Academic Credentials
B.F.A., Indiana University of Pennsylvania
M. M. in Sacred Music, University of Notre Dame
D.M.A., University of Illinois
Biography
Kimberly Ann Hess is Liturgical Music and Spiritual Life Events Coordinator at Marymount University, where she oversees the music for all campus liturgies, including directing the Marymount University Chamber Singers. In addition, she coordinates the various liturgical ministries, service projects, educational workshops and retreat programs offered through the Office of Ministry and Spiritual Life and teaches music courses through the School of Interdisciplinary Studies.
Currently, Dr. Hess holds the government contract to serve as assistant Ceremonial Organist for Arlington National Cemetery. She began this position in September of 2019 and since then, has played for close to 1000 funeral ceremonies and national level events there, including playing for current and former Presidents of the United States, Members of Congress, Supreme Court Justices and other national level leaders.
She was Director of Liturgical Music in Memorial Chapel at Ft. Myer (JBMHH) from June of 2017 through October of 2022 as a government contractor and served as Dean of the Northern Virginia Chapter of the American Guild of Organists from 2016-2020.
She was Director of Music and Organist at Most Holy Trinity Catholic Chapel at the United States Military Academy (West Point, NY), where she directed the Cadet Catholic Choir. As one of three post organists, she played in the many chapels on post including the Post Chapel, Old Cadet Chapel and the Cadet Chapel, which houses the largest, all-pipe, church organ in the world.
She was Director of Liturgical Music at Georgetown University from 2002-2006, where she directed the chapel choir, served as chapel organist, and oversaw the music for all campus liturgies. In addition, at Georgetown, she taught organ and music courses through the Program in Performing Arts. Under her direction, the Georgetown University Chapel Choir performed twice at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC, once with Roberta Flack and once with Jessye Norman.
From 1994-2001, she was Director of Music and College Organist at Stonehill College in Massachusetts. Under her direction, the Stonehill College Chapel Choir recorded two compact discs, Lux et Spes: Light and Hope (Music for the Liturgical Year) and Gaudete (Music for Advent and Christmas).
She holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in Organ Performance from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, a Master of Music degree in Sacred Music from the University of Notre Dame and a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Organ Performance from the University of Illinois.
In 1994, Dr. Hess won first prize in both the Arthur Poister National Organ Competition in New York and the Gruenstein Memorial Organ Contest for Women; a national competition sponsored by the Chicago Club of Women Organists.
She has performed solo recitals in Cadet Chapel at West Point and St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, Boardwalk Hall and Princeton University in New Jersey, the Church of the Ascension in Chicago, St. John’s Cathedral in Milwaukee, the University of Syracuse, Merrill Auditorium in Portland, Maine, King’s Chapel in Boston, the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception and the Washington National Cathedral in Washington DC, and Methuen Hall in Methuen, MA. She represented the Boston Chapter of the American Guild of Organists in a performance at Trinity Church on Copley Square as part of First Night Festivities to usher in the new millennium. Her concert at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, MA was broadcast live on radio and several recordings of her performances have been broadcast on Boston’s Classical Radio Station, WCRB-FM. She has been a featured recitalist for National Conventions of the Organ Historical Society in 1992 (Maine), 1994 (Connecticut), 2000 (Boston), 2005 (Southeastern, Massachusetts) and 2011 (Washington, DC); and her playing can be heard in the OHS Historical Organs series of recordings from those events.
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