John Kuzma dead at 75

James P. Autenrith

James P. Autenrith, 97, of Potsdam, New York, died September 20 in Canton, New York. Born in New Berlin, New York, on October 1, 1923, he was raised in Newport and graduated from West Canada Valley Central School. He served in World War II as a chaplain’s assistant in Mannheim, Germany, and was assigned to play the organ in Heidelberg at the funeral of General George S. Patton.

James Autenrith held a 46-year career including teaching at Michigan State University, East Lansing, and at the State University of New York Potsdam’s Crane School of Music. He also served as church organist in Gloversville, Utica, and Auburn, New York, as well as in Battle Creek and East Lansing, Michigan. Autenrith was organist and choir director at the Potsdam United Methodist Church for 35 years and played many organ recitals during this time, including performances at conventions of the Organ Historical Society.

James P. Autenrith is survived by his wife of 68 years, Audrey, as well as two sisters, Joan Stack of Boynton Beach, Florida, and Betsy Newman of Newport, New York, and nieces and nephews. A private service took place at Bayside Cemetery, Potsdam. Memorial gifts may be made to the James Autenrith Scholarship at Crane School of Music, c/o Potsdam College Foundation, 44 Pierrepont Avenue, Potsdam, New York 13676, or by visiting potsdam.edu/give.

John Kuzma

John Kuzma, 75, music educator, composer, arranger, organist, conductor, and philosopher, died August 7 in Cincinnati, Ohio. Born March 16, 1946, in Cincinnati, Kuzma began composing and arranging music as a high school student. Having taught himself to play the keyboard in grade school, he began study at Cincinnati Conservatory of Music and won a scholarship at Eastman School of Music, Rochester, New York, where he studied with David Craighead. A Fulbright scholarship took him to Copenhagen, Denmark, for a year’s organ work with Finn Viderø before returning to the United States for graduate studies in organ and composition at the University of Illinois. There his organ teacher was Jerald Hamilton.

After graduation, he served as organist and choir director for St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral, San Diego, founder and music director of the San Diego Chamber Orchestra, a teacher at San Diego State University and at University of California, Santa Barbara, and was a staff musical arranger at the Crystal Cathedral, Garden Grove, California. He became music director of the American Boy Choir in Princeton, New Jersey, before moving to Denver, Colorado, in 1987 to serve as minister of music at Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church, a post he held for nearly three decades prior to his retirement in 2015.

Kuzma’s arrangements and compositions have been performed by the Colorado Symphony Orchestra and Symphony Chorus, Colorado Children’s Chorale, Denver Brass, Denver Gay Men’s Chorus, Ars Nova Singers, American Boy Choir, and Dallas and Chicago Symphony Orchestras. Many of his compositions and arrangements have been performed around the world, and he was the arranger and composer of music for Pope St. John Paul II’s visit to Denver for World Youth Day in 1993. During his tenure at Montview, he established the Montview Conservatory of Music and began a series of classical music concerts for children that reached more than 14,000 Denver students over several years. His creation and funding of the Montview Music Endowment continues to support Montview’s music program and to pay professional musicians to perform in Montview’s concerts. Kuzma was a Colorado Arts Council Music Composition Fellowship winner in 1999.

John Kuzma is survived by his wife, Bess. Memorial gifts may be given to the music program at Montview Boulevard Presbyterian Church, 1980 Dahlia Street, Denver, Colorado 80220. For more information: montview.org/music.

Emma Lou Diemer

Emma Lou Diemer, born in Kansas City, Missouri, November 24, 1927, died June 2, 2024, in Santa Barbara, California. She played piano and composed at a very early age, and she became organist in her church at age 13. Her interest in composing music continued through College High School, Warrensburg, Missouri, and she majored in composition at the Yale School of Music, New Haven, Connecticut, earning a Bachelor of Music degree in 1949 and a Master of Music degree in 1950. She finished her Ph.D. degree at the Eastman School of Music, Rochester, New York, in 1960. She studied in Brussels, Belgium, on a Fulbright scholarship and spent two summers of composition study at the Berkshire Music Center.

Diemer taught at several colleges and was organist at several churches in the Kansas City area during the 1950s. From 1959 until 1961 she was composer-in-residence in the Arlington, Virginia, schools under the Ford Foundation Young Composers Project. She composed many choral and instrumental works for schools, a number of which are still in publication. She was consultant for the MENC Contemporary Music Project before joining the faculty of the University of Maryland where she taught composition and theory from 1965 until 1970. In 1971 she moved from the East Coast to teach composition and theory at the University of California, Santa Barbara. There she was instrumental in founding the electronic/computer music program. In 1991 she was named Professor Emeritus.

Through the years she has fulfilled many commissions of orchestral, chamber ensemble, keyboard, choral, and vocal works for schools, churches, and professional organizations. Most of her works are published. She received awards from Yale University (Certificate of Merit), Eastman School of Music (Edward Benjamin Award), National Endowment for the Arts (electronic music project), Mu Phi Epsilon (Certificate of Merit), Kennedy Center Friedheim Awards (for a piano concerto), American Guild of Organists (Composer of the Year), American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers/ASCAP (annually since 1962 for performances and publications), the Santa Barbara Symphony (composer-in-residence, 1990–1992), the University of Central Missouri (honorary doctorate), and others.

