Diane Bish

Diane Joyce Bish (born May 25, 1941) is an American organist and composer as well as executive producer of the Joy of Music television series. As a concert organist, she performs frequently at recitals throughout North America and Europe.

Early years

Bish graduated from Wichita East High School, Kansas, in 1959. She had played on the 1925 Austin Organ installed in the school auditorium. In 1984, she returned there to play a benefit concert, which raised enough money for the organ to be restored.

Bish began studying organ as a student of Dorothy Addy, then of Mildred Andrews. Later, she was a recipient of Fulbright and French government grants for study in Amsterdam with Gustav Leonhardt, and in Paris with Nadia Boulanger, and Marie-Claire Alain.

Career

Beginning in the 1970s, Bish served for more than 20 years as organist and artist-in-residence at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where she designed the 117 rank Ruffatti organ in the sanctuary. While at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, she began producing a weekly television program of organ music, The Joy of Music. A music writer for the South Florida Sun-Sentinel newspaper said in 1986 that Bish "combines masterful music and religion in a life filled with church work, concerts, and writing and producing her own TV show".

As of 2009, The Joy of Music is broadcast on The CatholicTV Network, EWTN, TBN, WLHG-CD and various PBS stations, and continues to feature her performances taped on-location at prominent organs in North America and Europe. Since the program's beginning in the early 1980s, she has recorded over 500 episodes as of 2009, each of which shows her playing one or more different pipe or digital organs.

No longer resident organist at the Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church, Bish now makes frequent concert appearances at recitals throughout North America.

Awards and honors

In 1989, Bish was awarded the National Citation by the National Federation of Music Clubs of America, considered to be the Federation's highest honor.

Discography

Bish has made over thirty recordings on many of the great organs of the world including the celebrated Müller organ of the St.-Bavokerk (or Grote Kerk) in Haarlem, Netherlands, Canterbury Cathedral, and Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. She is the first American woman to record at the organ of Freiburg Cathedral in Freiburg, Germany. Her recordings include music for organ and orchestra, brass and organ, cello and organ, most of the great organ masterpieces, original compositions and hymn arrangements.

List of recordings

• Artistry of Diane Bish (1978)
• Christmas Festival (1970)
• Favorites from Freiburg Cathedral
• Glorious pipes (1990)
• The Glory of the Organ (1980)
• Great European Organs (1990), featuring organs of Austria, France, Germany, and the Netherlands
• Hymns on Coral Ridge Organ
• The Joy of Christmas (1980), accompanying the Diane Bish Chorale at organ
• The Joy of Music presents Hymns and Classics (1990)
• Morning Has Broken (1989)
• Pipes and More Pipes (1978), organ and bagpipes
• Praise to the Lord (1985)
• The Passion Symphony (1979)
• Sixty-six hundred voices of praises

Works

Bish has also published seven books and numerous solo pieces for organ, along with arrangements of various hymns including "Christ the Lord Is Risen Today". Her compositions include:

• Festival Te Deum, for organ and orchestra
• Lead On, O King Eternal, for organ and choir
• Joy of Music, organ settings of hymns
• Passion Symphony, for organ and narrator
• Symphony of Psalms, for organ, choir, orchestra and soloist
• Morning Has Broken, for organ, choir, orchestra and narrator.
• "German Carol Fantasy", for organ solo
• "Dance of the Trumpets", for organ solo
• "Introduction, Theme and Variations on "All Creatures of Our God and King", for solo organ

External links

• The Official Diane Bish Website