Ludger Lohmann

Performing Monday, June 20, 2:00 - 2:50 PM and 4:00 - 4:50 PM, St. Philip Presbyterian


Ludger Lohmann is a leading international organ recitalist and one of the most influential organ pedagogues of our time. He launched his international career after winning several organ competitions, the most important being the Competition of the German Broadcasting Corporations in Munich in 1979, and the Grand Prix de Chartres in 1982. His artistic development was greatly influenced by his teachers Marie-Claire Alain, Anton Heiller, and Wolfgang Stockmeier, and by his harpsichord teacher Hugo Ruf who first introduced him to historical performance practice. These studies resulted in a musicological doctoral dissertation, "Articulation on Keyboard Instruments of the 16th to 18th Centuries,“ which is widely respected as an important reference work. Since its publication in 1982, Ludger Lohmann has been regarded as one of the leading authorities in the field of early-music performance practice. Over the last twenty years his activities as a researcher have been focused mainly on the performance practice of German Romantic organ music. He was involved in the founding of the Göteborg Organ Art Center at the University of Göteborg, Sweden, as a senior researcher.

After having taught for several years at the Cologne Musikhochschule, he was appointed Professor of Organ at the Musikhochschule in Stuttgart in 1983. At the same time he took up the position of titular organist at the city’s Catholic cathedral, which he held for a quarter century. Many talented young organists from all five continents have graduated from his organ class, among them many prize-winners of the most prestigious international competitions, professors at universities in various countries, and organists in important churches. Countless organists have benefited from his pedagogical work as a guest tutor in universities and organ academies all over the world. In 2015 he was awarded the medal of the Royal College of Organists. 


About the Composer of the AGO 2016 Commission

Organist and composer Chelsea Chen is internationally renowned for her concerts of “rare musicality” and “lovely lyrical grandeur,” and a compositional style that is “charming” and “irresistible” (Los Angeles Times).

Ms. Chen has received acclaim as a composer since she premiered her own Taiwanese Suite (2003) and Taiwan Tableaux (2007) at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion. Recently her solo organ pieces have been performed in Canada and Taiwan, and her most recent concerto, Jasmine Fantasy (for violin, organ, and strings), has been performed by orchestras in the US, China, and Indonesia. Her solo organ works were featured at the 2011 Region I/II and IV AGO conventions.

The recipient of the 2009 Lili Boulanger Memorial Award and winner of the 2005 Augustana/Reuter National Organ Competition, Ms. Chen is a graduate of Juilliard, where she received both her bachelor’s and master’s degrees. She was also a full scholarship recipient at Yale University, where she earned an Artist Diploma. Her major organ teachers include Thomas Murray, John Weaver, Paul Jacobs, Monte Maxwell and Leslie Robb, and her primary piano teachers include Baruch Arnon, Jane Bastien and Lori Bastien Vickers.

Her compositions are exclusively available from Wayne Leupold Editions, Inc.

In 2014 she became Organist and Artist-in-Residence at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, FL. She splits her time between Florida and New York, where she is also Artist-in-Residence at Emmanuel Presbyterian Church in Manhattan.


Program

Fantasie und Fuge g-Moll, BWV 542                                                      Johann Sebastian Bach
                                                                                                                                 (1685–1750)

Choralfantasie “Nun freut euch, lieben Christen gmein”                              Dieterich Buxtehude
                                                                                                                                 (1637–1707)

*Chorale-Prelude on "Bethold"                                                                             Chelsea Chen
                                                                                                                                      (b. 1983)

Choralvorspiel und Fuge über "O Traurigkeit, o Herzeleid“                            Johannes Brahms
                                                                                                                                (1833–1897)

Präludium und Fuge über BACH                                                                               Franz Liszt
                                                                                                                                (1811–1886)

*Houston AGO 2016 Commission