Fred's Facts ... a lot of specific details,
whether you want to know it or not!

To skip all of this, scroll down to the bottom of this page
for the text of Fred's concise, professional bio,
found at bottom of right column.

Frederick Hohman was born in Saint Louis, Missouri in 1955. As a teenager, he was recognized locally for talents in cinematography and film editing. At age 16, he produced a 30-minute historical film documentary intended for commercial distribution, entitled: St. Charles, Missouri: Essence and Reality.

Although he intended to pursue a career in Hollywood, on the advice of his musician father, and comfortable with vast teenage experience as a performing musician, and with the encouragement of a full scholarship from the Eastman School of Music (University of Rochester, New York), he entered the Eastman School in 1974 as a sophomore level undergraduate in the organ class of David Craighead. He would remain at Eastman to earn the Performer's Certificate in Organ (1977), Mus.B., Applied Organ (1977), Master of Music in Performance and Literature (Organ), 1979, and the Doctor of Musical Arts in Performance and Literature (Organ), 1990.

Fred is distinguished as the only student to have taken all available degrees at the Eastman School while remaining in the organ studio of David Craighead. David Craighead led a remarkable as an organ virtuoso and teacher, with more than 35 years at the Eastman School. (Fred did, however, study for 6 weeks with Eastman's other organ professor, Russell Saunders, while Dr. Craighead recovered from abdominal surgery. Those 6 weeks were given over exclusively to Froberger and Frescobaldi!)

Fred's primary piano and organ teacher in St. Louis from 1967 to 1974 was Charles Cordeal of Webster Groves, Missouri. Charles saw the opportunity to use Fred, then age 12, as a model student for the then-new St. Louis Archdiocesan Organist Training Program (AOTP), a program designed by Cordeal to attract a wide pool of keyboard players at a basic level, and to advance them through a program, with the goal of preparing pianists for placement as organists in Catholic parishes. Fred progressed through the program and presented his first solo organ recital at age 14, with Cordeal's turning pages at his side, in November, 1969, at St. John's United Church of Christ in St Charles, Missouri. While studying with Cordeal, from age 12 through 17, Fred served simultaneously as organist in two churches in St. Charles, Missouri: Good Shepherd United Church of Christ (playing a Baldwin electronic), and Faith United Methodist Church (playing a Hammond C-3).

Fred's father, Marvin, a jazz and big-band style dance band musician, and a teacher of woodwinds and brass, was schooling Fred concurrently in jazz theory during Fred's teens, and took him for weekly lessons with jazz pianists in St. Louis, in addition to weekly studies of the "classics" with Professor Cordeal. On Fred's 13th birthday, Marvin arranged for Fred to join the Musicians' Union (A. F. of M.) Local 2-197. Father Marv put son Fred to work on weekends, employing him as his pianist (and sometimes as keyboardist with portable electronic organs by Farfisa and Acetone (!!), for Marv's jazz combo and in big band gigs, playing wedding receptions, bar and bas mitzvahs and other private and corporate parties in places ranging from V.F.W. and American Legion halls to such noted St. Louis venues as La Chateau (Frontenac) and the Chase Park-Plaza Hotel. It was in this environment that Fred learned the value of a musician who also serves as an entertainer.

Fred's open acceptance of a wide scope of religious belief was tempered by his having completed confirmation courses during his youth in three different Christian denominations: United Church of Christ, Missouri Synod Lutheran and Roman Catholic.

Prior to leaving St. Louis at age 18, Fred served as Associate Organist for 19 months at Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Webster Groves (1973-1974), where his mentor in Anglican church music and hymn-leadership style was the Rev. Zane Wesley Gordy, a student and disciple of renown Philadelphia organ professor Alexander McCurdy. It was during his 19-month stay at Emmanuel Episcopal Church that Fred presented 3 organ recitals (memorized) on the church's 3-manual Holtkamp organ, drawing upon organ literature ranging from the "Wedge" Prelude and Fugue of J. S. Bach to the organ works of Maurice Duruflé and Paul Hindemith. Two of these events drew critical notice in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Prior to his entry into the Eastman School, Fred also studied organ for collegiate academic credit with Kathleen Thomerson and composition with James Woodard, both of whom taught then as faculty at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville.

During his first years at Eastman, 1977-1979, Fred produced, engineered, hosted, and performed all the organ literature for a weekly 30-minute radio program, entitled Pro Organo. This series was syndicated by Hohman in the USA to 20 affiliates with National Public Radio. The Pro Organo radio series had 26 weekly episodes. One broadcaster who encouraged Hohman the most in his radio series was Michael Barone, now renown host of the Pipedreams series, but then, a staff producer at Minnesota Public Radio's FM affiliate in Collegeville / St. Cloud, Minnesota. The Pro Organo radio series pre-dated Barone's Pipedreams series by two years. The name "Pro Organo" that once applied to Hohman's radio show was adopted by Hohman as the name of his CD label in 1984. The Pro Organo radio series was produced at first using an array of 4 condenser microphones, fed to and mixed by a Revox A700 open-reel recorder, configured as a professional 2-track stereo deck, and later, with an Ampex ATR-102 recorder.

