Damin Spritzer - Women Students of Marcel Dupré (2025)

The legacy of master to pupil is a profound connection in the organ world, and those relationships are at the heart of the programming for this album of organ works by women composers of the 20th century, all of whom share this connection with the foremost organ virtuoso and pedagogue of their time, Marcel Dupré (1886-1971). However, she who specifically connects these elements to the University of Oklahoma and to the selection of this Fisk Organ for this recording is former OU organ professor Mildred Andrews (1915–­1987), also a student of Dupré, and whose estate made possible the fund for OU’s Mildred Andrews Boggess Memorial Organ.

One of the preeminent organ professors of the United States, Miss Andrews taught organ at the University of Oklahoma for 38 years beginning in 1938. During her decades at OU she trained fourteen Fulbright scholars and twenty winners of national competitions. In 1959, the American Guild of Organists named her The Outstanding Organ Teacher in North America. She was inducted into the Oklahoma Hall of Fame and awarded the University’s Distinguished Service Citation. Born in Hominy, Oklahoma, her parents managed to find funds for her piano lessons and she herself began to teach when she was only in high school. She completed a degree in piano at the University of Oklahoma in 1937, a master’s degree from the University of Michigan in 1940. In 1939, Dupré urged her to give up her teaching to pursue an international concert career, but she declined and dedicated her life to her students, including continuing her studies with Dupré to perfect her own teaching technique. This program is dedicated to her memory and her legacy, which inspired my research into women composers and students of Dupré.