Rich Trojan

Richard H. Trojan died December 30, 2006, at the age of 80 at his home in Corvallis. The opening concert of the 2007 Chintimini Festival is dedicated to his memory.

In the early 1980s, Richard was introduced to a visiting Dutch musician as “Corvallis’ Renaissance man.” Broad knowledge and boundless curiosity characterized his mind, with a special capacity for delight.

Born in Astoria, Oregon, into a musical family, Richard was surrounded early by French cello and piano music of the Romantic era. An amateur pianist, flutist, and oboist with two grand pianos in his living room, he invited all comers to join him at four-to-eight-hand piano. His last 30 years were devoted to harpsichord and the Baroque. These two periods are the focus of Tuesday’s opening concert.

Interactive music-making was Richard’s chief delight — coupled with his enthusiasm for involving and mentoring the young. He taught absolutely anyone who showed interest, and gave away many recorders to kids of all ages. Of course he loved chamber music and was a hearty supporter of the Chintimini Festival from its beginnings in 2001.

Rich’s bachelor’s degree was in Art Education. After completing a Master’s in Fine Arts at Columbia University, he taught at Fresno, Columbia, Clark College, and for many years at Oregon State University in Corvallis. Blending work and hobbies, he was art professor, lifelong student, jewelry designer, weaver, knitter, spinner, dyer, painter, printer, portrait maker, naturalist, potter in both stoneware and raku, flute maker, chef, and winner of first prize in the Floral Division at the 1969 Oregon State Fair for a Japanese Tea Garden display and performance.

He loved to experiment, working always with patience and painstaking care. As a maker of bamboo flutes, he harvested canes from a particular California grove and cured them for a full year before cutting the holes. This called for a calculated guess, since the firing process would change the pitches. Unlike many bamboo flutes, those he made were perfectly in tune. The U.S. Post Office once delivered a letter addressed only to “The Flute Maker, Corvallis, Oregon.”

Carrying a lovely spinet harpsichord in the back of his station wagon, he founded early music groups in Corvallis, Salem, Lebanon, and Eugene, Oregon, and in Fresno and Auberry in California: Antiquae Novae, Heartwood, Emerald Chamber Players, Sierra Chamber Ensemble and Figs and Thistles. Richard hoped that members of Figs and Thistles would continue to play Baroque music. Two of his three spinets, used for the January 20 celebration of his life, are being so used in Eugene and Salem.

Chintimini Chamber Music Festival • (541) 753-2106 • dcaldwell26@comcast.net

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