Trumpet Tune in G Major (uploaded for Ascension Day)

David N. Johnson was born 28 June 1922, in San Antonio, Texas, and died 2 August 1987 in Tempe, Arizona. He was an American organist, composer, educator, choral clinician, and lecturer.

He studied organ and composition at Curtis Institute of Music (1940–1942), and was a lecturer at Syracuse University (1951). From 1960–1967, he was college organist of Boe Chapel and organ instructor at St Olaf College, Northfield MN. He was music department chair at St Olaf stolaf.edu 1965–1967. In 1967, he succeeded Arthur Poister as professor of music, university organist and director of music in Hendricks Chapel at Syracuse University. He later moved to Arizona in 1969, where he taught at Arizona State University, Tempe, and served at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in Phoenix. He died in Tempe on August 2, 1987.

Johnson published well over three hundred compositions, most of them for church use, and was author of an Instruction Book for Beginning Organists (1964) and an Organ Teacher's Guide (1971).

The "Trumpet Tune in G Major" was published by Augsburg in 1964. It is the third of a group of three, and is dedicated: "To Robert Kendall", who was born in 1900 and lived to the astonishing age of 116! He was a professor at St. Olaf College, and organist of St. Peter's Lutheran Church in Northfield, Minnesota.

Each trumpet tune, has a unique feel and flavor to it, and uses the organ in creative and colorful ways. This third one is the grandest of these three, although I suppose it's a bit on the "slow side" for a day on which one normally expects a fanfare. However, it is grandiose, and hopefully pleasing to the listener.

Attached below is a NOW CORRECT PHOTO of David N. Johnson and one of the dedicatee, Robert Kendall, as well as two classic paintings of The Ascension by Dosso Dossi and Rembrandt van Rijn.

God is gone up with a shout, the Lord with the sound of a trumpet. (Ps. 47, V. 5)