Noel A. Jones

At the Catholic school in his home town when other boys were memorizing the prayers at the foot of the altar in Latin to serve Mass, he was starting piano lessons at the age of 7, by the age 13 was also taking lessons with a Harvard-trained organist and then spent 5 years chanting daily Mass in Latin and playing the organ.

At the Guilmant Organ School in New York City, he gained much useful knowledge and enjoyed working as organist at the Church Center for the United Nations and accompanying the United Nations Singers.

Serving in the US Army and stationed in Germany he led his first musical, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, and remained in Germany as choir director at an Anglican/Episcopalian parish and was one of a series of organists for the English Masses at the Cathedral in Frankfurt.

Hired as musical director for a German production of “Hair” in Hamburg, one day he went to accompany a singer auditioning for a new musical in Bremen and he was added to the staff as guest musical director for ICH BIN ICH at the Theater am Goetheplatz, working with stage director and a retired opera singer. Norman Foster. The brilliant young singer, Donna Summers, was one of the cast members in her second premiere role in professional theater, another being Charles Williams, who performed widely and was engaged by the Metropolitan Opera for a key role in Porgy & Bess,

Returning to the USA, he spent a year at Kent State University he studied with Vance George and was also engaged as musical director of a student production of Man of La Mancha, then was at CIM in Cleveland as an opera studio student, mostly coaching roles of the singers - during that year The Crucible, Old Maid and the Thief. He had the opportunity to accompany singers in lessons for Eleanor Steber and Lorenzo Malfatti.

After a few years of church work continuing to improve his choral directing skills, he worked in Italy as a coach and rehearsal conductor at Opera Barga, having been hired and arriving a month earlier to prepare the Italian language score for Sir William Walton’s opera, The Bear. Sir William was in residence for the final rehearsals and performances.

Early on in life he had assisted pipe organ technicians in Ohio and New York City and falling back on experience working in a music store in his home town and then Lincoln Square Music in NYC, he transitioned into becoming a sales engineer with two of the oldest pipe organ builders in the USA and two of the major digital organ builders.

During this time he discovered a great need for basic books created to assist pianists into becoming or improving their skills as organists.

Hired as a director of music for a new Catholic Church being built, he built the choir from 16 to as many as 46 singers and transitioned into another field, editing and publishing Catholic liturgical music, including guides on turning pianists into organists in Catholic parishes.

A Catholic Sacred Music Library offers much free music to build a liturgical music program in even the poorest parish.

The Choir Organ is a recent addition to his projects, a simple and affordable MIDI module that churches, saddled with a only a midi keyboard, may use to play 31 different pipe organ stop registrations.