Sacred Music Staff
Nicholas Mitchell Garcia is a native of Covington, Virginia. A recent graduate of the University of Notre Dame du Lac in South Bend, IN, Garcia earned a Master of Sacred Music degree with a concentration in pipe organ performance with Dr. Craig Cramer. Garcia also holds a Bachelor of Music degree in Organ Performance from Westminster Choir College in 2012 where he studied with Alan Morrison. During his time at Westminster, he was awarded an annual scholarship in Organ Performance Excellence. Over the course of his training, Garcia has had the privilege of studying with many leaders in the field of music and liturgics including: Dr. James Jordan, Dr. Joe Miller, Dr. Stefan Young, a student of the celebrated pedagogue Nadia Boulanger, Dr. Peter Jeffery, Dr. Margot Fassler, Dr. Carmen Helena Téllez, and Dr. Maxwell Johnson.
As a member of the famed Westminster Symphonic Choir, Garcia performed Johannes Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem at Verizon Hall in Philadelphia, under the direction of Yannick Nézet-Séguin with the Philadelphia Orchestra. With the Westminster Symphonic Choir, he also had the honor of performing Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 in Carnegie Hall with the Berlin Philharmonic under the direction of Sir Simon Rattle. While at Notre Dame, Garcia was a member of the Basilica Schola Cantorum, and the Basilica Liturgical Choir. During his time with the Liturgical Choir, he worked as a Graduate Assistant, serving as an accompanist and conductor, as well as one of the organists for the Basilica of the Sacred Heart at the University of Notre Dame. He helped to develop and was the initial instructor of the Notre Dame Children’s Choir Organ Training Program. Garcia was instrumental in the installation of the new Paul Fritts organ at Moreau Seminary where he served as Organist.
An active recitalist, Garcia has performed in churches around the country including Gloria Dei Lutheran in South Bend, Indiana, St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Seattle, Washington, Kirk in the Hills Presbyterian Church in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, Greene Memorial United Methodist Church in Roanoke, Virginia, Moreau Seminary Fritts Dedication Recital in Notre Dame, Indiana, and Verizon Hall’s Organ Day at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Garcia’s performances have been heard on the nationally-Syndicated program “Pipedreams” (American Public Radio).
Originally from the San Francisco Bay Area, Duane Soubirous holds a master’s degree in music performance from the University of Oregon in Eugene and a bachelor’s degree in history from Oberlin College in Ohio. He has worked in a variety of roles for churches, including Interim/Acting Music Director and Organist/Accompanist for many Episcopal, Lutheran, and Catholic churches. Duane is thrilled to join St. Hugo of the Hills Parish and aid in the church’s mission to proclaim the Gospel and celebrate the sacraments through its remarkable sacred music program.
Duane first experienced sacred liturgy growing up in a Congregational church which celebrated Eucharist every Sunday accompanied by traditional music. He discovered his interest in music after the church organist demonstrated the organ to children on a Sunday. He started taking piano lessons in elementary school and added organ lessons in high school, studying organ with Angela Kraft Cross, a performer and composer based in the Bay Area. Although he was raised Protestant, he attended a Catholic elementary school and participated actively in the parish as an altar server, and became the regular accompanist for the 5 p.m. mass as a high school senior. He was an active member of ecumenical, multifaith, and Episcopal campus ministries while studying in Oberlin and Eugene.
As a graduate student at the UO School of Music, he studied organ with Barbara Baird and participated in multiple ensembles, singing in Chamber Choir under the direction of Sharon Paul, accompanying University Singers on organ, and playing harpsichord/continuo for the baroque ensemble. As a member of the UO Chamber Choir, he was invited to sing Joby Talbot’s Path of Miracles in Santiago de Compostella, Spain, as well as Bach’s St. Matthew Passion for the 2022 Oregon Bach Festival in Eugene. After graduating from UO, he became a sought-after accompanist for choirs in the Bay Area, playing the Duruflé Requiem along with choir and orchestra for a service on All Souls Day in Oakland, California. He has also performed solo recitals in San Francisco and Eugene.
Duane initially enrolled at the Oberlin Conservatory of Music to major in organ performance, but took time off from school after completing three years toward a music degree. He then returned to the liberal arts college at Oberlin and graduated in 2019 with a bachelor’s degree in history. As an organ major, he studied principally with Jack Mitchener and also took lessons from James David Christie and Marie-Louise Langlais, widow of 20th-century French organist and composer Jean Langlais. Traveling on an organ tour to France in 2013, Duane took organ lessons with Louis Robilliard, organist at Saint-François-de-Sales in Lyon, and studied improvisation with Sophie-Véronique Cauchefer-Choplin, co-titular organist at the Church of Saint-Sulpice in Paris.
On the same trip to France, he traveled to Nevers to visit the former motherhouse of the Sisters of Charity of Nevers, where St. Bernadette Soubirous lived the last years of her life. He was led on a private tour of the convent and St. Bernadette Museum, given in French by a religious sister and translated by the organist at the convent. He feels a special affinity for St. Bernadette, with whom he shares a last name and ancestral origin. Duane’s other interests include spending time outdoors on walks and bicycle rides, as well as reading and re-reading classics of world literature.
The Catholic Community of St. Hugo of the Hills Parish will continue to evangelize and proclaim the Good News that Jesus Christ is Lord. We go forth as a sacramental parish in faith, hope and love, to serve the family of God, and to grow in our faith.
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