The story of our pipe organ…
Dalhousie University Department of Music had been looking for a home for a practice organ which it was no longer in need of. The Department only occasionally has an organ student and when they do come, they normally connect with a local Halifax church and practice there. The organ is an electric action pipe organ built by Hill, Norman & Beard (London, England) in 1971. They were offering the organ free of charge, on an as-is, where-is basis.
Mark Himmelman, current organist at St. David’s Presbyterian Church in Halifax, knew of the Department’s desire to find a home for the organ. He asked the people of St. James’ Anglican Church in LaHave, the church he attended as a child, if they would like this gift. He offered to disassemble the organ from the practice room and reassemble the organ at St. James and to give a recital. The congregation and rector were most enthusiastic about the gracious offers of the Dalhousie Music Department and of Mark Himmelman’s time and skill.
Mark volunteered two weeks of his summer holidays in August and several Mondays in September and October to complete this complicated and delicate task of disassembling and then reassembling the organ in its new home and tuning the hundreds of pipes of all shapes and sizes. Mark had the help of his uncle Melvin Himmelman, a warden at St. James, and others to do some of the heavy moving. Only about a dozen of the hundreds of magnets which control the opening and closing of air valves for the pipes have had to be replaced.
The pipe organ was dedicated to the glory of God and in memory of Mark’s father, Wendell Himmelman, and great grandmother, Florence Himmelman.
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All are most welcome to the reception after the concert.
Pipe Organ Recital
Mark Himmelman
Performs works by Buxtehude, Couperin,
Guillard, Bach, and others.
Freewill offering.
Eve of the Feast of St. James
7pm Thursday July 24, 2008
St. James Anglican Church LaHave
Mark D. Himmelman
(b. 1978)
A native of Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, Mark Himmelman began playing the organ at the young age of seven years and by age eight had played his first church service. At age eleven Mark began studies in piano and organ under David Zwicker. His teachers have also included Allen Wayte, F. Alan Ressor and John Vandertuin. Mark holds a bachelors degree in music performance from the University of Prince Edward Island. Subsequent studies in organ have included the Mount Royal International and the McGillSummerOrganAcademies where he performed and studied under Simon Preston, David Higgs, Sara Buldock, Neil Cockburn, William Porter and Oliver Latry. Mark has held several positions as organist in Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Ontario and is currently organist and director of music at the Presbyterian Church of Saint David in Halifax, N.S. As a composer Mark has over 30 compositions to his credit which he publishes under his own label “M.D. H. Publications”. As a performing artist Mark has concretized throughout Canada and the United States and in 2006 he released his first compact disc entitled “Enigma”.
Recital Programme
Prelude, Fugue and Chaconne in C
Dietrich Buxtehude
1637 - 1707
Mass for the Convents (Four Movements)
Plein jeu; Fugue sur la trompette; Recide de Cremona; Dialogue sur la grand jeu
Fracois Couperin
1668– 1733
Sonata #5 for Trombone (Ted Huck) and Organ
Ernest Gilliard
Toccata and Fugue
J.S. Bach
1685 – 1750
Intermission
Now Thank We All Our God
Sigfried Karg-Elert
1877 – 1933
Prelude on Rhosymedre
R. Vaughan Williams
1872 – 1958
Prelude
Gabriel Pierné
1863 – 1937
Carillon de Westminster
Louis Vierne
1870 – 1937