FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
TUSCALOOSA, AL – The 2010 Church Music Conference will be held Jan. 29-30 at The University of Alabama School of Music. The conference will include workshops and concerts featuring notable performers in organ, choir and other forms of church music.
The conference will kick-off on Friday, January 29 at 7:30 p.m. with Lifting Up Our Voices and Instruments in Song: A Progressive Concert featuring the first place winner of the 2010 UA Organ Scholarship Competition. Other performers include UA music faculty members Stephen Cary, Paul Houghtaling, Susan Fleming, Jennifer Cowgill, Doff Proctor, Jenny Mann, Shelly Meggison, and Faythe Freese, the Chamber Ensemble under the direction of Marvin Latimer, and the University Singers under the direction of John Ratledge. The concert will include works by J. Haydn (Missa brevis Sti. Joannis de Deo [Kleine Orgelmesse]), J. Langlais, and L. Boulanger, and excerpts from J.S. Bach’s Cantata 140 and St. Matthew Passion, G.F. Handel’s Joshua and Israel in Egypt, and R. Vaughn Williams’ Five Mystical Songs.Tickets for the concert can be purchased at the door for $12 for adults and $7 for seniors. Conference participants and students are free with ID.
On Saturday, January 30 the conference continues with a number of workshops including seminars on Handbells; Liturgy, Word and Drama; Instruments in Worship; Children’s Choir Music Camps; Organ and Voice Masterclasses; Choral Singing; and Choral Reading Session. Guest masterclass artists include Robert Brewer, Faythe Freese, Carl Hancock, Paul Houghtaling, Phyllis Kirk, Marion Latimer, Marvin Latimer, Jeff McLelland, John Orr, and Stephen Tharp.
Finally, on Saturday, January 30 at 4:30 p.m. guest concert organist Stephen Tharp will perform a concert of works by works by Widor, Alain, Simmons, Sixten, Franck and Demessieux. Tickets for the event can be purchased at the door for $12 for adults and $7 for seniors. Conference participants and students are free with ID.
Stephen Tharp, hailed as “the organist for the connoisseur” (Organ magazine, Germany), “the thinking person’s performer” (Het Orgel), “every bit the equal of any organist” (The American Organist magazine) and “the consummate creative artist” (Michael Barone, Pipedreams), is recognized as one of the great concert organists of our age. Having played more than 1,300 concerts worldwide, Stephen Tharp has built one of the most well-respected international careers in the world, earning him the reputation as the most traveled concert organist of his generation. He is listed in the 2008 edition of Who’s Who in America and the 2010 edition of Who’s Who in the World.
In April 2008, Stephen Tharp was named the Official Organist for the NY visit of Pope Benedict XVI, playing for three major events attended by more than 60,000 people that were broadcast live worldwide. Mr. Tharp’s playing has also been heard on both English and Irish national television, on Radio Prague, orgelnieuws.nl in the Netherlands, and in the U. S. on American Public Media’s Pipedreams. In November 2005, Pipedreams broadcast an entire program dedicated exclusively to his career, making him one of the few organists in the world so honored.
He is also an active chamber musician nationwide, having performed on organ, piano and harpsichord with artists such as Thomas Hampson, Itzhak Perlman, Jennifer Larmore, Rachel Barton Pine, the American Boychoir (James Litton, conductor), the St. Thomas Choir (John Scott, conductor, in Duruflé’s Requiem), and at Carnegie Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Alice Tully Hall and Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. His solo organ recordings can be found on the JAV, Aeolus, Naxos, Organum and Ethereal labels, and are available from the Organ Historical Society (http://www.ohscatalog.org/), JAV Recordings (http://www.pipeorgancds.com/) and Aeolus (http://www.aeolus-music.com/).
His latest release, the Complete Organ Works of Jeanne Demessieux on Aeolus Recordings, received the 2009 Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik, Germany’s premier critic’s prize for recordings. Stephen Tharp earned his BA degree, magna cum laude, from Illinois College, Jacksonville, IL and his MM from Northwestern University, Chicago, where he studied with Rudolf Zuiderveld and Wolfgang Rübsam, respectively. He has also worked privately with Jean Guillou in Paris. He is currently Artist-in-Residence at Grace Church (Episcopal), New York City. He also served as Organist at St. Patrick’s Cathedral from 1995-1997 and the Associate Organist at St. Bartholomew’s, NYC, from 1998-2002. His website is www.stephentharp.com.
The cost to attend the conference is $85 if registered by noon on Friday, January 22, 2010. Registration at the door is $95. For group rates and further information please contact Dr. Faythe Freese, 348-3329, or email faythefreese@earthlink.net.
For full information on the conference please visit http://www.music.ua.edu/departments/organ/. Those interested in attending the conference are encouraged to register online at http://music.ua.edu/departments/organ/2009-church-music-conference-pre-registration/