Brennan Szafron - Principal Organ & Piano
A native of Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, Brennan Szafron is the first full-time organist and choirmaster of the Episcopal Church of the Advent in Spartanburg, SC, a position he has held since August 2003. In 2004, Brennan joined the Spartanburg Philharmonic first as a featured soloist, then as a member of the orchestra, eventually becoming the Organ & Piana Principal. His earliest training as an organist began in Ottawa, Ontario in 1990, when he took his first year of lessons with Danielle Dubé at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church. He finished high school in Regina where between 1991 and 1994 his teachers were Verleen Baerg, Gordon Wallis, and Harold Gallagher. Before coming to Spartanburg, Brennan Szafron was the assistant organist and choirmaster of Christ Episcopal Church, Grosse Pointe, MI, with whom he toured France and Switzerland in the summer of 2003. He was also a student at the University of Michigan, where he received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in organ performance, studying with Robert Glasgow. Other degrees include a Master of Music degree from Yale University, where his teachers were Thomas Murray and Martin Jean, and a Bachelor of Music degree, with distinction, from the University of Alberta, where his teachers were Jacobus Kloppers and Marnie Giesbrecht.
Off Stage
Dr. Szafron’s great non-musical passion in the great outdoors. He has attempted to hike as many trails as possible throughout the SC and NC mountains and hopes to eventually be an “ultimate outsider” upon completion of visits to all the SC state parks.
5 Questions
What piece or composer do you wish orchestras played more often? “Vetrate Da Chiesa” (Church Windows) by Ottorino Resphigi. (Naturally it has an organ part.)
What is your favorite place you’ve ever performed and why? The Church of St. Sulpice in Paris, France. I got to play the same organ that Charles-Marie Widor (composer of the famous toccata) presided over for more than 60 years.
What is the best concert you’ve ever been to, classical or otherwise? The Swedish Radio Choir performing the Verdi Requiem at Hill Auditorium on the University of Michigan Campus in 2001.
What is the most spontaneous thing you’ve ever done? Flying a plane from New York to L.A. to surprise a friend in 1999. My visit was less than 24 hours.
If you won a million-dollar lottery tomorrow, what would be the first three things you did? Travel to Europe, buy a pipe organ for one church, put the rest of the money in a rainy day fund.
+ MORE QUESTIONS
- What is your greatest accomplishment you’re the proudest of? I lead a fundraising campaign in 2017 to buy handbells for the Church of the Advent. The campaign ended three months early thanks to some corny singing on my part.
- When driving or traveling, do you prefer music or podcasts, and what’s your go-to choice?_Definitely music._I love the smooth jazz radio station on Sirius XM.**
- What would your perfect day look like?Waking up looking out at a beach, walking on the beach in the morning, lunch at a quiet cafe, making music on a big fabulous organ in the afternoon, dinner with lots of friends in a noisy setting, going to an orchestra or organ concert, walking on the beach before bed.
- If you could live anywhere in the world where would it be and why?Auckland, New Zealand. It’s big but remote and beautiful. New Zealanders I think are the first people that get to ring in the new year.
- If you could choose to be one age forever what would it be?40. When you’re 40 you have a lot of life experience but you’re still young.
+ FULL BIOGRAPHY
A native of Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, Brennan Szafron is the first full-time organist and choirmaster of the Episcopal Church of the Advent in Spartanburg, SC, a position he has held since August 2003. At this church, he is responsible for playing the organ for all services, directing two adult and three children’s choirs, and directing and arranging music for the instrumental and hand chime ensembles. He took a group of adults to New York City where on August 20, 2006 they were the choir-in-residence at Grace Church, Broadway and to Washington, DC in early June of 2013, when they sang at the Basilica Shrine of the Immaculate Conception and St. Alban’s Episcopal Church. He took an adult choir to Lincoln Cathedral, Lincoln, England where they were the choir-in-residence for a week in July 2016. Also, since 2009 he has been an adjunct instructor in organ performance and college organist at Converse College.
Dr. Szafron’s earliest training as an organist began in Ottawa, Ontario in 1990, when he took his first year of lessons with Danielle Dubé at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church. He finished high school in Regina where between 1991 and 1994 his teachers were Verleen Baerg, Gordon Wallis, and Harold Gallagher. While in Regina, he took on his first professional positions which were as organists of St. Peter’s Anglican Church and Christ Lutheran Church. He has had continued church employment since then.