After having been a semi-finalist and finalist in a number of competitions, including the J. S. Bach International Organ Competition (Leipzig, 1976) and the Diane Bish International Organ Competition (Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 1982 and 1983), in 1984, Frederick Hohman won First Prize in both the Clarence Mader Organ Competition (Ruth and Clarence Mader Memorial Scholarship Fund, Pasadena, California) and the Arthur Poister national organ-playing competition (American Guild of Organists, Syracuse, New York).

Fred's original compositions and organ transcriptions are published by Wayne Leupold Editions and by Zarex Scores. Only a small portion of Fred's compositional output is published as of this date. Only one of his many choral anthems is published (Lawson & Gould). Among the most secular of items in Fred's diverse output are a series of singing "jingles," composed during a stint as a jingle writer in 1980-81. In 1984, Fred took First Prize - winning over several composition majors at Eastman - for his anthem "Jerusalem, the City," with his entry in an anthem competition, held in conjunction with the sesquicentennial celebration of the city of Rochester, New York. During his years at Eastman, Fred's composition and orchestration professor was department chariman Samuel Adler.

Fred's Eastman School doctoral essay (1988), entitled "The Art of the Symphonic Organist" and his many CD recordings of original organ music and organ transcriptions by the king of symphonic organists, Edwin Henry Lemare (1865-1934), have cast Fred as a symphonic organist; however, most people in the profession forget that Fred has always performed the gamut of organ literature.

Between the years 1974 and 1993, Frederick served the following parishes as organist and choirmaster or as director of music and organist: First Lutheran Church of Lyons, New York; First Presbyterian Church, Durham, North Carolina; Union United Methodist Church, Saint Louis, Missouri; First Presbyterian Church, South Bend, Indiana.

During his career as a recitalist, Frederick Hohman has performed hundreds of recitals in the USA, including tours of the Caribbean (1997 and 1999), Australia (2000 and 2003), the UK and Finland (1986 and 2004). He has presided as the featured recitalist at the dedication of new American organs, and has been featured as a concerto soloist with a number of American symphony orchestras. He has appeared in concert and recital before regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists (2008 and 2009), and before national conventions of the Organ Historical Society and American Institute of Organbuilders. He is presently active with the American Guild of Organists at the national level as its Director of the Committee on Educational Resources.

From 1996 to 2000, Hohman produced and hosted a weekly television series about the organ and organists, entitled "Midnight Pipes." This series ran for 24 half-hour episodes, and was aired in the Los Angeles market and on over 12 other affiliates with public television (PBS) in the USA. Today, segments from the Midnight Pipes series may be found posted on a "channel" at YouTube.com: midnightpipes

Although he has presented many mastercasses for AGO Chapters and as a part of his duties during a 14-year tenure (1997 through 2011) as permanent juror and festival artist in the annual Albert Schweitzer Organ Festival and Competition USA, to date, Fred has never held a full-time academic position as an applied music teacher.

Frederick Hohman served as the president of Zarex Corporation from 1995 through 2010. He has supervised production and post-production at its audio / video facility, opened in 2005 in South Bend, Indiana: Zarex HD.

Frederick became wed in 1993 to Elizabeth; they have no children.

Further information is found at these websites:

www.zarex.com
www.proorgano.com
www.frederickhohman.net

More details, and stated a bit differently ...

Frederick Hohman is a name strongly linked with the pipe organ, but depending on who you ask, you will be told that he is either a concert organist, a church organist, a composer, an audio producer / engineer, an entrepreneur, an inventor, a corporate executive, a CD label director, or even a video director. Over the past 35 years, Frederick Hohman has become distinguished in all these seemingly diverse occupations, but few can believe that one person can in fact do all of these things quite well.

Fred was headed for a career devoted exclusively to concert touring in 1984, as he won First Prize in two of the most prestigious of American organ competitions. However, his performing career was interrupted several times over the next 25 years, as his expertise in audio and video media brought him the chance to produce and engineer over 350 organ and sacred choral albums for his organ and choral colleagues, including some of the top names in the field on three continents. 235 of his productions were released on the Pro Organo CD label he founded, and about 100 more titles were produced for other labels and publishers. From 1985 to 2011, the Pro Organo label has become renown for excellence in engineering and for its devotion to recording new organ and choral literature.

During his years building the Pro Organo label, Frederick managed to produce and release a dozen of his own organ CDs on the Pro Organo label. He also had some seasons that favored concert tours, in 1989, 1994, 1998, 2002, and 2004. Now in 2012, after 25 years, a period where he has put a number of personal music projects on long-term hold, while he still has excellent health, Frederick is spending more time on the live side of the microphone and in front of the lens, stepping back into the spotlight, on the organ bench.
 
Fred was born in St. Louis, Missouri to parents who were both professional musicians and teachers. He entered the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music in 1974 as an undergraduate scholarship student in the organ class of David Craighead, where through 1990, he had earned Eastman's Performer's Certificate, as well as Mus.B., M.M. and D.M.A. degrees in Performance and Literature.   In 1984, he was named First Prize Winner in both the Clarence Mader and Arthur Poister national organ-playing competitions.  

