We give thanks for the life of our beloved longtime member Gisela Krause, who died on June 11, 2021 at the age of 93.
Gisela Krause was a classical musician who earned her diploma at the Hocheschule für Musik in Freiburg, Germany, and received her master’s degree from the New England Conservatory of Music. She performed regularly on harpsichord, recorder, and piano in Boston beginning in the 1960s, including as a soloist with the Boston Symphony, the Melrose Symphony, and the Belmont Symphony. In 1970-71, she received a Charles E. Merrill Trust fellowship to study music at the Radcliffe Institute. She taught recorder and harpsichord at Northeastern University, Belmont Music School (now the Powers Music School), and All Newton Music School, retiring from the Powers Music School only in 2014, after teaching there for 49 years.
Gisela and David Beyer, a pianist and a longtime music director at UniLu, married in 1995. A native of Germany, Gisela became a dual German-U.S. citizen in 2013, a little more than fifty years after moving to the United States.
Gisela was a member of University Lutheran Church for decades, and she shared her gifts with the community in many ways. She anchored the alto section of the choir and performed on the harpsichord, recorder, and piano for numerous benefit concerts, primarily to support the student-run Harvard Square Homeless Shelter. In 2005, Gisela and David recorded Keyboard for Two, a CD of works by Mozart, Schmitt, Debussy, Corigliano, and Epstein, to benefit the Shelter. Composer Marti Epstein wrote the final piece, Hothouse, for Gisela and David.
A memorial service took place on Sunday, September 26, 2021 at University Lutheran Church, with attendees both in-person and on Zoom.
Our thoughts and prayers are with Gisela’s husband, David; her brother and sister-in-law, Gunter and Renate Krause; her niece, Martina; and all who mourn her loss.