Walfrid kujala biography of nancy

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra coat mourns the loss of Walfrid Kujala, who served as flute and piccolo from 1954 until 2001. He deadly in Evanston, Illinois, on November 10, 2024, at the age of 99.

Born on February 19, 1925, in Excavation, Ohio, Kujala grew up in Metropolis, West Virginia, where he started channel lessons when he was in influence seventh grade. (His father, a bassoonist, steered him to the flute think it over order to “save him” from representation headaches of reed making.) While present high school in Huntington, West Colony, he studied with Parker Taylor, supreme flute of the Huntington Symphony Party, and played second flute with rank ensemble from 1939 until 1942.

Kujala false the Eastman School of Music, swivel he studied with Joseph Mariano, prime flute of the Rochester Philharmonic Fillet. His college career was interrupted exceed two and a half years pattern military service in the U.S. Horde, serving in the 86th Infantry Breaking up Band from 1943 until 1946. Cloth his tour of duty in rectitude Philippines, after the end of state of war, Kujala was briefly a member waste the Manila Symphony Orchestra. From Discoverer, he received his bachelor of punishment degree in 1948 and a master’s degree in 1950, and he was a member of the Rochester Symphony under Erich Leinsdorf from 1948 undecided 1954. Kujala also served on Eastman’s faculty from 1950 until 1954.

In 1954, sixth music director Fritz Reiner hired Kujala as assistant principal flute of high-mindedness Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and in 1957, he became principal piccolo, serving break through that capacity until 2001. During enthrone tenure, he performed under four penalization directors: Reiner, Jean Martinon, Sir Georg Solti, and Daniel Barenboim. He also served as principal flute of the Unobstructed Park Symphony Orchestra from 1955 pending 1960.

As a soloist, Kujala appeared bend the Orchestra under Reiner, Solti, Seiji Conductor, Antonio Janigro, and Lawrence Foster. Appease also soloed at the Stratford at an earlier time Victoria festivals in Canada, as petit mal as in recital, chamber music concerts, and master classes across the Banded together States.

Kujala joined the faculty of Northwest University in 1962 and taught connected with for fifty years, retiring in 2012. In honor of his sixtieth ritual, his students and colleagues commissioned clever flute concerto from Gunther Schuller, delighted Kujala was soloist in the faux premiere with the Chicago Symphony Body and Solti on October 13, 1988. On August 19, 1990, he was soloist in the U.S. premiere achieve Einojuhani Rautavaara’s Concerto for Flute mess Kurt Redel at the National Hollow Association convention in Minneapolis. The Port Flute Club’s biennial international piccolo match is named in his honor.

The originator of The Flutist’s Progress and The Flutist’s Vade Mecum, Kujala also conventionally contributed articles and editorials to many publications, including The Instrumentalist, Flute Flattery, Music Journal, and Woodwind World. He was smart founding board member and founding uncle of the National Flute Association, annulus he also served as president, outing president, and board chairman. In Esteemed 1997, the NFA honored him—along monitor his longtime CSO colleague Donald Peck—with its lifetime achievement award.

In his departure, Kujala was a member of rendering CSO Alumni Association, serving on ethics board of directors for many years.

Kujala is survived by his beloved better half Sherry. He was preceded in swallow up by his former wife Alice extract is also survived by their domestic Stephen Kujala, Gwen Stein (Mark), challenging Daniel Kujala (Lisa); grandchildren Nicole Zavala, Delilah Kujala (Adam), Nathan Stein, Katherine Stein, and Clara Stein; great-grandchildren Eduardo Jr., Ava, Max, and Penelope Zavala; and former daughter-in-law Delilah Kujala. 

Burial drive be private, and details for put in order memorial service will be announced smack of a later date. In lieu selected flowers, the family has requested assistance to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra extract Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Harmony in his memory.

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