Nation's Capital Poaches Leading European Organist, Composer, And Music Professor For One-Time Only, Free Recital At Washington National Cathedral

Naji Hakim, organist, composer, professor of music
Organist of Trinity Church, Paris
[Honoured successor to Olivier Messiaen]
Composer in residence at the Trinity College of Music, London

Celebrity Organ Recital
Washington National Cathedral
Sunday, July 2, 2006 at 5 pm
Free, but offerings will be received
at half-time.

Naji Subhy Paul Irénée Hakim has for the last twenty years been one of the most important representatives of the great French tradition of organist-composer-improvisers. Born in Beirut (31 October, 1955), he studied with Jean Langlais, and at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris, in the classes of Roger Boutry, Jean-Claude Henry, Marcel Bitsch, Rolande Falcinelli, Jacques Castérède and Serge Nigg, where he obtained first prizes in harmony, counterpoint, fugue, organ, improvisation, analysis and orchestration.

He is a licentiate teacher in organ from the Trinity College of Music in London. He also received first prizes at the International Organ Competitions at Haarlem, Beauvais, Lyon, Nuremberg, St. Albans, Strasbourg and Rennes, the composition prize of the “Amis de l’Orgue” for his Symphonie en Trois Mouvements (Paris, 1984), and the first prize in the International Competition for Organ Composition, in memory of Anton Heiller for The Embrace of Fire (Collegedale, Tennessee, 1986). In 1991, he received the Prix de Composition Musicale André Caplet from the Académie des Beaux-Arts. His works include instrumental, symphonic and vocal pieces. He was the organist of the Basilique du Sacré-Coeur, Paris from 1985 until 1993, when he succeeded Olivier Messiaen at l’église de la Trinité.

He is much in demand as a recitalist, improviser and teacher, with engagements for concerts and masterclasses taking him all over the world. He is also professor of musical analysis at the Conservatoire National de Boulogne-Billancourt, and visiting professor at the Royal Academy of Music, London.

He is a graduate of the École Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications in Paris. In 2000 he became member of the Consociatio Internationalis Musicae Sacrae in Rome. In 2002, he received the title Doctor honoris causa of the University Saint-Esprit of Kaslik, Lebanon. In 2004 he became composer in residence at the Trinity College of Music, London.

PROGRAM

Ouverture Libanaise Naji Hakim
(b. 1955)


Cantabile César Franck


Sakskøbing Præludier (U.S. premiere)

Mit hjerte altid vanker
Nærmere, Gud, til dig
O Gud, du ved og kender
At sige verden ret farvel
Hil dig, Frelser og Forsoner
Den mørke nat forgangen er
Nu blomstertiden kommer
Påskeblomst
Op, al den ting, som Gud har gjort
O kristelighed
Så vældigt det mødte os først i vor dåb
Befal du dine veje


N. Hakim
—Offering—


Passacaglia in C minor, BWV 582 Johann Sebastian Bach
(1685-1750)
Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier


Bach’orama N. Hakim


Improvisation [on surprise themes]

*

Please see the Washington National Cathedral's
Organ Recitals page for more information on
organ recitals and organ demonstrations.

The Washington National Cathedral is an informal
part of Washington D.C.'s unsanctioned "Flying
Music Conservatory".









Organist, Composer, and Guest Flying Professor Haji Hakim

Photo credit: Via Binns Organ Program in the Albert Hall, Nottingham, UK. With thanks.