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Portrait: Daniel Hathaway

Reprinted from The Cathedral Connection, April 2001

When I went to interview Daniel Hathaway for the Cathedral Connection, I found I was not only learning about him but about organs, about the way Bach wrote music for church services every Sunday and about how the London churches designed by Sir Christopher Wren have noonday concerts. (Our Wednesday Brownbag concerts are modeled after them.) Our energetic, blue-eyed, sandy-haired Canon for Music, Arts and Worship is full of warmth, wit and lots of interesting information.

Daniel has been the Director of Music at the cathedral for 24 years. He arrived here in 1977 at about the same time as the arrival of our wonderful Flentrop organ, an exciting musical event that came at a time of gloom in Cleveland. "Those were the dark years for downtown Cleveland," Daniel said. "Play House Square was about to be torn down and the area was empty." To help resuscitate the dying downtown, Daniel organized noon concerts, a musical outreach of the cathedral that has since evolved into M&PA (Music and Performing Arts) at Trinity. The program flourished, and in 1986, the orchestra was formed. Later, hot lunches were added, and in 1991, M&PA was separately incorporated.

Today, Daniel does many things for the cathedral. He conducts the choir and the orchestra, for Sunday worship and Wednesday evensong; he is responsible for organizing our worship and helps to organize diocesan services. He originates our leaflets. He is our resident graphic artist, creating many of the fine posters and ads we have had for Adult Education programs, Brownbag Concerts, and the like. He serves on the liturgical committee of the diocese. As artistic director of M&PA, he organizes the Wednesday noonday concerts, gives informative and enjoyable short lectures on the music, and even cooks the food. A gourmet cook, he has conducted cooking classes with neighborhood kids. He composes many of the short anthems, antiphons, psalm settings and introits we sing together on Sundays. He occasionally teaches adult education classes, and, of course, he plays the organ and the piano.

In addition, Daniel is on the touring roster of both the Ohio Art's Council's Ohio Artists on Tour and Arts Midwest. He has performed over 400 solo concerts since coming to Trinity and in 1979 made a 14 concert European tour. As an adjunct professor at CSU, he also gives organ lessons.

Daniel thrives on this kind of variety and hopes to make it part of the cathedral's continuing growth. "I would love to see us offer every conceivable kind of worship experience from the traditional choral evensong to contemporary service," he said. "I love to play all kinds of music. Maybe I wouldn't do so well in a rock band," he added, but then a mischievous smile crossed his face as though even this might be a possibility.

One way ot another, Daniel has been in music for most of his life. He began singing in a boy choir at age seven and at 14, began to play the organ in another church. As a Harvard undergraduate, he had directed four operas by the age of twenty-two. He was also a member of the Harvard Glee Club, and after graduation traveled with the group as their assistant conductor on a 90-day world tour that included concerts in Israel, Japan, India and the Philippines and ended at the Edinburgh Festival.

After Harvard, Daniel decided to pursue a PhD in Musicology at Princeton, but changed his mind after a year. Instead he entered the Episcopal Divinity School with the intention of becoming ordained. "I was the only one in my class that entered knowing I wanted to become ordained," he explained, "and the only one that wasn't." From EDS, Dan entered a period of both teaching and playing and conducting music in church, first in Kansas and later at Groton School, a famous New England Episcopal perparatory school.

He was at Groton when he got a call from a friend in Cleveland about an opening for a Music Director at Trinity. "I thought to myself then that I could stay at Groton for a long time and get very comfortable," he said "and I worried that I might never be seriously challenged."

So that is why Daniel came to us - to be challenged. After learning about all he does for our cathedral, I know he has found that challenge here. It is also clear that he loves his work, and he loves this place. He has been at Trinity through difficult times to the exciting revitalization we have today. For his hard work, his many gifts and his generousity, we have much to be thankful for.

Maia White