Dear listmembers and friends,

it is with great pride to announce that Felix has been named
Distinguished Organist in Residence at the
Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettyburg. The respective press release
of LTSG you will find below.
As to now, Felix will begin his duties in September this year. For all,
who are interested in details, please feel
free and mail me privately.

Humbly and gratefully submitted

Hans-Friedrich Hell

*
LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY AT GETTYSBURG*
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE LTSG-04-50c June 16, 2004
CONTACT: John Spangler 717-338-3010
________________________________________

*LUTHERAN THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY AT GETTYSBURG NAMES FELIX HELL
DISTINGUISHED ORGANIST IN RESIDENCE *
<<...>> GETTYSBURG, PA- The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg
announced this week that the young German Organist Felix Hell will
become the seminary’s first Distinguished Organist in Residence.

Mr. Hell, who at 18 years of age has recently become the youngest organ
major graduate in the history of the Curtis Institute of Music in
Philadelphia, plays more than 60 organ concerts a year to packed,
enthusiastic audiences all around the world.

The prodigious and prolific performer will continue to play for Music,
Gettysburg! two times per year on the 38 rank Andover Organ, Opus 84,
one of the most striking features of the Seminary chapel. As
Distinguished Organist in Residence, Mr. Hell will also teach organ on
the Gettysburg instrument, and organize master classes.

“I fell in love with this instrument the first time I played [the
seminary’s Andover organ]” said Mr. Hell. He continued “It so
wonderfully plays the whole repertoire of J. S. Bach and other composers
of the Baroque era. And, even more important, it is an almost ideal
instrument for learning and teaching.”

Dr. Stephen Folkemer, an excellent organist in his own right, and Music
Director for the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, assisted
in establishing the arrangement. Folkemer said that in the four times
Felix Hell has played for Gettysburg audiences and in more than 350
public concerts around the world, “he has amazed his audiences with not
one dazzling masterpiece, but concerts full of them. Whereas most
organists play one of these difficult masterpieces for a recital, Felix
Hell plays one after another and makes it look easy.”

In this year alone, the Mr. Hell will perform more than 60 organ
concerts in America, Australia, New Zealand, Southeast Asia and Europe.
The young musician began to play the piano at age seven, took his first
organ lessons at age eight, and within a year was on duty in his first
performance in a liturgical setting at a Roman Catholic High Mass on
Easter in 1994 and gave his first solo recital abroad.

Beginning in September 2004, Mr. Hell will be available once a week at
the seminary. His next performance in Gettysburg will be January 30^th ,
as a part of the 25^th anniversary season of*/ Music, Gettysburg!/* He
will also offer a recital in May of next year.

Felix Hell spent a year at the Juilliard School in New York on a full
tuition scholarship. He recently completed his bachelors’ degree through
study at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he studied
with Dr. John Weaver, then chair of the organ departments both of
Juilliard and the Curtis Institute, and Mr. Alan Morrison. Mr. Hell will
next study for his Master of Music degree and his Artist Diploma at the
Peabody Institute, the oldest conservatory in the USA, now associated
with Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.

Mr. Hell has recorded six critically acclaimed CD’s and his music has
been broadcast several times by the nationally distributed program
“PipeDreams” of Minnesota Public Radio in addition to several radio
programs in Germany, the Netherlands, England, and Australia.

The Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg, the oldest of the eight
seminaries of the 5.2 million member Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America, prepares women and men to be outreach oriented public
theologians and mission leaders. It provides programs in continuing
studies, advanced theological education, and specialized educational
programs for informed lay persons, ordained and other rostered leaders,
and high school youth.


/Music, Gettysburg!/ is a free concert series featuring international,
regional and local musical artists supported by both the Lutheran
Theological Seminary and the wider Gettysburg community.

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