Organist David Ball to Perform at The University of Scranton Oct. 16

Performance Music at The University of Scranton will present “IN RECITAL” featuring organist David Ball on Sunday, Oct. 16, at 7:30 p.m. in The University of Scranton’s Houlihan-McLean Center. Admission is free and the performance is open to the public.

A native of St. Louis, Missouri, Juilliard-trained organist Ball is a recognized and acclaimed performer. The New York Times declared his appearance in Juilliard’s FOCUS! Festival “a rousing performance.” His performance of Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in a minor in Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall was broadcast on American Public Media’s nationally-syndicated radio program Pipedreams and his segment of the 2014 WQXR Bach Marathon was streamed on WQXR-FM, New York City’s classical radio station. In addition, Ball has performed solo and collaborative recitals across the country, including duet recitals with Dr. John A. Romeri on the largest musical instrument ever built: the Boardwalk Hall Organ in Atlantic City. 

Ball completed both his bachelor’s and Masters of Music at The Juilliard School in New York City, studying under Paul Jacobs. As part of a wide-ranging musical vision for 21st-century collaboration, he has concertized with wind instrument performers – often commissioning new works for these duo events – and co-founded the ensemble duo corgano, a horn and organ duet featuring award-winning hornist Trevor Nuckols. Orchestrally, Ball has most recently served as organist for Ives’ Three Places in New England under the baton of Jeffrey Milarsky and Bartok’s The Miraculous Mandarin under Robert Spano, and played harmonium for a production of Ullmann’s Der Kaiser von Atlantis conducted by Keri-Lynn Wilson.

An active member of the American Guild of Organists (AGO), Ball has won AGO Competitions in Wichita, Denver, Kansas City and St. Louis, and is the recipient of the rarely-conferred Outstanding Student Award from the St. Louis Chapter of the AGO.  As a winner of the AGO/Quimby Regional Competition for Young Organists, he performed as a Rising Star at the 2016 National AGO Convention in Houston. For this performance, Ball commissioned a new work Psalm 30: For he changed my mourning into dancing from friend and colleague Ryan Dodge.

From his earliest days as the organ scholar at the landmark St. Louis Cathedral Basilica, Ball has played for and accompanied liturgical choirs in performances across the country and in Europe. He has worked as the assistant director of music at St. Malachy’s – The Actors’ Chapel in Times Square, and he currently serves as the interim director of music there. 

The Houlihan McLean Center organ is an historic Austin opus #301 symphonic organ, a classic 20^th century pre-WWII symphonic organ. The rebuilt instrument contains 3,178 pipes, 45 ranks, and four manuals. Cheryl Y. Boga, conductor and pirector of Performance Music at the University, was on-site project manager for the re-building of the organ, a process which – from initial feasibility study, pursuit of funding and research of rebuilders, to contracting, the re-build process itself and completion – took more than a decade. The restoration was completed in January 2005 by Patrick J. Murphy & Associates, and the instrument is serviced and maintained by Emery Brothers Pipe Organs. Its re-dedication recital was performed by Thomas Murray, head of the organ program at Yale University, and other notable organists who have performed on the instrument include Timothy Smith, Frederick Hohman, Christopher Johnson, Greg Zelek and Aaron Diehl, among others.

For more information, contact Performance Music at The University of Scranton by calling 570-941-7624, emailing music@scranton.edu, or visiting scranton.edu/music