Craig Cramer
“A Performer Looks at the Buxtehude Praeludium in E, BuxWV 142"
Monday, Oct. 1, 4:15-5:15 pm
O'Neill Hall of Music Lecture Hall, Room 306
Free and open to the public
Craig Cramer is a Professor of Organ at the University of Notre Dame. He also serves as organist at St. David of Wales Episcopal Church in Elkhart, Indiana. Cramer holds degrees from Westminster Choir College and the Eastman School of Music where he earned the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Organ Performance. The Eastman School also awarded him the prestigious Performer's Certificate in Organ. He has studied with Russell Saunders, William Hays, James Drake, David Boe, and André Marchal (Paris).
One of the most traveled organists of his generation, Cramer maintains an active recital career across the country and in Europe. He has performed in forty-four of the United States as well as in Canada. Regularly invited to play some of the most important historic organs in the world, Cramer's European concerts have included performances in Germany on the 1727 König organ in Steinfeld, the 1748 Gottfried Silbermann in Nassau, the 1692 Schnitger in Norden. In the Netherlands he has performed on the 1725 Hagerbeer/Schnitger in Alkmaar, the 1727 Müller in Leeuwarden, the 1643/1814 Bader/Timpe organ in Zutphen, the 1696 Schnitger organ in Noordbroek, the 1770 Hinsz organ in Midwolda, the 1756 Van Deventer organ in Nijkerk, the 1756 Müller organ in Beverwijk, the 1768 Bätz organ in Woerden and the 1726 Vater organ in the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam. He recently performed in Denmark on the historic Compenius and Marcusson organs in the Frederiksborg Slotskirke in Hilleröd. In Sweden he performed in Buxtehude's church, Sancta Maria in Helsingborg, and on the new (2000) meantone North German Organ built by GoArt in the style of Schnitger inthe Örgryte nya Kyrka in Göteborg.
Cramer has performed for conventions of the American Guild of Organists, as well as for many AGO Chapters across the country. He has also appeared as a soloist with a number of different orchestras. Cramer performed the complete organ works of Bach during a series of eighteen concerts using a distinguished set of mechanical-action organs in the state of Indiana.
Dr. Cramer was instrumental in the installation of a new organ hall and organ built by Paul Fritts on the campus of the University of Notre Dame, which he dedicated in January of 2005 by performing a series of ten different recital programs. This organ was the focal point of an AGO National Pedagogy Conference on the subject of Buxtehude given in September 2005. In honor of the 300th anniversary of the death of Dieterich Buxtehude in 2007, Dr. Cramer presented his complete organ works in a series of nine concerts on this organ. The University of Notre Dame recently recognized Cramer with a Kaneb distinguished faculty award. He performed at the 2008 EROI Festival in Rochester, New York and will be a featured performer at the AGO National Convention in Boston 2014.
Dr. Cramer's performances are frequently heard on the nationally-Syndicated program "Pipedreams" (American Public Radio). He has fifteen CD recordings to his credit including releases on the Arkay, Dominant, Dulcian, Motette-Ursina, Organeum and JAV labels. He has recorded three CDs for Naxos, including a recording of works of Buxtehude on the Fritts organ at Pacific Lutheran University. JAV Recordings has recently released Cramer's premiere recording of the Notre Dame Fritts organ as well as his recording on the new Fritts organ at St. Joseph Cathedral in Columbus, Ohio. JAV will also soon release two more Buxtehude recordings performed on the new Taylor and Boody organ at Goshen College, Goshen, Indiana.