Karel Paukert, 90, of University Heights, Ohio, died April 30. He was born January 1, 1935, in Skuteč, Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic/ Czechia), where he fell in love with music, particularly oboe and organ, eventually leaving home at age 15 to pursue a career in music. Following organ studies in Prague and mandatory multi-year service in the Czech Army in the late 1950s, he traveled to Reykjavik and became the principal oboist in the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. Following this, he was given the opportunity to record organ music at the Cathedral of Oslo on the way back to Prague. He subsequently hitchhiked to Norway’s west coast and worked on a fishing boat, deciding not to return to his home country. Over the course of several months, Paukert journeyed to Ghent, Belgium, including a stint in a Danish jail over visa issues, to study with Gabriel Verschraegen at the Royal Conservatory. In 1964 Paukert won the audience prize for improvisation at the International Organ Festival in Haarlem, the Netherlands.
Following a national tour, Paukert secured a professorial position at Washington University, St. Louis, Missouri, in 1965, where he would meet Noriko Fujii, who had come to America from Japan to study voice on a Fulbright grant. They would marry in 1966, moving to Evanston, Illinois, in 1968, when Paukert was named an organ professor at Northwestern University. He taught there until 1974, having two of three children, Karel, Jr. (Kajo), and Cathy, in Chicago. He also served as organist and choirmaster at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, Evanston.
The family moved to the Cleveland, Ohio, area in 1974, after Paukert was appointed chief curator of the musical arts department at the Cleveland Museum of Art, where he would become renowned for playing over 800 concerts, as well as his avant-garde music programming. A third child, Chris, was born in 1976, the same year Paukert started teaching at the Cleveland Institute of Music. In 1979 he was named organist and music director at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland Heights. He would retire from the museum in 2003, continuing his church work until his passing, having been named artist-in-residence at the church in 2023. During his tenure at St. Paul’s, he was instrumental in the parish acquiring its 1986 Gerhard Hradetzky two-manual organ in the rear gallery of the nave and a 2002 Vladimir Slajch positiv organ, all complementing the church’s Holtkamp organ at the front of the nave. In his free time, he concertized annually around the world and made recordings with Azica Records. He received three awards for programming new music from The American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP)/Chamber Music America (CMA).
In 1995 Paukert was awarded a Special Citation for Distinguished Services to the Arts by the Cleveland Arts Prize. In 2003 he received an honorary doctorate at his retirement from the Cleveland Institute of Music, and in 2022 he was awarded a national arts prize by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, as well as an honorary doctorate from Prague’s Academy of Performing Arts.
Karel Paukert is survived by his wife, Noriko; his children, Kajo (Christine), Cathy (Barry), and Chris (Robin); and seven grandchildren. A service in celebration of Paukert’s life was held June 28 at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Cleveland Heights. Memorial gifts may be made to the Karel Paukert Memorial Music Fund at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 2747 Fairmount Boulevard,, Cleveland Heights, Ohio 44106 (https://onrealm.org/StPaulsCle/-/form/give/Paukert).
For more information, see “From Skuteč to Cleveland, A Journey to Freedom through Music: A conversation with Karel Paukert,” by Lorraine S. Brugh and Richard Webster, April 2024, pages 12–17.
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