LEWISTON – Diane Muise of Auburn, a nationally famous, award-winning Gospel singer, died Monday afternoon at Central Maine Medical Center, four days after a heart bypass operation. She was 59.

Muise was born in Georgia, the daughter of a minister. After college, she joined a New Jersey-based Gospel trio called the Majestic Singers. After the group broke up, she married Leo Muise and moved with him to Maine.

The Muises made their home in Auburn, where she became active in local theater for a short time.

Janet Gibson, recording secretary for Community Little Theatre in Auburn, remembers performing with Muise in “You Can’t Take it With You” in 1983. “She had this beautiful, beautiful voice,” Gibson recalls. “I just thought the world of her.”

Two years later, Muise returned to Gospel singing, starting the soloist career for which she was best known. She recorded seven albums in Nashville, wrote two books, and toured across the United States and Canada.

Muise was known for interspersing her performances with humor and personal stories. “She would tell stories about her own life, and be very, very open about not only the victories but also the struggles in her life,” said David Clark, her pastor at Court Street Baptist Church in Auburn. “You felt like she was just being herself onstage, like she was just talking to friends. She was a very good storyteller, a powerful speaker.”

Clark said Muise and her husband were longtime members of Court Street Baptist Church. Clark called them “just absolutely fantastic people. They loved God and loved what they did and were an inspiration to everybody in the church and myself included.”

“She always attended when she wasn’t doing a concert somewhere else,” Clark said. Muise sang her last concert there June 1. Clark said he knew she wasn’t feeling well, but that she gave “probably the best concert that I’ve ever heard her give, and I’ve heard her a number of times, obviously.”

Shortly after the concert, Muise went to Central Maine Medical Center, according to Clark. After some testing, she was scheduled for bypass surgery on Thursday. Clark said she was disappointed she would have to miss her son Michael’s graduation from Edward Little High School on Saturday night.

News of Muise’s surgery spread far and fast.

“Leo’s been telling me he’s been getting, in the last few days, just e-mails and messages and phone calls from all over,” Clark said. “People inquiring, people telling him they were praying for her.”

Clark said the bypass surgery seemed successful, but that on Friday things took a downward turn.

Clark was in the room with Muise and her family when she passed away.

He said the family is holding together. “Their faith, their love for one another was so demonstrated today,” Clark said. “Yes, there were a lot of tears, but there were a lot of prayers. They will find great strength in their faith and in family, and in their church family.”

Muise’s pastor said he and her family reflected on how her last concert took place at her own church. He said it may have been her best.

“I never heard her sing with such strength and conviction as she did that night,” Clark said.

She is survived by her husband Leo and her son Michael, as well as her two adopted children, David and Linda.