Local Organist to Play as Part of Holy Cross Chapel Artist Series

WORCESTER, Mass. – William Ness, an organist and minister of music and arts at the First Baptist Church of Worcester, will perform on Sunday, April 6 at 3 p.m. in Saint Joseph Memorial Chapel at the College of the Holy Cross.  The event is free, handicap accessible, and open to the public.

As part of the Holy Cross Chapel Artists Series, the program will feature organ works by J. S. Bach, Georg Böhm, Nicolas de Grigny, and Gilles Maurice Leclerc. This concert, as well as the entire 2007-2008 Holy Cross Chapel Artists Series, is dedicated to the memory of renowned composer Daniel Pinkham, who died in December of 2006.

Ness received two degrees from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and continued to pursue his studies at the University of Iowa. He taught at Andrews University from 1971 to 1982 and he and his wife served as co-directors of music at the First Presbyterian Church of Ottumwa, Iowa, where they hosted the National Undergraduate Organ Competition.

Ness moved to Massachusetts in 1987 and was appointed the minister of music at the church at Atlantic Union College.  He developed five vocal choirs and two bell choirs.  During this time, Ness also serviced other churches including the Village Congregational of Whitinsville and the First Baptist of Lexington.

Ness has performed on Iowa Public Television, 3ABN, National Public Radio, and has also been recognized abroad in Australia, Europe and the Caribbean. From 2003-04, Ness performed in three recital series of 20th-century organ music at the First Baptist of Worcester and, under the direction of Stephen Tucker, he completed Howard Hanson’s Concerto for Organ and Harp with the Atlantic Union College Orchestra.  Ness appears on the new 2CD set, Great Organs of Worcester.  Recently, he has played in Wyoming and California, and this November he will perform at Illinois College, in Jacksonville and Springfield, Ill.

Pinkham, one of America’s most active and most-performed composers, taught at New England Conservatory from 1958 until 2000.  In addition to composing, he was an organist, harpsichordist, conductor, pioneer in the early music movement, and longtime music director at Boston’s historic King’s Chapel. With an A.B. and an M.A from Harvard University, his scholarship and work were recognized with a Fulbright Fellowship in 1950 and a Ford Foundation Fellowship in 1962. He received six honorary degrees: New England Conservatory, Nebraska Wesleyan University, Adrian College, Westminster Choir College, Ithaca College, and the Boston Conservatory.