Middlebury celebrates Emory Fanning

MIDDLEBURY | Attending my first Emory Fanning performance was quite a few years ago now. I was still a resident of Pennsylvania, but I was already enthralled with Fanning's amazing talent and keen skill on the organ keyboard at Middlebury's Mead Chapel. Hearing that Fanning is celebrating his half century of concert in Addison County on Oct. 1 is music to my ears and the ears of many local residents and other fans. Fanning's big public Five-O event will be marked by an organ recital at Mead Chapel on Sunday, Oct. 1 starting at 4 p.m. The Middlebury maestro will tickle the keyboards of the mighty Gress-Miles pipe organ, which, we are told by college staff, he helped to design. Knowing his 50th anniversary concert was coming up, Fanning chose a program special to him consisting of works by Bach, Franck and Couperin. While Fanning likes the works, he designed the Oct. 1 concert to "showcase" the stunning sounds of the organ, according the college's Anne Chabot. Joining the professor will be pianist Diana Fanning for a performance of Franck's "Prelude, Fugue and Variation," a piece rarely performed on an organ. Professor Emeritus of Music, Dr. Fanning was named Artist of the Year in 1995 by the New Hampshire-Vermont chapter of the American Guild of Organists. "He was a faculty member, lecturer and performer at the first International Organ Academy in Paris, and his writings on César Franck have been translated into French and published in L'Orgue," according to Chabot who compiled Fanning's career while doing publicity for the anniversary event. "A graduate of Oberlin Conservatory, where he studied with Leo Holden and Robert Fountain, the professor also holds an M.M. degree from the University of Illinois... and a DMA (Doctor of Musical Arts) from Boston University. He studied harpsichord with Gustav Leonhardt." Chabot's statement about Dr. Fanning noted that under his direction, he has made recordings as an organist and with the Middlebury College Choir. "He has appeared many times as guest conductor of the Vermont Symphony Orchestra and was the soloist in Poulenc's Organ Concerto with the VSO, as well as in Saint-Saëns' Organ Symphony. His two programs for public television... were for many years broadcast annually throughout the U.S.... For 10 years, Professor Fanning and his wife Diana owned and directed Point Counterpoint Music Camp, a chamber music program that brings music students to Vermont from all over the U.S., Europe and Asia. The concert is sponsored by the Middlebury College Music Department. Admission is free and the public is invited to attend. From one and all — Happy anniversary, Emory Fanning.

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Middlebury celebrates Emory Fanning

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