UMS Digital Presentation
UMS Live Session:
Christian Schmitt, organ
Play
Apr 22 - May 22, 2023
UMS celebrates 130 years of Hill Auditorium’s Frieze Memorial Organ with virtuoso Christian Schmitt and a digital-exclusive performance.
Hill Auditorium’s Frieze Memorial Organ, named in honor of Henry Simmons Frieze, a professor of Latin and the founding president of UMS, is the focal point of the auditorium’s unique parabolic interior and one of the first great organs to rely on electrical connections from its keys. Frieze believed the shared experience of music was essential to a liberal education and to community life. Today, the organ is available to the University of Michigan students and faculty for teaching, practice, and performances to continue celebrating the beauty and diversity of the instrument.
Twelve of the organ’s ranks date back to when it was built by the Farrand & Votey Company of Detroit in 1893 for the Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Some 27 million people traveled to see what was widely regarded as one of the greatest musical instruments — and certainly one of the largest — ever constructed!
On the Program
Charles-Marie Widor “Meditation” from Symphony No. 1 in c minor
Jean Langlais Etude for Pedal Solo No. 7, “Alleluia”
Fritz Lubrich, Jr. “In der Abendstille” op. 24.3
César Franck Choral No. 3 in a minor
Since his debuts with the Berlin Philharmonic under Sir Simon Rattle and at the Salzburg Festival, Christian Schmitt has become one of the world’s most sought-after organists. Last season, he was “Artist in Focus” of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich where he inaugurated the new organ at the Tonhalle with conductor Paavo Jarvi. Schmitt recently debuted at Walt Disney Concert Hall presented by the Los Angeles Philharmonic, performed with the Staatskapelle Berlin conducted by Daniel Barenboim, and recorded Hindemith’s Chamber Music No. 7 with conductor Christoph Eschenbach. He has recorded two CDs for Deutsche Grammophon, and his 2013 recording of Widor’s organ symphonies won a 2013 Echo Klassik, Germany’s major classical music award. Schmitt is on the faculty at Codarts University Rotterdam. He studied organ in Paris, in Boston, and in Saarbrucken and is the principal organist of the Bamberger Symphoniker.