Fr. Sean Duggan

Fr. Sean Brett Duggan, Professor of Piano and head of the piano area, has been a member of the Fredonia piano faculty since 2004. Previously he was on the piano faculty at the University of Michigan, 2001-4, and was a guest professor at Eastman School of Music, Fall 2008. A monk of St. Joseph Abbey in Louisiana, he entered the Benedictine order in 1982 and was ordained a priest in 1988. From 1988 to 2001 he taught, music, Latin and theology at St. Joseph Seminary College and was organist and director of music at St. Joseph Abbey. In September 1983 he won first prize in the Johann Sebastian Bach International Competition for Pianists in Washington, DC; he was again a first-prize winner in the same competition in August 1991. Having a special affinity for the music of Bach, in the Bach year 2000 he performed the complete cycle of Bach's keyboard (piano) works eight times in various American and European cities. During that year he was featured on a special program on NPR's "Performance Today" hosted by Fred Child entitled "Stump the Monk" in which Child called out the name of any Bach keyboard piece and had him play it (fortunately the monk didn't get stumped!). For seven years he hosted a weekly program on the New Orleans NPR station entitled "Bach on Sunday." Presently he is in the final stages of recording the complete cycle of Bach's keyboard works which will comprise 25 CDs. 

Before he joined the Benedictine order, Fr. Sean was pianist and assistant chorus master for the Pittsburgh Opera Company, 1979-1982. He has performed with many orchestras including the Buffalo Philharmonic, the Louisiana Philharmonic, The New Mexico Philharmonic, the Leipzig Baroque Soloists, the Prague Chamber Orchestra, the American Chamber Orchestra and the Worcester (New England) Symphony. Since 2000 he has played a Bach concerto every year with the Pennsylvania Sinfonia, with whom he has recently begun the his third traversal of all of Bach's keyboard concertos. He has served as adjudicator of a number of piano competitions, including the Gina Bachauer and the New Orleans International competitions. He is a member of the faculty of the Golandsky Institute and the Atlantic Music Festival, and for several summers was a guest artist and adjudicator at the Chautauqua Institution. He continues to study the Taubman Approach with Edna Golandsky in New York City.

Many of Fr. Sean's performances, aural and video, including the complete Well-Tempered Clavier, can be accessed on YouTube by typing in "Sean Duggan piano."   

Teaching Interests

Piano Literature and Pedagogy; the Taubman Approach to piano technique; Latin; Theology.

Research Interests

The music of Bach (all areas).