Before coming to Spartanburg, Brennan Szafron was the assistant organist and choirmaster of Christ Episcopal Church, Grosse Pointe, MI, with whom he toured France and Switzerland in the summer of 2003. He was also a student at the University of Michigan, where he received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in organ performance, studying with Robert Glasgow. Other degrees include a Master of Music degree from Yale University, where his teachers were Thomas Murray and Martin Jean, and a Bachelor of Music degree, with distinction, from the University of Alberta, where his teachers were Jacobus Kloppers and Marnie Giesbrecht. While living in Edmonton, he served as the organist of First Baptist Church (1995-98) and sang with the University Alberta Madrigal Singers. At the age of 21, he became a Fellow of the Royal Canadian College of Organists. He has participated in conducting masterclasses with Robert Simpson and Dennis Keane.
Brennan Szafron is the recipient of numerous awards and scholarships. While at the University of Alberta, he received several Beryl Barns memorial scholarships and at Yale, he received the Edwin Stanley Seder memorial scholarship. He was the third prize winner of the 1997 Royal Canadian College of Organists National Competition and the 1998 recipient of the RCCO John Goss Memorial Scholarship for advanced organ study outside of Canada. In 2008, he received the third prize in the first ever RCCO National Improvisation competition and competed in the Marcello Galanti International Organ Competition in Mondaino, Italy. He also received the third prize in the 2015 University of Michigan Organ Improvisation Competition.
In November 2004, Dr. Szafron played the Barber Toccata Festiva and Saint-Saens Symphony No. 3 with the Greater Spartanburg Philharmonic orchestra, and in July 2005, gave a recital at First Baptist Church, Charlotte, NC. On September 11, 2005, he gave a recital at the National Cathedral in Washington, DC. He has also performed on the 1998 Organ a la Carte series at Jack Singer Concert Hall, Calgary, AB, performed a 2000 recital in Regina, SK in commemoration of the death anniversary of J.S. Bach, and performed at St. James Cathedral in Toronto, ON just before the 2001 RCCO National Convention. He was a featured recitalist in the L’organo series for the 2006 Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, SC (and again in 2012 with the duo “The Philharmonic Flutes”), and a recitalist at North Greenville University on October 2nd, 2006. Other recitals have been on the Pro Organo series of the Royal Canadian College of Organists, Ottawa Centre, Cliffs Community chapel at Glassy Mountain, South Carolina, St. Thomas Church, New York City, Holy Family Catholic Church, Hilton Head Island, First Presbyterian Church, Gastonia, NC, Holy Cross Episcopal Church, Tryon, NC, Princeton University Chapel, Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, Columbia, SC, St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Charlotte, NC, First United Methodist Church, Easley, SC, the Episcopal Church of the Advent, Spartanburg, Trinity Episcopal Church, Abbeville, SC, Trinity Lutheran Church, Greenville, SC and at Twichell Auditorium, Converse College in a faculty recital with multiple instrumentalists. In 2012-13, he reprised the Barber Toccata Festiva with the Spartanburg Philharmonic Orchestra (formerly the Greater Spartanburg Philharmonic Orchestra), and gave recitals at the Cathedral of St. Philip in Atlanta, GA and St. James Episcopal Church in Hendersonville, NC. In the summer of 2013 he dedicated the organ at St. John’s Lutheran Church, Spartanburg and gave a recital at First United Methodist Church, Charlotte. 2013-14 included a recital at the Church of the Advent celebrating their organ’s 25th anniversary, a solo recital with guest pianist Doug Weeks in Twichell Auditorium, a performance with the Converse College Symphony Orchestra as the soloist for the Poulenc organ concerto, a recital at Central Synagogue, NYC, and a recital at Landrum Presbyterian Church, Landrum, SC. He played at Holy Cross Episcopal Church again in October of 2014. Other recitals have been at North Greenville University, Tigerville, SC (February 2016) and at Myers Park Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, NC (August 2016). He reprised the Symphony No. 3 of Camille Saint-Saens with the Spartanburg Philharmonic Orchestra in April of 2017. In 2018 he gave his third recital at Piccolo Spoleto in Charleston and gave no fewer than six recitals in 2019, several of which were all-Bach recitals. He gave three all Bach recitals in SC three days in a row in March of 2020. The venues were the Church of the Advent, Spartanburg, Daniel Chapel at Furman University, and the Lutheran Seminary in Columbia.
Dr. Szafron has been featured on the South Carolina Public Radio show “On the Keys” and discusses his church’s organ in a YouTube video series entitled “Pipe Organs of South Carolina”. He also discussed the organ in Twichell Auditorium.