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Sept. 18, 2015 – Organist and composer Charles Callahan will give a recital devoted to the work of American composers at 2 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 26 in Ford Chapel at Allegheny College. Admission is free.

The program will include music by Clarence Eddy, Dudley Buck, Arthur Foote, Humphrey J. Stewart, James H. Rogers, Horatio Parker, Wallace A. Sabin, Gordon Balch Nevin, Florence Price, Gottfried Federlein, Richard Purvis and Charles Callahan.

In addition to the recital, Callahan will give a free workshop for organists from 10 to 11:30 a.m. on Sept. 26 in Ford Chapel. Topics include music for organists who don’t have time to practice, organ registration and hymn introduction. To reserve a space at the workshop, call Becky Borthwick-Aiken at 814-587-3998.

An award-winning composer, organist, choral conductor, pianist and teacher, Callahan is a graduate of the Curtis Institute of Music and the Catholic University of America. He studied with legendary organ instructor Alexander McCurdy and renowned Belgian organist-composer Flor Peeters.

Callahan’s compositions are performed frequently in church and in concert. He has become one of the most recognizable names in American church music, with scores of choral and instrumental compositions in print from leading publishers. The Washington Post has described his writing style as “gentle, confident lyricism.”

Among his notable compositions are two commissions from Harvard University and commissions from the Archdioceses of St. Louis and New York for Papal visits, scored for full orchestra, choir and congregation. His “Mosaics,” a symphonic work in four movements for organ and orchestra, was premiered in the St. Louis Cathedral-Basilica.

An active church musician and concert organist, Callahan has conducted many of the major choral works with orchestra and has played on many of the great organs of the world, performing in such notable sites as Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral. He has appeared with the Philadelphia Orchestra, at the White House and at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He has a dozen solo organ recordings to his credit and is the author of two standard reference works, “The American Classic Organ” and “Aeolian-Skinner Remembered.”

Callahan has been honored by the American Guild of Organists with its Distinguished Artist Award. In 1999 he was awarded the Papal Honor of Knighthood in the Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem.
Callahan’s concert at Allegheny College is supported by the Chapel Organ Recitals Fund established by Dr. Edward S. Hodgson Jr., Allegheny Class of 1947. The workshop is co-sponsored by the Erie chapter of the American Guild of Organists.