for his sense of humor, wrote five books, including “Hymns That Jesus Would Not Have Liked.” A prolific writer and composer, Lovelace has several hundred compositions in print, as well as numerous articles and books on church hymnody; he was involved with twenty denominations in the development of their hymnals. A past president and Fellow of the Hymn Society of America, Lovelace was also active in the American Guild of Organists, including serving as dean of the North Shore chapter. In 2009 he received the American Music Research Center’s Distinguished Achievement Award, and was honored by the Denver Chapter of the American Guild of Organists with a hymn festival.
Austin Lovelace is survived by his wife of 69 years, Pauline Palmer (“Polly”) Lovelace, daughter Barbara Lovelace Williams, and a grandson.

Betty Jean Taylor Bartholomew died October 11, 2008, at the age of 84 in Eugene, Oregon. Born in Eugene on December 10, 1923, she had a career as a piano and organ recitalist and church musician in five states before returning to Oregon in 1990, where she was music director-organist at the Episcopal Church of the Resurrection. She established the Leadership Program for Church Musicians in the Diocese of Oregon, and presented workshops at AGO conventions and for the American Choral Directors Association, the Association of Anglican Musicians, and at diocesan conferences. Ms. Bartholomew was dean of the Seattle and Eugene AGO chapters and served as a regional and national councillor. She also held positions on the AGO special projects advisory board, the national convention committee, and the professional concerns committee.
Bartholomew was the recipient of the Bishop’s Cross of the Episcopal Diocese of Olympia in 1991, and in recognition of her achievements and service to the AGO for more than 50 years, she received the Edward A. Hansen Award during the 2004 national convention in Los Angeles. She is survived by five children and five grandchildren.

Margaret E. Brakel died July 17, 2008, at age 85 in Reading, Pennsylvania. Born in Marshall, Minnesota, in 1923, she earned a bachelor’s degree in music from the University of Minnesota and a master’s in organ performance from the University of Oregon–Eugene. She served as organist at First Congregational Church, Eugene, before moving to Pennsylvania in 1965. Brakel served as organist for West Chester United Methodist Church, West Chester, Pennsylvania, for 37 years until her retirement in 2002. During her years there, she continued organ studies with Harry Wilkinson and Vernon deTar. She is survived by a son, daughter, sister, brother, and three grandchildren.

N. Frederick Cool, long-time organ builder, died December 27 in Pauls Valley, Oklahoma, at the age of 80. He was born June 1, 1928, in Independence, Missouri, where a memorial service was held at the Stone Church, the same building where, as a small boy, he fell in love with the church and the church’s Pilcher organ. He married Beryl Romaine Lafferty in 1949 while at Graceland College in Lamoni, Iowa. They had seven children over the next eleven years, all of whom worked at one time for the organ building firm that he founded in 1953, Temple Organ Company.
Starting in Independence, the company was moved to Lamoni in 1958 and then to Burlington, Iowa in 1966, where six organs were built. The company was moved to St. Joseph, Missouri in 1975, where it has been ever since, now under the direction of oldest son David.
Early in his career, having apprenticed with the late Charles McManis, Cool eschewed the style of organ building prevalent in this country during the 1950s, opting for the more classical approach. Obtaining a contract for a large rebuild in the Episcopal church, then a cathedral, in Quincy, Illinois, he secured the consultation help of Robert Noehren and designed a 51-rank organ in 1955. It had, before being destroyed with the church in a recent lightning strike, 23 ranks of mixtures and seven reeds, including a horizontal trumpet.
Before his retirement in 1999, Cool had built 150 organs, including several digital instruments in conjunction with Classic Organ Works of Ontario, Canada, after he could no longer do intricate voicing work due to the onset of Parkinson’s disease. The company continues to operate in St. Joseph, based on the tonal concepts of a balanced organ, with the legacy of N. Frederick Cool’s determination to build church organs suitable for edification and musical uplift in divine worship.
—David Cool

Carol A. Griffin died September 14, 2008, at age 76 in San Jose, California. Born in French Camp, California, she majored in organ at San Jose State University. She was a church organist for 59 years, serving in various churches in the Bay Area, including First Christian Church, San Jose; Willow Vale Community Church, and Trinity Presbyterian Church. A member of the San Jose AGO chapter, Griffin earned the Colleague certificate in 1981. She was also a member of the Music Teachers Association of California and for 41 years held various offices for MTAC, including president and vice-president. She is survived by her husband Bill, a son, a daughter, six grandchildren, and four great-grandchildren.

Alfred John Neumann died October 13, 2008, at age 79. Born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1928, he earned a bachelor’s degree from Davidson College in North Carolina, and a master’s from the University of Michigan. From 1958–94 he was organist-choir director at Christ Congregational Church, Silver Spring, Maryland, during which time he took the choir on 20 singing tours in the U.S., Canada, Hawaii, and Europe. Under his leadership, the choir premiered two of his sacred operas on NBC-TV in Washington, DC. During his tenure at Christ Church, Neumann produced and directed many musical works, and the choir recorded two commercial LPs on the Crest label. In 1976, he was coordinator and music director of the national convention of the United Church of Christ. During the summer months, he served as assistant to the director of the Brevard Music Center in North Carolina.

Wesley T. Selby, Jr. died July 3, 2008, at age 80. He was raised in Salisbury, Maryland and enlisted in the Army in 1946. He earned a bachelor’s degree in composition from the University of New Mexico and a master’s degree from the University of Colorado, where he studied with Everett Jay Hilty. He served two tenures each at the Cathedral of St. John and St. Paul Lutheran Church in Albuquerque, and was organist-choirmaster at the Church of St. Michael and All Angels. For four years he was minister of music at Montview Presbyterian Church in Denver, and he taught at the University of Colorado in Boulder. As professor of organ at the University of New Mexico, he taught organ, music theory, composition, and conducting. He directed the installation of the Holtkamp organ in Keller Hall and the Wicks organ in the Alumni Memorial Chapel. He served as dean of the Albuquerque AGO chapter, was coordinator for two regional conventions, and served as state chairman for New Mexico. He built a harpsichord, which he donated to UNM, and a small practice pipe organ for his home.