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Organ Concert Series, 2025-2026
All performances begin at 4:00 p.m. (unless otherwise noted) and are free to the public.
Donations are gratefully accepted.
To give online, please click HERE.
Be sure to select “Organ Concert Series” as the designated fund.
Richard Elliott
Sunday, November 2, 2025
@4pm
Richard Elliott is the Principal Organist for The Tabernacle Choir at Temple Square in Salt Lake City, Utah. For the past 34 years he has accompanied the choir on its weekly radio and TV broadcast, “Music and the Spoken Word,” as well as in general conferences of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, on dozens of CDs and DVDs, and in the choir’s annual Christmas concerts, which are broadcast each year on PBS.
He also has a busy solo career, having given thousands of organ concerts on Temple Square as well as numerous performances on five continents. He appears on seven organ CDs and is a published composer and arranger of music for organ, choir, and orchestra. Before becoming a Tabernacle organist in 1991, Dr. Elliott was an assistant professor of organ at Brigham Young University, and for several years he served as assistant organist at the Wanamaker Department Store (later Macy’s) in Philadelphia, home to the world’s largest fully functioning pipe organ. He holds a Bachelor of Music degree in organ from the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, and MM and DMA degrees from the Eastman School of Music.
Karol Mossakowski
Sunday, February 22, 2026
@4pm
A newly appointed titular organist at Saint-Sulpice Church in Paris France, Karol Mossakowski is renowned for both his interpretation and improvisation skills. He has received First Prizes at important performance competitions (Prague, and Chartres), and he leads an expansive international concert career. Mr. Mossakowski also serves as professor of improvisation at the Higher School of Music, San Sebastián, Spain (Musikene), and is Artist in Residence at the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in Katowice, Poland.
Mr. Mossakowski’s performances have taken him to distinguished venues across Europe, Russia, Canada, and the USA, and he has performed with many orchestras in Europe. He is also known for his silent film accompaniments, and in 2017, his accompaniment of Dreyer’s Jeanne d’Arc for Lyon’s Festival Lumière was released on DVD and produced by Gaumont films. In 2021 he released his first solo recording Rivages, on the Tempéraments label. As a composer, he is in residence at the Festival of Sacred Music in Saint-Malo, France, for which he composed two significant works which premiered in 2021 and 2022.
Thomas Sheehan
Sunday, April 19, 2026
@4pm
Thomas Sheehan is the Cathedral Organist and Interim Director of Music at Washington National Cathedral in Washington, DC, where he is responsible for all the music at the cathedral, including both concerts and liturgical music. In this position, he has played for several high-profile civic events, including most recently the state funeral of Jimmy Carter. Prior to this position, he served on the music staffs of the Memorial Church, Harvard University; Saint Mark’s Church in Philadelphia, PA; and Trinity Episcopal Church in Princeton, NJ.
Tom holds the Doctor of Musical Arts degree from Boston University, where he was a student of Peter Sykes and wrote a dissertation on the organ works of his National Cathedral predecessor Richard Wayne Dirksen. He received both the Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees from Westminster Choir College in Princeton, NJ, as a student of Ken Cowan. In 2016 he was named one of The Diapason’s “20 under 30,” a list of rising artists in the field of organ playing. He has performed as an organist throughout the United States, in Canada, and in Europe, including recital appearances in Reykjavík, Toulouse, and Montréal.
Casavant Organ Specifications
Hyde Park Community United Methodist Church Organ by Casavant Frères, Opus 3671 The organ at Hyde Park Community United Methodist Church (Opus 3671) was built by Casavant Frères of Quebec, Canada. It was completed in 1990 and was first heard in a dedicatory recital given on September 25 of that year by organist and director of music, Mark Schaffer, who with his predecessors, Edwin Domb and Todd Wilson, assisted in the design of the instrument.
In 2015, the organ celebrated its 25th birthday. Thanks to a generous gift from the estate of the late Dr. Olga Platz, a significant console technology upgrade was completed by Denis Blain of Casavant Frères in August 2015. During the upgrade project, the piston layout was reorganized by consolidating chancel and gallery divisional pistons and converting 11 unused divisional pistons into general pistons (for a new total of 19 generals). The organ’s memory was doubled from 32 to 64 levels, piston sequencing and manual transfer were added, and a set of chimes was installed in the gallery swell division. The improvements offer the organist much greater versatility and ease of playing across the entire breadth of organ repertoire up to and including the 21st century.
Summary
Gallery: 44 Stops, 63 Ranks ~ Chancel: 18 Stops, 25 Ranks ~ Total: 4843 Pipes
Thank You To Our Donors
The Organ Concert Series at HPCUMC is committed to offering top-quality musical performances to the community without an admission price, but we need your help. The series has been sustained solely through private donations and receives no assistance from the church budget. If you have been blessed by this ministry of music, and if you share our mission of promoting excellent music on an excellent organ, played by some of the world’s finest concert organists, please consider giving a gift to The Organ Concert Series Fund. Your contributions are tax-deductible and will enable us to continue to offer these concerts for many years to come.
2024-2025
Doppelflote (Vince Ryan & Melissa Freilich), Tromborgan (Brad Schultz & Benjamin Yates), Organized Rhythm (Clive Driskill-Smith & Joseph Gramley)
2023-2024
Paul Jacobs, Wesley Hall, David Briggs, Brenda Portman & Kentucky Symphony Orchestra
2022-2023
Carolyn Craig, David von Behren, Caroline Robinson
2021-2022
Damin Spritzer, Aaron David Miller, Stephen Price
2020-2021
Rhonda Sider Edgington, Graeme Shields & Brenda Portman, Dexter Kennedy
2019-2020
Thomas Gaynor and Katelyn Emerson
2018-2019
Thomas Heywood, Eric Plutz, and Bálint Karosi
2017-2018
Jean-Baptiste Robin & Romain Leleu, Kola Owolabi, Renee Anne Louprette
2016-2017
Greg Zelek, Ken Cowan & Lisa Shihoten, Tom Trenney, Amy Johansen & Robert Ampt
2015-2016
CCM Wind Ensemble with Brenda Portman & Michael Unger, Rachel Laurin, Stephen Tharp, David Baskeyfield
2014-2015
Jonathan Ryan, Christoph Bull, Huw Lewis
2013-2014
Jeannine & David Jordan, Organized Rhythm (Clive Driskill-Smith and Joseph Gramley), Raúl Prieto Ramírez, The Canterbury Brass with Brenda Portman
2012-2013
Ken Cowan, Christian Lane, Janette Fishell
2011-2012
Frédéric Blanc, Michael Unger, Douglas Cleveland
2010-2011
Clive Driskill-Smith, Brenda Portman, Raúl Prieto Ramírez, Isabelle Demers
2009-2010
Christopher Houlihan, Anthony & Beard, Bradley Hunter Welch
2008-2009
Thomas Trotter, The Chenaults organ duo, Lynne Davis
2007-2008
Alan Morrison, New York Organ & Piano Duo (Daniel Sullivan, organ, and Jason Cutmore, piano), and Thierry Escaich
2006-2007
Vincent Dubois, Martin Jean, and Anthony & Beard (Gary Beard, organ, and Ryan Anthony, trumpet)
2005-2006
Stefan Engels, Olivier Latry, and Carol Williams
2004-2005
Pierre Pincemaille, Sonia Kim, and Paul Jacobs