"Kraybill is easily one of Kansas City's -- and the organ world's -- treasures. At times the use of the organ was so subtle that it felt subconscious rather than heard, and then other times the effect is reversed: the crash of the chord so completely consuming that little else filtered through to comprehend. It's heartening to hear a performance like this: new material performed with the same confidence of familiar works, standard repertoire performed with thrilling enthusiasm, the concert experience renewed and vibrant."
-KC Studio magazine
-The American Organist Magazine
'The Orchestral Organ' [CD] is a stunner. Imagine some of classical music's most powerful orchestral works performed on Helzberg Hall's Casavant organ. If you think that sounds good on paper, wait until you actually hear the recording. Kraybill, who is also the conservator of the Casavant organ, is a one-woman orchestra whose renditions of Wagner, Tchaikovsky, Verdi and Sibelius will leave you slack-jawed. ... 'The Orchestral Organ' will knock the socks off any music lover, even those who claim they don't like organ music.
-The Kansas City Star
"Kraybill's apt registrations and general keyboard wizardry turn her into something of a Prospero figure, very much in command of all that she surveys. ... Kraybill's playing is always refined, and she brings out the music's inner voices with ease and good humor."
-MusicWeb International
"Kraybill's enthusiastic Bach playing had clarity ... transparency ... sparkle ... without every letting virtuosity overshadow musicality."
-The American Organist
JAN KRAYBILL
CONCERT ORGANIST,
COLLABORATIVE MUSICIAN, & SPEAKER
GRAMMY®-nominated artist JAN KRAYBILL is a concert organist, pianist, harpsichordist, dynamic speaker, educator, church musician, consultant, and enthusiastic cheerleader for the power of music to change lives for the better.
In addition to maintaining a very active concert schedule, Dr. Kraybill is organ conservator at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts in Kansas City, Missouri, USA; organist-in-residence at the international headquarters of Community of Christ in Independence, Missouri; and organist at Village on Antioch Presbyterian Church in Overland Park, Kansas. In these roles she plays and oversees the care of three of the area’s largest pipe organs: the 113-rank Aeolian-Skinner (1959) and 102-rank Casavant (1993) at Community of Christ’s Auditorium and Temple, and the Kauffman Center’s 102-rank Julia Irene Kauffman Casavant (2012).
Throughout her career Jan has performed as both a solo and collaborative musician, designed and led international hymn festivals, taught workshops on a variety of topics, and inspired audiences and congregations. While in high school in Colby, Kansas, Jan was invited to play her first European piano recital in Andover, England. Since then she has performed in many venues in North America, and in Australia, Europe, Russia, South Korea, and Tahiti. She has undertaken multiple tours of the United Kingdom, including organ concerts at the grand cathedrals of Chester, Exeter, and St. Paul’s in London. In 2015, she designed and led a hymn festival at the International Gathering of Hymn Societies at Cambridge University.
Jan has been featured at regional and national conventions of the American Guild of Organists (AGO), the American Choral Directors Association, the Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, and other musicians’ organizations, and has been heard many times on American Public Media’s nationally broadcast program Pipedreams. She has collaborated with many ensembles, including the Bach Aria Soloists, the Phoenix Chorale, Kantorei Denver, the Kansas City Chorale, the Kansas City Symphony and Symphony Chorus, and others.
Several solo CDs and collaborative recordings are available. Jan’s first solo CD, Two by 2: Two Organ Symphonies on Two Magnificent Organs, features both of Community of Christ’s pipe organs. Rejoice and Remember contains hymn arrangements for piano. The Auditorium Organ: Fifty Years of Excellence celebrated that organ’s 50th anniversary in 2009. Solo CDs of the Julia Irene Kauffman Casavant were released by Reference Recordings in 2014 and 2019. Organ Polychrome features music by French composers. The Orchestral Organ, a disc of transcriptions, received three nominations for 2020 GRAMMY® awards, including Best Classical Instrumental Solo album. Jan has also recorded for Reference with the Kansas City Symphony on several occasions. Their disc containing Saint-Saën’s “Organ” Symphony was nominated for a GRAMMY® in 2015. Her most recent album, Marked for Grace, was produced by ProOrgano and released in June 2021 by Naxos.
Dr. Kraybill’s degrees in music education and piano and organ performance were earned at Kansas State University and the Conservatory of Music and Dance at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. In 2010 she achieved the distinction of Fellow of the AGO, organists’ highest certification level. She has served in many elected local, regional, and national roles in the AGO, The Hymn Society, and the Master Teacher Institute, most recently as Executive Director of The Hymn Society in the U.S. and Canada. She is a member of Mensa. Her extra-musical interests include antiquing, lace making, and riding her Harley-Davidson motorcycle.
Visit www.jankraybill.com for more information and Jan’s concert schedule.