POTSDAM -- Longtime music professor and Crane Symphony Orchestra conductor Richard Albert Stephan passed away on May 15, 2021.

He was conductor of the Crane Symphony Orchestra and taught string bass, jazz guitar, and string education.

Stephan graduated from Fredonia State University with a Bachelor's in Music Education, Eastman School of Music with a Master's of Music, and Doctoral Studies in Music Education at University of Buffalo and Brigham Young University.

He was drafted in the Army in 1954 and served in 101st Airborne and 1st Army Band in Atlanta, Ga.

Richard was a music teacher in elementary and high schools in Buffalo and Hamburg, N.Y.

He is an accomplished musical composer and arranger who had over thirty published compositions for string and full orchestra. In 1986, his Fanfare And Frippery won the National School Orchestra Association (NSOA) composition contest, according to his bio information on music publishing company Kendor Music Inc.

Stephan has been listed as a noteworthy conductor, composer, music educator by Marquis Who's Who.

Stephan conducted the music for the Winter Olympics at Lake Placid in February 1980 and was an instructor in Australia for 6 months as a winner of the Fulbright Senior Scholar Award.

Stephan and his wife Dory married on Jan. 6, 1951. They had five children: Carey Stephan (deceased), Cheryl and Dru Burton, Orem, Utah; James Stephan, Shanghai, China; Tim and Colette Stephan, Orem, Utah; Michelle and Bryon McConkey, Chico, Calif.; and many grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Stephan’s hobbies included fishing, woodworking and playing gigs. While known for string bass foremost, Stephan was also a world-class guitarist and could often be heard playing jazz at Maxfields in Potsdam on Fridays during Happy Hour and he is remembered by the hundreds of aspiring guitarists who had the good fortune to take a lesson with him.

To leave a message for the Stephan family or to post a remembrance visit https://bit.ly/34aL9dL.