Stuart Gardner died from natural causes on July 19, 2022 at Hospice By the Sea in Boca Raton, Florida. He was 96 years old.
A native of West Hartford, Conn., he graduated from Westminster Choir College in 1947, followed by a Master of Music degree from Yale University. While at Yale he was the organist and choirmaster of St. Paul’s-on-the-Green in Norwalk, Conn. In 1955 he was appointed to the Church of the Transfiguration, popularly known as the Little Church Around the Corner, in New York City, following a tenure at St. Paul’s in Flatbush, Brooklyn. He remained at Transfiguration for nearly a quarter of a century. He also taught at the McBurney School and Trinity School in New York.
At Transfiguration Stuart directed a choir of men and boys which had been established in the mid-19th century shortly after the church was founded, and he collaborated with the New York Pro Musica, founded in 1952 and directed by Noah Greenberg (1919-1966), which was in residence at the church. The New York Pro Musica was at that time in the forefront of the nascent early music movement in New York. Though not actually a part of the parish music program, several professional singers sang in the church choir and in the Pro Musica, and boys of the church choir often performed in the Pro Musica’s concerts, recordings, and tours, including their celebrated production of the mediaeval Play of Daniel which attracted national and international notice, including a European tour under the auspices of the United States State Department.
The Transfiguration choir frequently participated in extra-parish musical concerts and activities offered in New York City, including performances and recordings with the New York Philharmonic and Leonard Bernstein in Mahler’s Second Symphony, which was nominated for a Grammy award. Following that, they also participated in New York Philharmonic concert performances of Mahler’s Third and Eighth symphonies with Pierre Boulez, the Berlioz Damnation of Faust, and other events including the world premiere of George Crumb’s Voices of Ancient Children.
In a 2019 visit with Stuart at his home in Florida, he told Claudia Dumschat (his successor at Transfiguration several times removed) and me that it was the policy of the better-known boy choirs in New York, like those at St. Thomas Church and the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, not to allow their choirs to accept outside secular engagements. As a result of recommendations from them, his choir received and accepted many such invitations, and a generation of choirboys to this day recall these exciting appearances apart from their normal rota of singing liturgical church services.
In June 1981 Stuart married his wife Mary Lou, who he met in New York in 1973. Shortly before that he left New York to accept a position at Saint Luke’s Parish in Darien, Conn. His passion for sailing precipitated this move, which passion he pursued in a serious way. In an email to me recently, his step-son Tim Ferrell said “ . . . he was an avid sailor and would spend at least a month of each summer sailing. I sailed with him many times, anywhere from his homeport of Norwalk, Conn., to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. He liked to make distance and sailing was a vigorous activity. In later years we often spoke about the great times we had sailing up and down the coast of New England.”
In 1988 Stuart moved to Florida to accept a position at St. Paul’s Church in Delray Beach. In addition to the normal round of music at services, he founded the series “Music at St. Paul’s” to serve the community, as well as the parish. There he presented concerts featuring local parish musicians as well as community professionals featuring a wide variety and combinations of forces, with repertoire drawn from disparate eras and genres. The series continues to this day. Local newspaper accounts indicate that the St. Paul’s series took its place as a serious venue for classical music in the wider community in Southeast Florida.
In a 1998 article in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel Stuart said “Historically, churches were always centers of the arts . . . I view our concerts as part of the church’s outreach to the community. They are not just for the people of St. Paul’s.” And in the same article, a member of the contracted orchestra said “ . . . he does have a genius for programming. He has established a really interesting series in a warm, comfortable atmosphere for people to enjoy music in.”
See the full article at: AT ST. PAUL’S, A DEVOTION TO MUSIC – Sun Sentinel (sun-sentinel.com)
Toward the end of his career, Stuart was featured in an interview-article, also in the Sun-Sentinel, which includes the following exchanges, giving insights into Stuart’s approach to music and life:
Q: [What is] a distinctive feature of your music program”
A: We consider the music program an outreach. We give monthly concerts including solo recitals all the way up to orchestra [programs] with 60 musicians. The other thing I do is train the two choirs and play at our two services.
Q: You allow young people to come to parish concerts at no charge. Why?
A: In the old days, music was as important as sciences, literature, drama, and so forth . . . enlightened headmasters and educators realize the arts are very important.
Q: If you couldn’t be a minister [of music] what would you be?
A: I would sail the seven seas. When I get an opportunity to, I still sail. Sailing is stimulating physically and mentally.
Q: Do you have a guilty pleasure?
A: The second martini!
See the full interview: STUART M. GARDNER – Sun Sentinel (sun-sentinel.com)
Stuart Gardner’s wife Mary Lou died in 2015. He leaves three step-children and many choristers, friends, and students on whom he left an indelible mark on their lives through his friendship and support, and his consummate musicianship freely shared with all.
Plans for a memorial service are pending.
—Neal Campbell, October 2022
Neal Campbell--Words and Pictures. 