Score!

Here are some pictures of the new score for my most recent composition:  "The Ignored Morality Interlude of Mssr. Freeman".

Christmas Season and Music

For those of you who are musicians for religious groups (or even some secular groups) you know that Christmas begins sometime around September.  Aside from a few services that I will be playing for Shalom, and I believe one for my LDS ward, I have two big programs that I am working on this year.

The first is the annual AGO Choral Festival, which will be held this year at the Central United Protestant Church (CUP) in Richland on December 4th, 2011 at 4 PM.  I am co-chairing the event with another lady from our local chapter, and it has proven to the most difficult program I am putting together to date.  Basically, we get a bunch of congregational choirs together from around the Tri-Cities and sing our hearts out (and finish with the Hallelujah chorus from Handel's Messiah).  However, about five letters were lost in the mail, causing confusion and delay (I sound like Sir Topham Hat).  All is well, we have eleven choirs set up.  I will be playing prelude music and the first congregational hymn.  I think I will play "Wachet Auf" by Bach for prelude (still undecided) or "Angels We Have Heard on High", an original arrangement.  I will be accompanying the congregation on "O Come, All Ye Faithful".  We are donating all proceeds from the offertory to the local food bank.

The second is an LDS program where we wanted to bring in classical music back into the church.  For the past several years (you can read my earlier Facebook rant) more Sally DeFord has popped into our services, let alone the old standby Janice Kapp Perry, and much of the classical repertoire has been lost to the ears of the average LDS congregationalist.  We put together a program, reaching into a variety of music, along with two congregational carols and scripture reading, to bring classical music back to the ears of the listeners.  I have put this program together with three other musicians, one a cellist in a local symphony, one with a master degree in piano performance, and the other with her undergraduate degree in flute performance.  I will be playing the opening congregational carol, again "O Come, All Ye Faithful", and assisting the other organist on the final carol, "Silent Night".

For the LDS service I will be playing the first three short pieces from J.S. Bach's Das Orgelbuchlein (I don't have the titles in German in front of me):  "Now Come, Heathen Savior", "Lord Christ is Coming", and "Lord Christ, God's Only Son", I will play "Sleepers Wake, A Voice Calleth" from the Schubler Chorales by J.S. Bach, and the Bell Symphony (along with his trumpet tune in C) by Henry Purcell.

If you are interested in attending the LDS service.  It is at 7 PM on December 18th, 2011 at the Richland LDS Thayer Building.  I don't have the address, but the cross street is Thayer and Sunset.

Hope to see you all there!

Painful Practice

Practice was painful today.  I was snaking out a drain yesterday evening and sliced my hand on a pair of scissors.  The good news is that it wasn't on a finger, the better news is that the tub is now draining appropriately.  The bad news, for what it is worth, is that it is painful to stretch my hand or contract it.

But on a side note, my transposition study is going quite well.  I am going to build up a score for "Come, Come, ye Saints" where I modulate the last verse from F (so I play all three verses in F) to G (final verse in the original key).  It should be fun.  Video to follow some time in the next few weeks.

Sunday Service Line-Up

I thought I would start posting up the Sunday services that I play:

Prelude - Hymn Improvisation on "Abide with Me"
Anthem - I don't remember the title, but I only had one day to learn it and it was fast with four flats
Offertory - Little Prelude in E Minor - J.S. Bach
Postlude - Irish Benediction

I love the congregation that I work for.  They are so wonderful and sing with such enthusiasm!  They are accepting and loving of all, and are very much a Christian universalist sect.  The pastor gave a wonderful sermon on generational thinking.

Current Work

I thought I would keep this blog more as a personal journal than anything else.  Because, let's be frank, nobody reads it, but I would really like to come back to it and review what I have learned while learning the organ.

I started a few days ago to go back to the structured practice sessions:

• 15 minutes hymn practice
• 15 minutes from current practice piece (one of the 8 little preludes and fugues or 6 schubler chorales)
• 15 minutes from current Das Orgelbuchlein piece
• 30 minutes on next recital piece

Today, because I have service on Sunday, was mostly in preparation for the services.  However, I did spend some time in hymn play and some more time working on the piece I will be preparing for Christmas, "Sheppherd's Pipe Carol" by Dale Wood.

Exciting times.  I get to sleep in tomorrow, the kids are at Grandma's house!

Organ for LDS Pianists

(Not pictured:  Me)

After three weeks, we are finally done with the Organ Basics for LDS Pianists.  We had a fairly successful turnout.  I was really happy with the results and had a lot of positive feedback from those who attended the class. The skill level was varied throughout the crowd, from the "never touched an organ" to "can play basic literature".

They even heard me rant one night (after class had ended) about the word "performance" in policy.

The stake music coordinator wants to open it up now to the more advanced classes (which would be titled more appropriately "discussions") and some hymn plays.

Facebook Conversation

I had an amazing conversation on Facebook a few days ago, and I thought I would paste the conversation here on my blog.  It is in regards to the musical culture of the LDS church.

John - "I've said it once (well many times), but I'll say it again. Music is dying in LDS culture. In 1992 Dr. Pollei lamented over the decline of music in LDS culture. I say it is not declining, but dying."

This is in reference to the article from Sunstone, "The Decline of Music in Mormon Culture".  You can read it here.

Kate - "Sad, isn't it?"

