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E. Power Biggs

Organist E. Power Biggs was classical music royalty later in life, performing a great variety of music and recording prolifically. He was an important figure in the revival of interest in the organ music of Bach and other Baroque composers, but he was interested in a wide variety of other music, from Giovanni Gabrieli to Scott Joplin. Edward George Power Biggs was born in Westcliff-on-Sea in the east of England on March 29, 1906. He began as an electrical engineering student but soon switched to the organ, attending the Royal Academy of Music in London and taking classes with G.D. Cunningham. Hit hard by the Great Depression, Biggs moved to the U.S. in 1929, almost destitute and working as an accompanist to a Welsh vocalist. In 1932, he found a job as organist at Christ Church in Cambridge, Massachusetts; he would live there for the rest of his life. Biggs became a U.S. citizen in 1937. Working with a Baroque-style Aeolian-Skinner organ at Harvard University's Busch-Reisinger Museum, Biggs began to investigate historical organs and repertory, becoming an early pioneer of historical organ performance. From 1942 to 1958, he broadcast a weekly program of organ music on the CBS radio network. Biggs toured Europe in 1954 and brought back information about European Baroque organs that led to an American revival in Baroque-style organ building. He made 78 rpm records for the Victor and Mercury labels in the '40s and early '50s. In 1962, Biggs released the album Music for Organ and Orchestra on the Columbia label, inaugurating a relationship that would last for the rest of his life. He was accompanied on the album by conductors Leonard Bernstein and Eugene Ormandy, leading the New York Philharmonic and the Philadelphia Orchestra, respectively. In the late '60s, Biggs was one of the top musicians in the classical world, with some of his recordings appealing to pop audiences. His rival was Virgil Fox, who recorded for the RCA and Capitol labels and sometimes criticized Biggs' style as too scholarly. Biggs, however, was also capable of crossover releases such as E. Power Biggs Plays Scott Joplin on the Pedal Harpsichord and Stars and Stripes: Two Centuries of Heroic Music in America. He traveled to Europe to make many recordings on historic organs there. Biggs commissioned new music from Roy Harris, Walter Piston, and other composers. In the '70s, he was slowed by arthritis but continued to make organ music editions and to teach at the Longy School of Music in Cambridge. He died in Cambridge on March 10, 1977. Many of Biggs' more than 50 LP recordings have been reissued in digital form. Among other honors, Biggs has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
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