During five Fridays this fall, world-class musicians will offer recitals on the magnificent pipe organ in historic St. Helena’s Church at 505 Church Street in downtown Beaufort. These free concerts will feature sacred and secular music. The guest virtuosos are Dr. David Arcus; Christopher Jacobson; Paul Braxton Thomas; our featured young organist, Robert Elliott Stubbs Jr.; and Adam Brakel. The series kicks off Friday, October 11 with Dr. David Arcus. Come spend an exhilarating hour with these incredible musicians and welcome fall. All concerts begin at 12 p.m. For more information, contact Pat Gould, Director of Music for the Parish Church of St. Helena, at 522-1712.
Dr. David Arcus is chapel organist and associate university organist at Duke University, where he participates in nearly 200 services and events annually. He holds degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the School of Music at Yale University, where he earned his Doctor of Musical Arts degree. He has received awards in composition and improvisation competitions, and he is in demand as a solo recitalist, having performed throughout the United States, Europe, and Great Britain. He has also toured with the Duke Chapel Choir in Great Britain, Poland, the Czech Republic, Spain, Greece, Turkey, and China; and he has appeared as organist with the North Carolina Symphony Orchestra.
He has served on the faculties of St. Mary’s School, Duke University, and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dr. Arcus’ recitals have included premieres of new works by well- known composers such as Aaron Jay Kernis, Dan Locklair, and Marianne Ploger. He is frequently commissioned to write new works for organ and choir, and he is also active as clinician, teacher/lecturer, and conductor. In the summer of 2013, he presented a workshop on improvisation at the Southeast Regional Convention of the American Guild of Organists and was course organist for the Royal School of Church Music Carolinas Course. His compositions are published by Concordia, Hinshaw, and Wayne Leupold Editions. His CD, The Organs of Duke Chapel, is on the Gothic label.
