7th annual N.C. High School Organ Festival and Competition is Jan. 26-28
The seventh annual North Carolina High School Organ Festival and Competition will be held in Winston–Salem Jan. 26-28, with events at the University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Salem College and Augsburg Lutheran Church.
Festival Director Timothy Olsen said the festival draws on the city’s rich history and abundant resources of pipe organs and organ music. Olsen is the Kenan Professor of Organ in UNCSA's School of Music and associate professor of organ at Salem College.
Students from across the country will compete for prizes that include the Thomas S. Kenan, III First Prize of $2,000 or one year of in-state tuition to UNCSA; a second prize of $1,000 sponsored by the Piedmont Chapter of the American Guild of Organists; third prize of $500; and the John and Margaret Mueller Hymn Prize of $350.
The competition on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 26 and 27 includes several events that are free and open to the public:
UNCSA organ student recital on UNCSA’s C.B. Fisk, Op 75 organ at 7 p.m. Friday in Crawford Hall on the UNCSA campus at 1533 South Main St.
Awards presentation and winners recital at 4:30 p.m. Saturday at Augsburg Lutheran Church at 845 West Fifth St., on the 1968 Casavant with further modifications by Létourneau in 1997.
Salem College student and faculty recital at 7 p.m. Saturday on the 1965/2013 Flentrop organ at Shirley Recital Hall in Salem’s Elberson Fine Arts Center.
On Sunday, Jan. 28, the festival weekend concludes on the UNCSA campus with a workshop on Alexander Technique and injury-preventive keyboard techniques taught by Barbara Lister-Sink and Suzy Perkins, a master class with Olsen, and individual lessons with Olsen.
February 25, 2026