This preview has been provided by Patrick Zelezik.

Patrick Zelezik will be performing an organ recital on the historic 1852 Jardine Cabinet organ at Holy Trinity in Hertford on Tuesday, March 15 at 5 pm. He is Artistic Director of Houston Baroque; Minister of Music at Holy Comforter Episcopal Church and School; Adjunct Professor of Music at Houston Community College; and a doctoral candidate at University of Houston. This performance is free and open to the public.

Mr. Zelezik states, “Playing a historic organ is the closest thing to a time machine. When I play an old organ, I get in touch with the souls who lived in a different time and place, who thought and lived in different ways, but basically had the same feelings and life experiences as we do in 21st Century America. My job is to take the musical language they left behind and translate it into a rhetoric any listener can understand, appreciate, and be moved by. Historic organs give the interpreter and audience an even further glimpse into the souls of past cultures.”

In 2015, Mr. Zelezik, who holds degrees from Cleveland Institute of Music and University of North Carolina, Greensboro, lived for six months in Leipzig, Germany, where J.S. Bach served at St. Thomas Church for almost three decades. Mr. Zelezik performed on several organs Bach himself knew and played. He also played historic organs in France, Germany, the Netherlands and Poland.

“Upon my return to the United States, I was curious to see if there might be any historic organs on this side of pond; my dad had heard about ‘that old organ in Hertford’ and told me about it.”

Mr. Zelezik is at his best in organ music of the German Romantic period, but is equally at home in music of the Baroque. He leads Houston’s only group dedicated to chamber music of the Baroque period (www.houstonbaroque.org), and has performed the complete solo organ works of several important Baroque composers, including Bach. The program at Holy Trinity will feature various Baroque composers from the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, and Germany, concluding with works by Bach.

The organ, constructed by George Jardine of New York for Holy Trinity c. 1852, is a one manual tracker organ that has been in constant use since its installation. Lighting for the organist’s music rack was originally provided by oil lamps mounted on the façade; the air source was originally supplied by hand pumps. Today both of these functions utilize electricity.

In 2008, the organ was taken to Winston-Salem where it was cleaned, refurbished and restored as closely as possible to its original specifications by J. Allen Farmer, Inc., Pipe Organ Builders. Mr. Farmer specializes in the restoration of historic organs and, with the help of Holy Trinity’s organist and historian Raymond A. Winslow, Jr., did extensive research to accomplish this.

Holy Trinity Episcopal Church is located at 207 S. Church Street, Hertford.