All About Norbert Krausz, Director of Music/Organist

Norbert was born in St. Joseph's Hospital in Breese, Illinois, before going home to grow up on a farm located between New Baden and New Memphis, Illinois.   If you drive through New Memphis and blink you may have missed the town!!!!!   But, the Krausz farm home is still being lived in today by family members where Norbert grew up just loving being a 'farm boy'!
There was always a piano in the Krausz home!   Norbert's mother played the organ growing up at the Evangelical and Reformed Church in Cordes, Illinois.   So, music goes back several generations in the Gilbert and Krausz families.  Following high school graduation, Norbert entered Southern Illinois University Carbondale as a music major with an emphasis in voice and organ.   Upon college graduation he taught public school music in Kansas City and St. Louis.  During that time the musical theatre bug bit Norbert.  He went off to perform at The Little Theatre On The Square in Sullivan, Illinois and returned there several seasons.  For five years Norbert was the Associate Producer of TLTOTS(his current car license plate) in addition to being on stage in the productions. 
In 1978 Norbert came to St. Paul Church as the Director of Music-Organist and served the congregation in that capacity through June of 1997.   During those years the music ministry of the church grew and the addition of handbells, the Schantz pipe organ and Fine Arts Series kept Norbert busy.  
From the summer of 1997 through June of 2003 Norbert moved West to the great city of Las Vegas, Nevada where he worked in show production and costuming at the MGM Grand Hotel.  Norbert also served as a part time church musician at the First Presbyterian Church in LV.  Returning to St. Louis in July of 2003 found Norbert serving in the music ministry of Kirkwood United Methodist Church and the Catholic Church of the Immacolata.  Norbert also spent three seasons singing with the St. Louis Symphony Chorus appearing one April at Carnegie Hall in New York City.
He continues to enjoy a variety of styles of music, but his most favorites are the classic music of the church and the Broadway stage.  In his free time Norbert enjoys cooking (not cleaning!), walking, window shopping, the beach and riding the train to Chicago!   Of course now you will find him frequently slipping away to the console of the mighty Schantz in the chancel of St. Paul Church and ushering at the Fox Theatre in St. Louis!   He is a member
of the American Guild of Organists, the National Association of Pastoral Musicians and the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers.  --Dare to ask him how many times he has been in the studio audience of The Tonight Show in Burbank!!  Soli Deo Gloria!