Death of an eminent US organist, 81

Dr Delbert Disselhorst of Iowa City, Iowa died unexpectedly on September 1, 2022 from natural causes.

He was professor of organ at the University of lowa from 1970 until his retirement in 2008.

Tributes:
Del was a monumental influence in the lives of his decades of students. His shared talents and knowledge were prodigious and profound. His innate kindness came hand-in-hand with the high standards and expectations that demanded the best of those who studied with him. Very few students came to a lesson with Del unprepared. And Del applied those scrupulous standards most rigorously to his own performance. Del honored the compositions he played, and he expected the same reverence from his students. –David Tryggestad (retired minister and musician)

I heard this afternoon that Delbert passed away peacefully last night in his sleep. Looking back, it’s hard to believe that he was officially my teacher for only three semesters — I feel like I learned so much from him, not only about technique and musicianship, but about how to be a professional and, finally, a good man. Like many of his former students, our relationship transitioned easily from student-teacher to good friends. He was unbelievably generous to me over the years with both his time and treasure — a large percentage of my scores and books were inherited from him.

There are so many memories I could recount: good lessons, terrible lessons, lunches, dinners, terrifying car trips, professional advice, LONG talks about bygone eras and artists, and, of course, recitals. He played Bach — particularly the trio sonatas and Clavierubung — like no one else.

If I had to pick one memory, though, that I think best sums up what he was about, it would be this one, from a recital we attended in 2008. We were sitting in the audience at intermission, discussing the first half, when a well-meaning woman in front of us turned around and asked Delbert if he was also an organist. If you know anything about the organ world, you know that there are many (MANY) organists who would have reacted with indignation and disdain as they exhaustively recounted their myriad accomplishments and shamed the poor woman for her gross ignorance. Delbert certainly could have taken that route — he was a former Fulbright scholar and one of the most accomplished and highly esteemed performers of his generation — but he just smiled and said, “yes, I do play.” That moment of humility and magnanimity has always stayed with me.

Del had hundreds of students over 30+ years of teaching, and I’m sure there will be as many heartfelt tributes penned over the coming days and weeks. I remember the outpouring of love and gratitude that accompanied his retirement celebration in 2008 and I look forward to reading and hearing those recollections. Many knew him much longer than I did, and as a younger man, when he would sometimes tell underachieving students that he hoped they knew how to pump gas.

For me, though, I’ll always think of him in a somewhat grandfatherly way, seated magisterially at the console (you could tell just by looking at him that he was a powerful and engaging performer), holding court in a convention hotel bar surrounded by generations of former students and admirers, or simply relaxing at home with his beloved “little girls,” Tabby and Tessie.

Del was first and foremost a great performer, and I think it only right to conclude this with a recording. It’s from a concert he gave on the Casavant organ at the First Congregational Church in Iowa City, designed and installed by our good friend Carroll Hanson. Let light perpetual shine upon him. –David Crean (Music Director of St. George’s Episcopal Church and the Bach Society of Dayton, OH)