Barbara Owen | 1933 – 2024

Bar­bara J. Owen passed away peace­ful­ly on the evening of Octo­ber 14, 2024, at Mas­conomet Health­care in Tops­field, Mass., after a brief peri­od of declin­ing health. She was 91.

 

Born in Uti­ca, N.Y., on Jan­u­ary 25, 1933, she earned a bach­e­lor of music degree from West­min­ster Choir Col­lege and a mas­ter of music degree in musi­col­o­gy from Boston Uni­ver­si­ty in 1962. The next year she began a 40-year tenure as direc­tor of music at the First Reli­gious Soci­ety of New­bury­port. Mass. In addi­tion, she was a voicer for C.B. Fisk, Inc. from 1961 to 1979.

 

Bar­bara Owen was one of sev­er­al Amer­i­can organ enthu­si­asts who found­ed the Organ His­tor­i­cal Soci­ety in 1956, became the found­ing pres­i­dent, and served in sev­er­al capac­i­ties. She was hon­ored with the OHS Dis­tin­guished Ser­vice Award in 1988, and was des­ig­nat­ed an Hon­orary Mem­ber in 1998 in recog­ni­tion of her con­tri­bu­tions both to the soci­ety and to schol­ar­ship. The Amer­i­can Musi­cal Instru­ment Soci­ety hon­ored her with its pres­ti­gious Curt Sachs Award in 1994. She served the Amer­i­can Guild of Organ­ists as region­al coun­cilor and chap­ter dean and was a trustee of the Methuen Memo­r­i­al Music Hall. She was the founder and cura­tor of the Organ Library of the Boston Chap­ter of the Amer­i­can Guild of Organ­ists, locat­ed at Boston University.

 

Few have served and influ­enced a pro­fes­sion in as many aspects as Bar­bara Owen. Through­out sev­en decades she was an organ­builder, organ restor­er, researcher, author, advo­cate, con­sul­tant, musi­cian, music edi­tor, lec­tur­er, hymn writer, and librar­i­an. In addi­tion to a con­stant flow of arti­cles in schol­ar­ly jour­nals, her books includ­ed The Organ in New Eng­land, E. Pow­er Big­gs: Con­cert Organ­ist, The Mor­mon Taber­na­cle Organ: An Amer­i­can Clas­sic, The Reg­is­tra­tion of Baroque Organ Music, The Organ Music of Johannes Brahms, The Great Organ at Methuen, and Pio­neers in Amer­i­can Organ Music 1860 – 1920: The New Eng­land Classicists.