Since 1984, he has toured the USA with organ concerts, workshop and lecture recitals.  His tours have taken him throughout the USA, to the Caribbean, Australia, the UK and Finland.  In addition to appearing before regional and national conventions of The American Guild of Organists, The Organ Historical Society, and The American Institute of Organbuilders, he has appeared at several noteworthy music festivals, including The San Anselmo Organ Festival, the Redlands Organ Festival and the Spoleto Festival.  Since 1997, he has also served every September as an adjudicator and festival artist in the Albert Schweitzer Organ Festival and Competition / USA in greater Hartford, Connecticut.

As an organist, Frederick Hohman has been acclaimed by a critic with The Diapason magazine as "one of the symphonic organ's strongest exponents."  His 1984 doctoral essay, "The Art of the Symphonic Organist," and his 1985 CD "Lemare Affair" ignited a revival in symphonic organ literature and performance practices.  This led to his first organ transcription publications, and to the appearance of 2 sequel "Lemare Affair" CDs as well as a popular organ CD entitled "SympHohmania."  

Frederick Hohman's organ transcriptions and original organ music can be found published by Wayne Leupold Editions - www.wayneleupold.com - and by Zarex Scores - http://www.zarex.com/AboutZarexScores.html . He has also penned music under the nom de plume "Carlos Xavier Santiago." Works for organ and orchestra - penned under both identities - were recently premiered to a warm reception with the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra, under the baton of Joseph Schlefke, before the 2008 Twin Cities National Convention of the American Guild of Organists in Minneapolis.

Since 2008, Fred has become active at the national level in The American Guild of Organists (AGO). He presently serves as the Director of the AGO's Committee on Educational Resources, lending both his academic and his manufacturing and publishing experience, as the AGO develops, publishes and distributes timely and relevant educational articles, in print, CD and DVD, to the AGO membership.

Fred has produced over 300 organ and choral CDs, working with a variety of both new and established artists.  Many of these CDs have drawn critical-acclaim in music and audiophile trade journals, including The Absolute Sound, Fanfare, The Gramophone, The Organ, The Tracker, The Journal of the Association of Anglican Musicians, Choir & Organ, The Diapason, Musical Opinion and The American Organist. Most of his CD productions find release on Pro Organo, a label he founded in 1985, and for which he still serves as Senior Producer / Engineer and Director of Artists and Repertoire.  

Fred is also known for his mastering and engineering skills as have been applied in many recent surround-sound SACDs for the Albany Records label.  His work as an audio producer expanded to television in 1996, where, through 2000, he produced a television series about pipe organs and organists, entitled "Midnight Pipes."  This series aired over several public television affiliates.  Segments from the Midnight Pipes series are still seen on the worldwide-distributed Classic Arts Showcase (ARTS Cable Channel), and on YouTube at www.youtube.com/midnightpipes .

When not on location for concerts or recordings, Fred can be found working in his music studio and audio / video facility, Zarex HD, in South Bend, Indiana, and in his home shared with spouse Elizabeth.  There he practices on a 1923 vintage 4-manual Austin organ console and on a 1985 C. Bechstein Model D 280 concert grand, and composes on a Sibelius workstation.  

Frederick Hohman's independent, entrepreneurial American artist's life was featured as a lead story in the recent issues of The Organ and Choir & Organ, two of the British organ trade "glossies."  His website is: www.frederickhohman.net and his CD label website is: www.proorgano.com .

Frederick Hohman (December, 2010.)

A Brief, Concise, Professional Bio
for Program Publication:

Frederick Hohman is known as a concert organist, but he is also a sought-after classical music audio-video producer / engineer, and a composer or organ and choral music.  He earned the Performer's Certificate, Mus.B., M.M. and D.M.A. degrees while in the organ class of David Craighead at the University of Rochester's Eastman School of Music. In 1984, he won First Prize in both the Mader and Poister national organ-playing competitions.

His original compositions and organ transcriptions are published by Wayne Leupold Editions and by Zarex Scores. His 1990 doctoral essay "The Art of the Symphonic Organist" and his many CD recordings of orginal organ works and organ transcriptions by Edwin Lemare have established him as a leading symphonic organist.

Since 1984, his concert tours have taken him throughout the USA, at to the Caribbean, Australia, the UK and Finland. He has performed before regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists (AGO), and has served as the Director of the AGO's Committee on Educational Resources.

The CD label Pro Organo, founded in 1985 by Hohman, has its production facility, Zarex HD, in South Bend, Indiana.

He has served as an adjudicator at several noted national and international organ-playing competitions, including the Arthur Poister (2011-AGO), Albert Schweitzer Organ Competition and Festival / USA (1997-2011 ASOF), the Fort Wayne National Organ-Playing Competition, and the Herbert Davis State Organ Prize (2000-Victoria, Australia).

His CDs and DVDs are available from www.proorgano.com.
His website is www.frederickhohman.net