Paul William Lyddon, Jr., 92, of Honolulu, HI passed away peacefully on May 10, 2024, at the University of Pittsburgh Jameson Medical Center in New Castle, PA after a brief illness. The classical music world has lost one of the great pianists of the late 20th century.
Paul was an Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Hawaii at Manoa from 1976 until he retired in 1998. Prior to his UH career, he was a Professor of Music at the University of Wyoming from 1965 through 1976, and began his teaching career at Monmouth College in Monmouth, IL from 1960 through 1965. He also taught at the University of Iowa, Northern Illinois University, the Beijing Conservatory, the Shanghai Conservatory, the University of the Philippines, and Tamagawa Gakuen University in Japan. As a college professor his assignments in addition to piano included courses in music theory, counterpoint, piano literature, music history, and coaching chamber music ensembles. Many of his students went on to take advanced degrees at the Eastman School of Music, the Manhattan School of Music, the University of Indiana, the University of Illinois, the University of Texas at Austin, the Vienna Hochschule für Musik, Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest, the Royal Academy of Music in London, the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Japan, and the Musashino School of Music in Japan. He took several sabbaticals during his teaching career and made frequent trips to Japan to perform and teach. He had 35 advanced regular students in Japan, all teachers, and was highly sought after by piano students throughout the country.
He combined his teaching career with a concert career. He was an active recitalist, soloist with several major American orchestras, member of various chamber music ensembles, and accompanist. While at the UWY he was a member of the Western Arts Trio with cellist Professor David Tomatz and violinist Professor Richard G. Strawn. He gave over 700 performances in 40 states, including at Carnegie Hall in 1965, the Phillips Collection in Washington, D.C., and in England, Germany, Austria, Japan, China, and the Philippines. He performed at music festivals in Cheltenham, England and Hiroshima, Japan in 1981.
In 1969, Paul was a soloist with the Denver Symphony in the final performance of conductor Vladimir Golschmann’s distinguished career. He gave many performances of the Tchaikovsky 1st Concerto, the Rachmaninov 2nd and 3rd Concertos, the Liszt 1st Concerto, the Chopin 2nd Concerto, the Schumann Concerto and four Mozart Concertos. In 1981 in Japan, he gave the premier performances of Rachmaninov’s 1st and 2nd Sonatas, and in 1983 gave premier performances of Rachmaninov’s 1st Sonata in China and the Philippines.
Paul was among the first Western artists invited by the Government of China to perform there following the end of the ten-year Cultural Revolution. He performed concerts in Beijing, Chengdu, Chongqing, Nanjing, Shanghai, Wuhan, and Xi’an in Spring 1983.
He married pianist Kaoru Tajima Lyddon in 1984. Together they performed many two-piano duet concerts and single-piano pieces for four hands. They played concerts together in Germany in 1993 (Debussy, Brahams, Dvorak), 1995 (Schubert, Mozart, Fauré, Barber), and 1997 where they played a full Schubert concert in the Jever Castle. They played Mozart’s Concerto for Two Pianos (K. 365) with the Hawaii Chamber Orchestra in 1990, gave a master class in Bergamo, Italy, and gave performances on UH’s public radio station, in Tokyo and in the mainland United States. Mrs. Lyddon survives him and resides in Honolulu and Tokyo.
Paul graduated from high school at the Phillips Academy in Andover, MA. He then attended the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester, graduating with a Bachelor of Music with Distinction in 1954. He was the youngest student ever admitted to Eastman, beginning in its Preparatory School at age three under Lottie Ellsworth Coit, the first female violinist in the Rochester Philharmonic, and Marjorie MacKown, pianist, cellist and composer also with the Rochester Philharmonic. He earned his Master of Music with Honors in Performance from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1960. He continued his studies at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., and later at the University of Iowa. His teachers included Soulima Stravinsky, Stanley Fletcher, John Simms, and Alfred Brendel.
Paul served in the U.S. Army, stationed at Fort Myer, VA from 1955 through 1959 (now Joint Base Myer-Henderson Hall). He was the first piano accompanist for the newly established U.S. Army Chorus and had the honor of performing with its first Black member, the great George Shirley, and under its first announcer, the late Charles Osgood Wood. The chorus performed twice in the White House for President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the U.S. Supreme Court and the Diplomatic Corps. He had the honor of playing on the piano designed especially for the White House by George Steinway with its inlaid scenes of American history.
The chorus had some interesting experiences involving rainstorms. Once after performing in Chicago, the military plane returning most of the chorus to Washington, D.C. nearly crashed in a bad rainstorm. Then when Paul was invited to play the piano accompaniment for the U.S. Army Band in a concert on a barge in the Potomac River, a rainstorm came along and destroyed the piano. The chorus also performed in the Hollywood Bowl and at the Red Rocks amphitheater outside Denver without rainstorms.
Years later, Paul served the Army in a different way. While at UWY, he managed a U.S.O. tour in East Asia and Hawaii during the Vietnam War. The band “Jubal” led by Patrick Patton of Casper, WY was composed of several university students and performed popular music from that era. He greatly enjoyed that tour as did the band and the troops.
Paul loved UWY and UH football, UH women’s volleyball, British humor, cars, and motorcycles. He had a deep love of Western Europe and France in particular. He enjoyed taking his kids fishing, picnicking and hiking in the Rocky Mountains of Wyoming. The family enjoyed spending weekends at his former wife Vicki’s cabin near Centennial, WY. He loved to entertain and, together with his first wife Lois, often threw parties in their Laramie home for his UWY students and music department faculty. His kids loved these parties and relished the attention from the adults. Lois often took the kids to see their father perform, and they were both proud of their father and proud to learn classical music concert etiquette at very young ages.
Paul William Lyddon, Jr. was born in 1931 to the late Paul William Lyddon, Sr. and Winifred Jessie (nee: Cowles) Lyddon in Rochester, NY. He was the eldest of three children. His sister, the late Sarah Lyddon Morrison, authored seven books related to witchcraft. His brother David Lyddon (Sally) of Pittsford, NY survives him. Paul’s marriage to Vicki Federer of Cheyenne, WY ended in divorce in 1980. His marriage to the late Lois Lyddon ended in divorce in 1970.
In addition to his sister, he was predeceased by his daughter Catherine Lyddon in 1979. In addition to his wife and brother, he is survived by three children: Susan Lyddon-Hayes (Thomas) of New Castle, PA; Julia Lyddon Gourley (Bruce) of Brunswick, MD; and William Lyddon of Columbus, OH; and two nieces: Wendy Henriques (Tom) of Haymarket, VA; and Jodi Stewart (Brad) of Fairport, NY.
On October 7, 2024, Paul was buried at sea along with the ashes of his and Kaoru's dog, Sergei. Their ashes were dispersed in an ocean burial several miles off the south shore of O‘ahu.