Karen Stoody has been on staff as organist since fall of 2003. She and her husband John moved to Fort Collins in June of 2003, where she was hired as one of the staff accompanists for the music department at CSU. She is also the accompanist for Opera Fort Collins and has a private piano studio in her home. Karen studied organ and piano with Austin Lovelace and Ruth Parisoe at Colorado Women's College, and she studied organ with Karl Wienand at Adams State College. She has a BA degree in organ performance. She has held organist positions at Methodist Churches since she was 15 years old (being urged into it by her father, a Methodist minister) including Delta, Alamosa, Greeley, and Montrose, where she was also the director of music; and she has just finished her 30th year of private teaching. She has been a frequent solo performer around the western slope in Colorado, and has been a choir accompanist also since her teen years. Practicing and playing for worship on the Marcussen pipe organ is a joy!