Inaugural Recital of the Rebuilt and Enlarged
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April 1, 2009
PRESS INFORMATION: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Press Contact: Mike Anastas, 203-417-4308
Church Contacts:
Director of Music and Church Organist: Ms. Toni Sullivan, 203-426-6283 (home)sullivantt@hotmail.com
Organ Reconstruction Director for the Church: Mr. David Goral, 203-775-7086 (home)dgoral@earthlink.net
The Rev. Bryn
Smallwood-Garcia, 203-775-1259 (Church)
bryn@uccb.org
(See contact information on following pages for Austin Organs and Ronald Ebrecht
RECITAL TO INAUGURATE ORGAN IN BROOKFIELD SUNDAY, APRIL 19
The Congregational Church of Brookfield (CT) announces a recital by Ronald Ebrecht at 3:00 pm Sunday, April 19, to inaugurate the organ which was rebuilt by Austin Organs of Hartford, the same company that installed it in 1916.
Director of Music Toni Sullivan says the program includes both Mr. Ebrecht’s choir at the First Congregational Church of Waterbury and the Brookfield Church choir. Mr. Ebrecht is on the faculty of both Wesleyan University and was the consultant on the rebuilding of the original Austin Organ, Opus 629A. The Church will host an Afternoon Tea in Fellowship Hall following the organ recital and dedication.
Austin Organs still maintains the same designs for pneumatic actuators as those they installed in 1916. Electronic switching mechanisms replaced the original mechanical switches. A new three manual console replaced the two manual console and additional pipes that have been installed.
On its 250th Anniversary in 2007, the Church conducted a successful capital campaign to raise the funds necessary to rebuild the organ, renovate the Church Parsonage built in 1812, update the kitchen in Fellowship Hall, and install air conditioning in the Church School wing. The rebuilt organ is the first of these projects to be completed.
For an image of the newly rebuilt organ and console, go to this link:
http://www.uccb.org/whats_happening/press.htm
AUSTIN ORGANS, INC.
Organ Architects & Builders Since 1893
156 Woodland Street, Hartford, CT 06105
CONTACT: Michael B. Fazio, President & Tonal Director
Voice: 860-522-8293
Cell: 860-227-6752
mikefazio@austinorgans.com
Background:
from the Company’s website, a remarkable resource:
(paste to browser)
www. austinorgans.com
Austin Organs is the only remaining Great Name from the Grand Period of American organ building. Companies like M.P. MÖller, Aeolian-Skinner, Kimball and a host of others have closed their doors and passed from living to legend. By good management of a good product, and by moderation in all things, Austin has survived the vicissitudes of economic hardship and perhaps of greater significance: stylistic change, to emerge with the experience that comes from over a century of works of all kinds, styles and sizes, from grand concert organs to small chapel instruments.
NOTE: Excellent article appeared March 27, 2009 in the
Hartford Business Journal
(paste to browser)
www.hartfordbusiness.com/news4374.html
Excerpt:
Austin Organs is now an international company and has built more than 2,700 organs in 49 states (Alaska is the exception), South America, China, Mexico and even one in Palestine. In Hartford alone, its credits include the organs at Mather Chapel at Trinity College, the Cathedral of St. Joseph, the Bushnell Congregational and the Hartford Seminary.
Currently, the company has four projects online for churches in Kentucky, Ohio, Connecticut and Massachusetts. Two are repair jobs, and two call for the construction of new organs.
... the organ culture experienced a baroque revival, said Wesleyan University organist and international performer Ronald Ebrecht.
But Austin Organs “didn’t ever follow,” said Ebrecht, who is currently working with Austin Organs to create an organ for the Congregational Church of Brookfield. It stubbornly stayed above the passing fad, which likely saved it from the tragic fate of other organ companies.
Also, traditional construction techniques ensure easy maintenance, even 80 years from now. Unlike a computer or a cell phone, an Austin organ is never outdated. Classic construction makes for eternal music.
RONALD EBRECHT, Organist
email:
ronald.ebrecht@yale.edu
phone: 203-776-7339
Ronald Ebrecht is University Organist of Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut. He studied at the Schola Cantorum in Paris, Yale University, and Southern Methodist University, Dallas and has given numerous international concerts devoted to late 19th and early 20th century French music
He has appeared to critical acclaim for three decades over a territory that spans four continents. He has given master classes and lectures in world-famous conservatories such as Vienna, Sydney, Beijing and across the U.S. He is particularly known for his interpretations of the first editions of Duruflé. Mr. Ebrecht is the editor of Maurice Duruflé, 1902-1986, ‘The Last Impressionist,’ The Scarecrow Press, Inc
References about Ronald Ebrecht
Wesleyan University Newsletter
http://www.wesleyan.edu/newsletter/people/2006/0206ebrecht.html
Question & Answer format about Mr. Ebrecht’s education and career. Sample:
In addition to organ, I also studied harpsichord at all three institutions. This does not mean that I was only interested in Baroque music. In organ concerts, I play a wide range of repertoire. My research, writing and editions are of late 19th and early 20th century French music.
Organ Historical Society Catalog
http://www.ohscatalog.org/maurdur19las.html
Mr. Ebrecht collected and edited seven articles on the life of Maurice Duruflé, composer of universally beloved organ works and organist at Saint-Etienne-du-Mont in Paris.
Ronald Ebrecht Wesleyan University Organist
Teacher, advisor, colleague
During his twenty-year tenure at Wesleyan University, his studio has grown from a few students to capacity and is the largest of peer institutions. The organ class has a lively, broad outlook in keeping with the Music Department, and encompasses many traditions, as well as current composition. Ebrecht has established the renowned festival, Young Organ Virtuosi that presents emerging artists, as a counterpoint to the regular artists on the organ recital series. The silent film, organ romp and other events draw large student audiences.
After SMU and Yale, it was during Ronald Ebrecht’s study at the Schola Cantorum and Sorbonne in Paris that he developed his concentration on French music 1870-1950. He has secondary specialties in three areas: music of African and African-American origins, music by less-represented women and non-Western composers, and music for organ and percussion. For the first he prepared a recital for West Point in 2004 A Century of Black Organ Music, and he has since traveled extensively with this program, taking Black music to main-stream audiences from Mexico to Belarus. The organ and percussion repertoire was explored in the Wesleyan festival Hearts Pounding and Skins Taut and continued at Baylor University and the Universities of Redlands, of Northern Iowa and of Sydney. These presentations have included the compositions of his Wesleyan colleagues, especially Alvin Lucier and Neely Bruce.
He has great success with encouraging performers and composers and historians to re-examine the possibilities for and repertoire of the organ, especially in its interaction with non-Western traditions. As advisor and tutor, he has directed undergraduate and graduate majors in projects that have broken ground in public perceptions of the organ.
With the cooperation of the Wesleyan Film Studies and the Center for the Arts, he has presented dozens of silent films in their original context with improvised organ accompaniments, using teams of students for some and outside specialists for others. This led to his Snowdon-funded commission from Mexican composer Raul de Zaldo Fabila of a new silent film with organ accompaniment, La Danza de las Aves.
In addition to his work at Wesleyan, Mr. Ebrecht is frequently invited as performer, guest artist and teacher at other institutions, including: Amherst, Baylor, Belarus Conservatory, Brown, Central China Conservatory, College of Charleston, Connecticut College, Louisiana State, Conservatory of Lithuania, Oxford, Russian Gnessins’ Academy, Southern Connecticut, Trinity College, Universities of Connecticut, Glasgow, North Texas, Northern Iowa, Redlands, Sydney, Vienna, and Yale.
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04/03/2009 08:35 AM.
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