John Walthausen
John Walthausen has been heard across Europe, North and South America, and Asia as a keyboard soloist and ensemble artist. Accomplished as a recitalist in both Baroque literature and contemporary keyboard works, Walthausen has concertized throughout the world in Paris, New York, Washington D.C., Chartres, Bogotá, Toulouse, Hamburg, Milan, Treviso, Innsbruck, Tokyo, Basel, and Zurich. From 2015 to 2016, he served as Organist in Residence at Sapporo Concert Hall in Hokkaido, where he performed and recorded on the Hall’s four-manual organ by Alfred Kern and in cities across Japan. In 2016, Sapporo Concert Hall released his debut disc, “De Fil en Aiguille.”
A Philadelphia resident, Walthausen appears regularly as a collaborative artist in his home city, as well as throughout the East Coast and the Mid-Atlantic region. In 2019, he co-founded the ensemble Filament with baroque violinist Evan Few and viola da gamba player Elena Smith. In 2022, they recorded their debut album of the Sonatas Opus 1 of Dietrich Buxtehude, Alchemy of Another, called by Fanfare “artistically satisfying on all levels.”
In 2012, he won first prize at the Pierre de Manchicourt International Organ Competition in Béthune, France, a competition devoted particularly to North German music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, featuring an international jury chaired by Michael Radelescu. In 2009 he was awarded first prize in the American Guild of Organists’ Regional Competition for Young Organists.
Walthausen earned his bachelor’s degree from Oberlin College, and in 2011 he gained admission to the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Paris. There he studied organ with Olivier Latry and Michel Bouvard, earning a master's with highest honors (mention très bien). In 2015, he studied harpsichord with Jörg-Andreas Bötticher and organ with Lorenzo Ghielmi at the Schola Cantorum of Basel, Switzerland where he was awarded a Master’s in Historical Performance.
In 2024, Walthausen served as Artistic Director for the first edition of the Philadelphia Organ Festival, a week-long event sponsored by Partners for Sacred Places. In addition to his concert appearances, Walthausen currently serves as Director of Music at First Presbyterian Church in Germantown, Philadelphia, PA.