WELL-KNOWN ORGANIST TO PLAY AT SHRYOCK TOMORROW

[davmar]

WELL-KNOWN ORGANIST TO PLAY AT SHRYOCK TOMORROW

BY MARLEEN SHEPHERD

THE SOUTHERN

CARBONDALE -- How does celebrated organist Peter Richard Conte routinely make the world's largest organ sound like a symphony orchestra?

He uses tricks, Conte said. His idea of tricks, though, is playing six musical lines at once, two with each hand and one with each foot in the nearly lost 19th-century art he dubs a "calisthenics for the keyboard."

Conte -- who will appear at Shryock as the first in SIUC's Distinguished Organ Recital Series this Friday -- is the one of the world's foremost organ transcriptionists, which means he translates pieces designed for the orchestra into music for his organ.

His organ, by the way, is the Wanamaker Organ, located in Philadelphia's Lord & Taylor department store. It carries the distinction of being the largest musical instrument ever created.

It is composed of six keyboards, 30,000 pipes and some 1,000 controls.

Mastering this beast of an instrument is a high accomplishment in the classical music world.

"There's only one Wanamaker Court Organist and he's it," says Marianne Webb, an SIUC organ professor who helped provide the endowment for the series. "He really is one of the foremost organists in the U.S. today."

Conte is also the organist and choirmaster of St. Clement's Church in Philadelphia, and his critically acclaimed performances here and abroad have landed him spots on "Good Morning America" and National Public Radio's "Pipedreams."

Conte will perform an example of his transcriptions on Shryock's organ, but the organ there was not designed for such a feat.

"I love a good challenge," Conte said of trying anyway. "It's going to be interesting. I'm going to force it to do things it's not happy doing. The organ and I will have a little chat, and we'll see who wins.

"The audience is always the final judge of these things."

Conte's transcription of "Brahms Variation on a Theme" by Joseph Haydn is just part of the Shryock repertoire that also includes classical organ music.

"Mr. Conte is one of the very best if not the best. It's an opportunity for all of us in Southern Illinois to hear this type of playing, and I think the audience will be captivated by it," Webb said of his turn at Shryock.

"It's something totally different than we have featured at this recital series the past several years."

marleen.shepherd@thesouthern.com 618-529-5454 x15074

DETAILS

Peter Richard Conte; guest of the SIUC Marianne Webb and David N. Bateman Distinguished Organ Recital Series; 7:30 p.m. Friday; Shryock Auditorium; free.

[scriven]

I wish he had shown up when I was at SIU! (Back when dinosaurs roamed the earth!)

[ob1clodi]

Too bad I will be working Friday night, SIU is only 1 hour away. SIU class of 2002. Shyrock is a nice place, saw David Grisman there while at SIU. I would like to see a pipe organ really put through it's paces.