L. Eugene Roan died September 21, 2006 at the University Medical Center in Princeton, New Jersey, at the age of 75. He was professor emeritus of organ and harpsichord and chair emeritus of the piano and organ department at Westminster Choir College, Rider University. Born in Albany, Georgia, he was a scholarship student at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, where he studied organ with Alexander McCurdy. Graduate study was at Westminster Choir College and at the School of Sacred Music of Union Theological Seminary in New York City, where he studied organ with Alec Wyton.
Eugene Roan taught at Westminster Choir College for 50 years, retiring in 2003. He served as organist at Holy Trinity Episcopal Church in Philadelphia, and for close to 40 years was organist and choirmaster at St. Thomas’s Episcopal Church, White-marsh, in Fort Washington, Pennsylvania. He was a frequent recitalist, lecturer, and clinician throughout the country and at regional and national conventions of the AGO. He also taught at the Royal School of Church Music and was active in the Organ Historical Society. As an organ consultant, his projects included Princeton University Chapel and Christ Church, New Brunswick, New Jersey.
