Tag Archives: Samuel Hsu

Celebrating Sam

Posted on by under Anticipating, brokenness, personal

Tim and I are down in Philadelphia today to attend the memorial service for our dear friend Sam.The Broad Street Review has a short piece by Kile Smith, one of Sam’s former students, called “Samuel Hsu: A Polymath’s Giant Shadow.”

From the essay:

“Sam was the most ‘in’ the world and least ‘of’ the world of anyone I know. That quality rendered him exotic in evangelical Christian circles— this concert pianist, this Philadelphia Orchestra lecturer, this colleague of world-famous scholars. I suspect it also made him exotic everywhere else— this Bible-study leader, this Presbyterian elder, this Christian summer music camp teacher.”

Sam was indeed an extraordinary human being–extraordinarily loving, gracious, kind, and humble. We will miss him. I would not be surprised if there are literally thousands who will miss him.

I was going to post a video of Sam playing, but since I can’t watch any of them without bawling, I’m posting this video of the great pianist Van Cliburn playing Schumann’s Widmung, which Sam played at our wedding 8 years ago. Listening to this piece makes me cry, too. But it’s not as hard as actually listening to (or watching) Sam play.

{See also Sam’s NYT obit}

In Memory of Sam Hsu

Posted on by under Uncategorized

Yesterday, our dear friend and teacher Samuel Hsu died as a result of injuries he sustained as the victim of a car crash in Center City Philadelphia. He will be mourned by so very, very many people, because he was so very, very special–a brilliant pianist and musicologist, yes, but also a beautiful human being full of kindness, gentleness, wisdom, grace, and great, great love. He is at peace; he is with God, but we mourn him so.

DEATH be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadfull, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think’st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poore death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleepe, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe goe,
Rest of their bones, and soules deliverie.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poyson, warre, and sicknesse dwell,
And poppie, or charmes can make us sleepe as well,
And better then thy stroake; why swell’st thou then;
One short sleepe past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.

John Donne, Divine Sonnet X