She was an active keyboard performer on piano, organ, harpsichord, and synthesizer, and in later years gave concerts of her own music at Washington National Cathedral, St. Mary’s Cathedral and Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels in Los Angeles, and elsewhere. For information: emmaloudiemermusic.com.

Eugene “Gene” E. Englert

Eugene “Gene” E. Englert, 93, pianist, choral director, composer, organist, and liturgist, died June 2. Born March 15, 1931, he began playing organ for Catholic Masses at a young age. Upon graduation from Purcell High School, Cincinnati, Ohio, he attended the Athenaeum of Ohio in Cincinnati. After serving in the Army in Korea where he was prompted to give a concert in the American embassy and form and conduct a Korean children’s choir, Englert completed his Master of Music degree at the University of Cincinnati Conservatory of Music.

Englert married Ruth Caplinger, and they began their family and his long career as a Catholic church musician and choir director in the Archdiocese of Cincinnati. He was music and choir director at St. Clement, St. Charles, St. Clare Catholic churches in Cincinnati, Sacred Heart Catholic Church in Fairfield, Ohio, and Assumption Catholic Church in Mt. Healthy, Ohio, where he served for 52 years. He also was music director at McAuley High School and Good Samaritan Hospital School of Nursing, both in Cincinnati, preparing choirs and music groups for concerts and shows for many years. One of his accomplishments was taking two of his choirs to Rome to sing for Pope John Paul II in 1988.

Englert began composing choral, piano, and organ music in the 1960s with more than 250 pieces of published choral music, mostly written for church choirs and hymnals and still being sung in churches all over the world. He was a founding member of the National Catholic Music Educators Association, an organization of musicians dedicated to Catholic music education that eventually developed into what is now known as the National Association of Pastoral Musicians (NPM). Englert was part of the Milwaukee Composers’ Forum that produced a major document on church music and liturgy.

Eugene E. Englert was preceded in death in 2010 by his wife of 53 years, Ruth, and also by their son Mark who died as a young child. He is survived by three children: Stephanie (John Williams), John, and Jeannette (Clifton Funches), and two grandchildren. A funeral Mass was celebrated June 8 at the Church of the Assumption, Mt. Healthy, with burial at St. Mary’s Cemetery, St. Bernard, Ohio, with military honors.

Dana June Hull

Dana June Hull, 97, of Ann Arbor, Michigan, died June 4. Born February 14, 1927, in Waterville, Ohio, she graduated from Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio, with a Bachelor of Music degree in organ performance. Hull was one of the first women to start a business for the restoration of historic pipe organs in the United States, located in Ann Arbor.

Throughout her life she held organist positions and worked as a choral conductor and accompanist in churches, working until the age of 92. She was an active member of the American Guild of Organists, the Organ Historical Society, and the Reed Organ Society.

Dana June Hull is survived by her daughter-in-law, Christiane Hull, three grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her son, Dallas Hull, and stepdaughter, Diane Willis. A memorial service was conducted June 25 at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Ann Arbor. Memorial contributions can be given to St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church Music Fund (www.standrewsaa.org/give.html), or by mailing gifts noted in her memory to the church: 306 North Division Street, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104.

Richard “Rick” Ivan Morel

Richard “Rick” Ivan Morel, 76, died June 3 in Denver, Colorado. He was born July 14, 1947, in Watertown, Massachusetts; his family moved to Colorado when he was eight. Rick’s father, Ivan, came to Denver to work for Fred H. Meunier in the pipe organ business. Ivan eventually bought the business, and it became Ivan P. Morel and Associates, Inc. When Rick graduated from high school, he joined his father’s firm. When Ivan retired, Rick took over the business. The firm installed, built, refurbished, and provided service to organs in five states.

Rick Morel not only loved the pipe organ but also its history. The Morel company refurbished the organ at the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Denver. Rick was present at the cathedral making sure the organ worked perfectly when Pope St. John Paul II visited in 1993. Morel spent the last decade or more trying to bring new people into the business of pipe organs. He was dedicated to preserving historical files on many instruments. He celebrated his 58th anniversary of employment at Morel and Associates on May 8.

When Morel was 25 he met and married Sharlie Ann Kern, who survives. They celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary September 1, 2023.

A memorial service will take place at Montview Presbyterian Church, Denver, August 21. Phil Bordeleau, music director at the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception, will dedicate a recital to Morel’s memory in spring 2025.

Kenneth Robert Reed

Kenneth Robert Reed, 73, of Otsego, Michigan, died at home on May 1, 2024. He had been diagnosed with lung cancer a year earlier, which had metastasized to his brain. Born on April 3, 1951, in Sturgis, Michigan, he was a graduate of Mattawan High School. After managing a plastics company for ten years, he became fascinated with pipe making upon being introduced to it. In 1978 Ken met his life partner, James Lauck. Together they owned and operated the Lauck Pipe Organ Company, Otsego, Michigan. Since 1983 he had been a pipemaker and operated his pipe shop adjacent to Lauck Pipe Organ Co.

Reed was skilled in all phases of pipe making including metal casting, flue and reed pipe making, and the machining of shallots and blocks. Most of his production found its way into Lauck organs, but he was always willing to help out other organ builders with on-site installation problems. He was also office manager and general manager of Lauck Pipe Organ Co. until the company closed in 2018. His passions were his home, gentleman farming, raising various animals, and tending to the acreage. Kenneth Reed is survived by his husband, James Lauck, whom he had been with for 45 years.