Laura Edman, who teaches the organ at UWRF, will be among the performers during an April 21 pipe organ concert at UW-River Falls. Pat Deninger/UWRF photo. 
 

Concert will showcase pipe organ, raise money to restore the instrument 

Performance of virtuoso organist is part of coffee concert series on April 21 

April 6, 2023 - A concert featuring multiple styles of pipe organ music at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls is intended not only for audience enjoyment but also to raise money to restore the pipe organ that musicians will play during the performance. 

The concert, “Laura Edman and Friends,” is at noon on Friday, April 21, in Abbott Concert Hall in the Kleinpell Fine Arts building on campus. It is part of the Frances Cohler Coffee Concert Series. The concert is free and open to the public. 

The concert was originally scheduled for February 24 but was cancelled because of a snowstorm. 

The event is the third since last April showcasing organ performance, an effort designed in part to solicit funds to restore the musical instrument, installed at UWRF in 1974 by Charles Hendrickson who built numerous pipe organs throughout the Midwest. The organ is outdated, and a $130,000 fundraising effort to make improvements to it has been undertaken. Donations can be made at https://www.uwrf.edu/Give/Organ-Restoration-Fund.cfm.

“I’ve tried to put together a concert that shows what you can do with an organ, that it really is a versatile musical instrument,” said Laura Edman, who teaches the organ at UW-River Falls and who designed the concert. “And I’m trying to tell the story about how we need to raise money to restore this organ.” 

Renowned organist Aaron David Miller, known for his improvisational playing style, will be among the musicians to play the organ at the concert. He will be the event’s last performer, said Edman. 

“It’s a very special occasion for us to have a world-class improviser, someone of his caliber, performing as part of our concert,” Edman said of Miller, who has won numerous international awards and has had his orchestral works performed by major symphonies. 

Among other concert performers is Scott Hyslop, minister of music at Zion Lutheran Church and School in Dallas, Texas. Hyslop, a graduate of the UWRF Music Department, will play virtually from Dallas as part of the concert. Edman said she is honored to showcase a former UWRF student as part of the concert. 

Edman will also be a part of the concert. She will play the organ as she performs “Shade in a Parched Land” with two percussion players and a narrator. The song is inspired by the poetry of Tom Gillaspy, who wrote about his experiences after making mission trips to Kenya through First Presbyterian Church in Stillwater, Minn. 

Miller was commissioned to write a music composition reflecting those poems, and Edman and others will perform that work. 

Other concert performers include Craig Hara and Joel Bolen. Hara, a musician, producer, conductor and music director, also teaches music at UWRF and Hamline University. Bolen performed with bands in and around Nashville for more than 20 years. He recently moved to the Twin Cities and works as interim director of music at Ascension Episcopal Church in Stillwater, Minn.