Skinner Sesquicentennial Conference presented April 24–25 in Evanston, Illinois
THE DIAPASON, along with the Chicago, Fox Valley, and North Shore Chapters of the American Guild of Organists, the Chicago-Midwest Chapter of the Organ Historical Society, and the Music Institute of Chicago, presented a conference in honor of the sesquicentennial of the birth of Ernest M. Skinner, April 24–25, in Evanston, Illinois.
The conference opened with a concert by the choral ensemble Bella Voce in St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, accompanied by Christine Kraemer on 1922 Skinner Organ Company Opus 327.
The following day’s events included recitals by Andrew Schaeffer and David Jonies on 1927 Skinner Organ Company Opus 616 in the First Congregational Church. James Russell Brown provided a demonstration program and lecture on the restoration of 1914 Ernest M. Skinner Company Opus 208 in the Nichols Concert Hall of the Music Institute of Chicago (formerly First Church of Christ, Scientist, of Evanston).
Rounding out the day were lectures by Stephen Schnurr and Joyce Robinson in the lovely chapel of First Congregational Church.
A consideration of the record series made by the Aeolian-Skinner Organ Company
The arrival of the post-World-War-II 331/3-r.p.m, high-fidelity, long-playing recording was embraced by the legendary Aeolian-Skinner Organ Company of Boston as a means of promoting its product. In the course of approximately twenty years, thirty volumes of the series, entitled The King of Instruments, were released. The series can be divided into three groups, (1) The Harrison Era, (2) The Whiteford Era, and (3) The Post-Whiteford Era.
Turning nineteen is a pretty awesome event—exploding horizons, new responsibilities, new friends, leaving home for an exciting new place to live, long-held goals coming within range, and dreaming ever bigger for the future.
Lukas Foss, James Barclay Hartman, Thomas A. Klug, Ewald Kooiman, Joseph F. MacFarland, Richard H. (Dick) Peterson, William J. (Bill) Stephens, Marguerite Long Thal