John - "I really feel like crying right now"

Karen - "At least in American LDS culture. I hope someday Saints in other countries will write their own hymns and we can have an international hymn book! Wouldn't that be awesome?!"

Cathy - "Unfortunately, I have to agree with you, John."

Karen - "So, in what sense exactly? The pop LDS music scene? Hymns? The interest of LDS in hymns and music? Just interest in culture and music in general? And what are we going to do to change it? ;)"

John - "In what sense: Sacred music in sacrament services. I don't even care about the "hymn-only" rule in our stake. It is the performance policy that kills me, because of the perspective of many of leadership. One who doesn't understand the intricacies of an instrument and how it is played (like say, the organ) interprets even simple proper organ hymn accompaniment as performance and thus inappropriate. But these attitudes are inappropriate because they turn our hymn singing into funeral marches and un-interested congregations when it comes to music. It leads to fewer kids being inspired, and thus fewer trained musicians and the cycle continues downwards further and further. Now to the what are going to do: EDUCATE! Those with appreciative ears to music, educate other listeners. Those who are trained, train. Last night a woman said she "challenged" the priesthood leadership on their policy. That made me sad. We shouldn't "challenge" them, but teach them about the instrument and point out that more sing, and they sing with more gusto! Education is more powerful than controversy! It has worked well in every ward I have been in, but fewer wards have advocates for music!"

Karen - "Good thinking John! I think you are right, if we challenge we get no where, but when we can show people that what we are doing is actually accomplishing the goal they too have, but in an even better way, then things work much better! that is what I try to do with the YW manuals. Onward!"

Chris - "I've been feeling the same way myself for a few years now. John, I'm curious as to what exactly you're noticing that's happened or is happening in your stake? I definitely agree that sometimes people in the church that don't play instruments or have any musical background really don't understand how they should be used in church because they don't appreciate them like we do."

John - "It all started a few years ago when a young man was asked to play a special musical number at Stake Priesthood. He had nothing prepared that was "spiritual" and told them so. They said play what he has been preparing...which was a movement from a Samuel Barber piece. Brilliantly executed, but horrifically inappropriate for a church setting. The stake then scaled back its rules entirely and said, "nothing deviating from the hymn book whatsoever". It originally was applicable to ALL, meaning sacrament prelude/postlude and congregational hymns, stake meetings, and funerals.   I correct myself, congregational hymns are always supposed to be from the hymn book by global church policy as in the CHI.  They tightened their belts as to what was appropriate, but the piece played by the young man, which was most definitely written for recitals/concerts, made leadership at the stake level weary of musicians "performing" at events. Suddenly, _simple_ organ techniques like changing registration between verses and playing soprano with right hand, tenor/alto with left hand, and bass with pedals was labeled as performance and discouraged (both at ward level and with stake).  However, things have been improving significantly. We've had two amazing concerts and one event in our chapel that have changed many attitudes of leadership: The Steven Buese recital, the James Welsh recital, and the AGO Christmas concert. I taught an organ class for beginners a while back which was attended by a member of the current stake presidency and what would eventually be the bishop of our ward. The class they attended taught how the pipe organ works, and the work that the organist has cut out for them. I have had much more leniency with these two individuals since that class than I have had with any leader in the past.  Now, stake policy has relaxed to slightly more conservative than church policy (again, the policy is not my issue, at all). That is that hymns for all sacrament service pieces (congregational hymns and special musical numbers). Stake services follow the CHI, where special musical numbers can reach outside of our hymnal as appropriate. Prelude and postlude have been opened up to the discretion of the organist (at least in my ward, which I hear is in the minority in the stake with these attitudes).   Still the issue remains of performance. The most I can get away with is soloing the soprano, adding the occasional descant, and registration changes. I've been slowly pushing the envelope, to steal from the general conference message (I guess in the wrong way) of the camel getting in the tent during the sandstorm. But I have had good success and bringing out singers where I can.  Furthermore, the stake has not called, but assigned me to be a stake organ teacher under the coordinator. Once a year I teach a beginner's class. Then we have hymn plays where organists try out different techniques to push their studies further and then advanced classes, where various organists of skill and experience will speak, teach, and lead discussions. Only the beginner classes have started up, the rest will start up in the new year, but they have been successful. We have about 22 showing up each night.  But now that I think of it, I have heard Betty Russel and Elaine Burgess complain of similar matters about ten or fifteen years ago. They both pushed the envelope and inspired me to be the musician that I am today. Perhaps being a serious musician in the church is always going to be an uphill battle. As a music teacher it is easy, because people come to you, but not so much as a musician trying to enrich the sacred musical experience.   I'm done. That was my longest Facebook post I've ever written. I need a blog."

Kate - "You DO need a blog:P My family used to play music in sacrament. My elder siblings played carefully selected classical pieces. We sang together. Now, we had to bed for my Mum and I to play a duet from the hymnal (exactly as it's written), because we were playing it on a dulcimer and a celtic harp:/ When you have to beg to play or sing something in church that is from an EFY? Something is not right:/  I guess my biggest pet peeve about it is what you've been saying, just in a very small nutshell. If we have boring music in church, the next generations will only learn about boring music in church. Not that the hymns are not wonderful and beautiful, but they are the norm, and we need stirring, spiritual, MOVING music. Music is the universal language, and we need to use it as such!"

John - "I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees the cyclical nature of the problem."