Remembering Karen Dirks

The Chicago Symphony Orchestra family mourns the passing of Karen Moe Dirks, a member of the viola section from 1997 until 2013. She died in St. Louis, Missouri, on October 25, 2023, at the age of 76 following a long illness.

Dirks was born in San Diego, California, on June 12, 1947, and grew up in a house filled with music. Her mother was a cellist with the San Diego Symphony; her father, who taught high school English literature, built a pipe organ in their home; and her brother Emory played classical and blues guitar.

As a violinist in the San Diego Civic Youth Orchestra, she met her future husband, cellist Douglas Dirks, when she was eleven and he was fourteen. She studied violin with Gilbert Back (who was forced out of the Berlin Philharmonic in 1934, and, with the assistance of conductor Wilhelm Furtwängler, subsequently emigrated to the U.S.), Daniel Lewis, Josef Gingold and Joseph Silverstein, and viola with Donald McInnes.

At the age of 17, Dirks began her professional career in the first violin section of the San Diego Symphony in the same month that she graduated from high school. She frequently shared the stage with her mother and later her husband, who were often stand partners in the cello section. Dirks’s musical endeavors put her through college, and she earned a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from San Diego State University.

For 32 years, Dirks performed as a professional musician in San Diego, as associate concertmaster and then principal viola of the San Diego Symphony and concertmaster of the San Diego Opera Orchestra. She performed in the Sun River Music Festival and was principal viola of the New Hampshire Music Festival. Dirks appeared as a soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the San Diego Symphony, Music of the Baroque and the New Hampshire Music Festival.

At the age of 49 in 1997, Dirks was invited by music director Daniel Barenboim to join the Chicago Symphony Orchestra as a member of the viola section, a position she would hold for nearly 17 years. For five of those years, she performed alongside her daughter Jelena, who was a permanent substitute in the CSO’s oboe section; Jelena was appointed principal oboe of the St. Louis Symphony in 2013. In 2000, Dirks said that the best part of her job was “being inspired by and performing with the superb musicians in the CSO, many of them rapidly becoming dear friends.” For many years, she performed on a viola made in 1724 in Brescia, Italy, by Antonio Pasta.

Upon her retirement from the CSO in 2013, Dirks and her husband relocated to St. Louis where they constructed a home designed by architect Stuart Shayman. While music was her central form of artistic expression, her life was filled with arts and crafts of all sorts. She was a talented weaver, knitter, quilter and seamstress, having sewn her own and her daughter’s wedding dresses. Dirks studied rosemaling (Norwegian folk painting) with Karen Jensen, and her Scandinavian heritage sparked her love of the outdoors, including skiing, hiking, kayaking and extensive gardening. Having trained Shetland Sheepdogs for competition, she was never without a canine companion for long.

Some of her greatest joys were in the sharing of her passion and knowledge in music and the arts, and she served on the faculty of DePaul University; taught privately; and worked with violinists, violists and other musicians who joined major orchestras across the country. Dirks also was a longtime member of the CSO Alumni Association.

Dirks is survived by her husband Douglas, and her children Olin and Jelena. The family is incredibly grateful for the extraordinary care she received from the doctors, nurses and staff at Siteman Cancer Center, Barnes Jewish Hospital and Missouri Baptist Medical Center.

A celebration of life service will be held on January 7, 2024, 2:00 p.m. at the Second Presbyterian Church in St. Louis, Missouri, and in lieu of flowers, the family has requested memorial gifts to the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Missouri Botanical Garden, Pedal the Cause and the Vesterheim in Decorah, Iowa.

This article also appears here.