Pianist for musical theater and organist in Phillips Church, coxswain for the boys varsity crew and photography editor for both the Exonian and the PEAN—Jonathan Ortloff ’03 of Plattsburgh, NY, has been a ubiquitous figure on campus since he arrived three years ago. Indeed, his numerous photographs in one issue of the Exonian suggest that Jon can be in more than one place at a time. If this is an illusion, it is one Jon has mastered: He is literally a one-man orchestra on the organ, the instrument around which he is planning his future.

At Exeter, Jon is supported by the Augsbury Scholarship Fund, which provides tuition for students from upstate New York, and the Richard French ’33 Organ Scholarship, which provides for organ lessons and a performance stipend. “Like most people I know here, I am grateful for being able to come to Exeter,” says Jon. “I especially value all the things I’ve been able to do, the ways in which I have been able to grow—as a student, photographer, musician and athlete.”

Though he feels he was academically prepared, Jon has found Exeter to be very challenging. “It’s definitely not boring!” he says. Jon believes he has finally mastered doing all of the work and doing it well, and his grades concur. He also notes that while he might have pursued similar extracurricular interests at home, Exeter’s residential nature and its wealth of organized opportunities, such as the senior recital program, have made it much easier for him to take his interests to new levels of expertise. This spring he will give
a recital of mid-19th century piano music, and Baroque and early 20th century organ music. “What’s great about Exeter,” says Jon, “is that the people here are excited enough about the things they do to want to share them with you, even if they don’t
know you well.”

Jon began playing piano at age 3, and became fascinated with the organ at 10, when his church installed a new pipe organ. He went to watch the organ builders so often that, at his request, his mother arranged for him to have lessons on the new instrument. On his 14th birthday, Jon went to hear the world’s largest organ in Philadelphia’s former Wanamaker’s Department Store, now a Lord and Taylor, and ended up playing the enormous, six-manual, 348-stop instrument. “For some reason, I wasn’t intimidated by the size of it,” he says.

But Jon’s interest in the organ goes well beyond performance: He hopes to become an organ builder. “Building organs combines so many of the things I am interested in,” he says. “It involves musicianship, computers, carpentry, electronics, all kinds of engineering and, most likely, business skills.” Toward that end, Jon is looking at colleges that offer joint music, engineering and management degrees. And last summer, Stephen Russell and Company of Cambridgeport, VT, the same company that built the pipe organ in Jon’s church in Plattsburgh, took Jon on as an intern to work on restoring a water-damaged Aeolian Skinner organ from Worcester, MA. “I spent the first several weeks cleaning over 4,500 pipes in a trough of frigid soapy water,” says Jon. The pinnacle of his experience was being allowed to regulate pipes, a voicing process normally done by owner Steve Russell. “This meant putting a series of pipes in a rack, playing them, and adjusting the tone of each pipe by making any of a number of minor physical changes to it,” says Jon. “It was a real honor.”

Unfortunately, the Academy’s new Ruffatti organ will not be installed
in Phillips Church before Jon graduates, but perhaps this is just as well: Exeter will certainly want to lure this Exonian back.