NEWS BRIEFS

REVIEW: THE FIRST OTTAWA BACH-A-THON!!

This new event, which was being tried out on a smaller scale as a substitute for the very popular Bach Marathon which Sondra Goldsmith Proctor organized so brilliantly for many years before the pandemic, took place at Woodroffe United Church on Saturday November 1, 2025 at 2 p.m. It was so successful that we hope there will be many more like it!

In this event, which was planned by Frances Macdonnell but entirely organized and managed by Aleesha Katary, nine different members of the Ottawa Centre played large pieces by Bach through two hours on a Saturday afternoon. The shorter length of the programme, rather than the much more massive six-hour Bach Marathon of years ago, seemed to work out very well for the present day, and the event attracted an excellent audience. Voluntary donations were suggested, and $950 was received at the door for the Centre’s Scholarship Fund.

During the two hours, a huge variety of Bach pieces was played by the nine organists: one of the Partitas, four Preludes and Fugues, three Chorale Preludes from the Leipzig collection, and a movement from Art of Fugue. Frances Macdonnell was the MC throughout the programme.

Here, for the record, is a summary of the exciting programme: ...

Chorale Prelude on O Lamm Gottes unschuldig (BWV 656)
- Shawn Potter -

Prelude and Fugue in C (BWV 547)
- Robert Jones -

Chorale Prelude on Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele (BWV 654)
- Nicholas Busch -

Prelude and Fugue in e (BWV 533)
- Yi Zhou -

Prelude and Fugue in G (BWV 541)
- Wesley Warren -

Fantasia super Komm, heiliger Geist (BWV 651)
- Aleesha Katary

Partite diverse sopra Sei gegrüßet, Jesu gütig (BWV 768)
- Thomas Annand -

Prelude and Fugue in e (BWV 548)
- Samuel Lee -

Contrapunctus XI from Art of Fugue (BWV 1080)
- Matthew Larkin -

Many thanks to Woodroffe United Church and Katarina Jovic, their Director of Music, for their hospitality and welcome. Each of the nine organists went in to practise on the day before the concert at carefully-timed intervals, and everything happened exactly as planned.

Thank you very much! - !
- to all the nine Centre organists for playing their Bach repertoire so brilliantly and giving us such an exciting event,
- to Aleesha Katary for her very efficient work in organizing and managing this programme so well,
- and to the audience who came and enjoyed so many different organists interpreting the great organ music of J. S. Bach, and who donated so generously to the Centre’s Scholarship Fund.

Let’s do something like this again next year in the Ottawa Centre!

 

OTTAWA KIWANIS MUSIC FESTIVAL

TEACHERS and STUDENTS: Applications to enter the classes must be made by January 2. There is an early-bird rate for applying by December 19.

PRESS RELEASE

ANNOUNCING THE 2025 FIRST PRIZE in the NATIONAL ORGAN PLAYING COMPETITION

The Godfrey Hewitt Grand Prize of $6,000 in the National Organ Playing Competition held in Kitchener in July 2025 was won by Maria Gajraj. She also won the Douglas Haas Prize ($1,000) and the Jan Overduin Audience Prize ($1,000). She won the Godfrey Hewitt Scholarship in 2022. Details are found here.

The third prize winner was Isaac Howie who won the Godfrey Hewitt Scholarship this past June.

ANNOUNCING THE 2025 HEWITT SCHOLARHIP WINNER

The 2025 Hewitt Scholarship winner is Isaac Howie. Details on the Hewitt Memorial Fund Press Release.

SACRED CHORAL MUSIC OF GODFREY HEWITT

Frances Macdonnell and Ross Jewell are very happy to announce that after two years of work, they and an advisory group have published a book containing all of the Sacred Choral Music composed and performed by Dr. Godfrey Hewitt who was the Organist and Master of the Choristers at Christ Church Cathedral, Ottawa, from 1931 to 1980.

This publication includes all his choral music for the Eucharist (Missa Brevis) and for Matins and Evensong, his original Psalm chants, and an Introit, but also, and most notably, it publishes for the first time his wonderful reharmonizations of hymn-tunes! These hymn reharmonizations use chord movement and harmonic development to illustrate the mood and meaning of the words in an inimitable fashion: all organists will enjoy playing them.

The second half of the Book, following the reharmonizations, is made up of all the service music which Godfrey had written and which survived only in photocopies of his own handwriting. They include settings of a Missa Brevis, an Introit, an original setting of the Versicles and Responses and the Canticles for the Morning and Evening Offices, and three psalm chants.

The academic Preface to the Book was written by Dr. John Brough, who grew up as a member of the Cathedral Choir and later wrote his DMA thesis at the University of Alberta on the history of church music at Christ Church Cathedral, Ottawa.

Click here to view the Table of Contents.
...

The Book also contains a full-size photograph of Godfrey seated at the Cathedral's Casavant organ console, taken by Malak Karsh in 1947.

The new Book is bound with wire-o binding so that it will lie open easily on the console, and the paper is heavier than regular bond so that there is no danger of the pages blowing over.

Purchasers of this Book are granted permission to make copies of a choral piece out of it for performance purposes.

The publication of this Book has been undertaken with the help of the Godfrey Hewitt Memorial Fund, established after Godfrey's death in 2002. The mandate of the Fund is to assist in preparing the Organ Teachers of the future.

And now the Fund has guaranteed the publication of this book of all Godfrey's Sacred Choral Music. Tax-receiptable donations to the Fund at the address below are always welcome, cheques to be made payable to "RCCO - Ottawa Centre".

Copies of this new Book will be available for sale for $30 at Pro Organo concerts and other Ottawa RCCO Centre events.

To order copies of the Book, please use the following contact information. If you are ordering Books to be mailed to your address, please add $5.00 per Book for mailing costs.

  Frances Macdonnell email
  303 - 3099 Carling Avenue, Ottawa ON K2H 5A6
  Tel: 613-726-7984

For mail orders, please add $5.00 for postage costs.
Please make cheques payable to: RCCO - Ottawa Centre
EFT payments are also available through: payment@rcco-ottawa.ca
If paying by EFT, please specify in the Comment Section that it is for the "Godfrey Hewitt book" and add your address if it is to be mailed, along with the additional $5.00 mailing charge.
Read more

You may purchase copies here for $30 plus $5 shipping for each book:

CENTRE HISTORY

Please note that this timeline can be found by selecting Centre Info | Web Archive pages | Ottawa Cente History Timeline on the menu above.

The Centre History kiosk made its debut at Orgelfest 2013. This is an interractive display which places significant events on a timeline. Bill Vineer supplied muich of the content and Rick St Germain put it all together. Click on the graphic below to access this display.

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