The Santa Barbara Music Club, now in its 50th year of presenting free concerts and awarding vital scholarships, offers one of those free concerts at 3 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 9, in the First United Methodist Church, 305 E. Anapamu St.
The event, presented in collaboration with the Santa Barbara Chapter of the American Guild of Organists, is called Three Organists and features organists Emma Lou Diemer, Steven Hodson and Charles Talmadge.
The program spans the better part of four centuries, and includes works by Emma Lou Diemer (whenever-forever), Mahlon E. Balderston (1923-2019), Maurice Duruflé (1902-86), César Franck (1822-90), Johann Jakob Froberger (1616 -67), Naji Subhy Hakim (born 1955), George Frederick Handel (1685-1759), Johann Ludwig Krebs (1713-80), Johann Pachelbel (1653-1706), Dieterich Buxtehude (c. 1637/39-1707), and Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750).
Note: Most of what follows, that in quotation marks, comes from the Music Club. My apologies to Charles Talmadge for the meagerness of the information about him. He generously volunteered his time and virtuosity when the scheduled organist Thomas Joyce was involved in an accident and could not participate.
Our local supernatural resource, “composer and organist Emma Lou Diemer is an active keyboard performer (piano, organ, harpsichord, synthesizer), and has given 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.
“She studied composition at the Yale Music School (BM, 1949; MM, 1950) and at the Eastman School of Music (Ph.D, 1960). She studied in Brussels, Belgium, on a Fulbright Scholarship and spent two summers of composition study at the Berkshire Music Center.
“In 1971 she moved from the East Coast to teach composition and theory at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she was instrumental in founding the electronic/computer music program. In 1991 she became professor emeritus at UCSB.”
As most of you know very well, “Steven Hodson is Professor of Music and Director of Piano Studies at Westmont College in Santa Barbara, where he teaches choral conducting, piano, and organ.
“He holds a bachelor’s degree from Lewis and Clark College with emphasis in piano performance, a master’s degree from the University of Oregon, also with emphasis in piano performance, and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder, where he accompanied the top graduate choir.”
Charles Talmadge is the beloved organist at All-Saints-by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in Montecito. He is also a composer of note in his own right, although it doesn’t look as if he will be favoring us with one of his own works this time around.
“The pipe organ at First United Methodist Church is considered a premiere instrument in the city of Santa Barbara. A three-manual Artcraft pipe organ was installed during construction of the present sanctuary in 1927; it remained in service up until 1961, when the church purchased a three-manual Aeolian-Skinner pipe organ of 31 ranks.
“In 1993, a 61-pipe Trompette-en-chamade was added as a memorial gift, installed above the altar by the Schantz Organ Company of Orville, Ohio. In 1999 the same firm installed a new three-manual console, featuring multiple memory systems and capture action.
“Most recently, in 2003, Schantz brought the organ to gorgeous tonal completion with the addition of 20 new ranks of pipes, as well as three digital ranks of 32′ pitch stops. The added registers include an entirely new Great division mounted on slider chests; unenclosed diapason pipework from the new Great is now framed in classical pipe façades on both sides of the Chancel.
“The instrument stands today at 52 ranks, totaling over 2,500 pipes, plus three digital pedal stops. It is the third largest pipe organ in Santa Barbara.”
— Gerald Carpenter covers the arts as a Noozhawk contributing writer. He can be reached at gerald.carpenter@gmail.com. The opinions expressed are his own.