Richard Wagner wrote operas, not organ music. Yet organist Ken Cowan will end his Monday faculty recital at Rice University with the overture from "The Mastersingers of Nuremberg."

Generations of organists would have once scoffed at turning an orchestral work into a pipe-organ extravaganza, calling it poor taste. Cowan, who has taught at Rice since 2012, disagrees.

As students, Cowan and his fellow pipe-organ majors realized many people who liked classical music paid no attention to organ works. Their careers would depend on winning those people over.

"A lot of the discussion was: 'Never mind what everyone always said you should do. How are you going to try to make sure that, if someone comes to the instrument for the first time, it piques their interest?' " Cowan says.

"For me, that's always a big goal."

Solo organists face another challenge: They're often tucked away in church balconies or cubbyholes where audiences can't see them. That situation is all the more reason to offer music that's varied and colorful, Cowan says.

So his recital will range from a zippy J.S. Bach trio sonata to a tone-painting by Sigfrid Karg-Elert, a German who was inspired by French Impressionists. "The 94th Psalm" by Julius Reubke, a short-lived 19th-century composer, is not only a landmark of the pipe-organ repertoire, but also a showcase of the instrument's fire-and-brimstone power - like the psalm, evoking God unleashing his wrath on the wicked.

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Ken Cowan

When: 7:30 p.m. Monday

Where: Alice Pratt Brown Hall, Rice University, entrances 8 and 18

Tickets: Free; 713-348-8000,

Fascinated by the sound

Cowan, who grew up in Canada near Niagara Falls, is a fourth-generation organist.

His father played for a church that had a large, powerful instrument made by one of Canada's leading builders, which showed Cowan how colorful the pipe organ could be.

"From the time I was a little boy, I was always fascinated with the sounds and the mechanics (of the organ)," he says. "I always knew I wanted to learn how to play. I just didn't know how far I would take that."

Cowan started with piano lessons and took up the pipe organ around age 12. As he explored the instrument's repertoire, his first love was the music of Bach.

"It has everything in it," Cowan says. "It has emotional impact. It has detail and complexity. It has rhythmic momentum. And it can make an organ sound really good. That came across to me pretty instantly."

Cowan also was intrigued by less familiar works, including arrangements of orchestral works such as the Wagner overture.

"It really makes you stretch what you're trying to do with the instrument," Cowan says. "It's ... a different side of what to play on the organ. And appealing."

Mapping out a career

By high school, Cowan was playing for church services, and he discovered how an organist could invigorate a congregation's singing. He decided to make music his career.

"It's thrilling," he says. "You're basically in a supporting role. But you can hear when people are inspired to lift their voices. That's a really satisfying feeling."

At Baltimore's Peabody Conservatory, Cowan was exposed to a wider range of music and musicians.

"It's great going to a conservatory where you meet people who play all kinds of instruments, and they're all very passionate," he says.

"I remember when someone said to me, 'Oh, have you ever heard the Beethoven Violin Concerto?' I said no. 'Are you kidding me? You have to go listen to it right now!' So I did. ... Having that around you is fantastically stimulating."

By the time Cowan earned a master's degree from Yale University, he still did not have a career mapped out.

"I studied mostly because I was so fascinated with the instrument and its repertoire," Cowan says. "I thought, whatever the result was, that's what I wanted to do."

His opportunities have included some of everything. Cowan initially played at a church full time and performed concerts on the side. Then he joined the faculty of Westminster Choir College, a New Jersey school geared to church music. His concert schedule expanded.

Now, most every weekend during the concert season, Cowan flies off to perform. Though he no longer has time for a church position, he might consider it again if he tires of life on the road.

He tells his students that while playing concerts can be exciting, church music and teaching can be even more rewarding.

"If you play solo repertoire a lot, there's a lot of time spent in solitude, working on that," he says. "For people who are really community-minded, if you're the center of a musical community, in church or elsewhere, it's a great feeling. And people can be really satisfied with their influence."