Rinse, repeat, part 2: “Do you have a student who could … ?”

The emails and phone messages I receive each week: “We need an organist!” “We need a pianist!” “We’re looking for an ‘accompanist’ for our services,” (whatever that is). “Do you have a student …?” One of my teachers added the following statement to his office answering machine greeting: “If you’re calling about the availability of a student for a church position, your call will be returned only if a student is available, due to the large volume of such calls.”

I remember as a child that no church in my hometown was without an organist or pianist. Then in about the early 1990s, things began changing. Those organists/pianists started getting older and retiring and/or getting replaced by the band. Then I began to hear rumblings along the lines of, “Alice played for us for 50 years out of the goodness of her heart. We can’t find anyone to replace her.” I’d say that in many parts of the country, they won’t find a replacement for dear old Alice for two primary reasons: 1) there isn’t anyone, and 2) no one does it for free anymore.

The so-called “organist shortage” occurs on different levels in different places for different reasons. It began to become a bit more epidemic when more churches came into need of organists to replace aging Alices all over the country. But it is a little puzzling that out of 319 million Americans, there aren’t enough keyboardists (not just organists) to play for church. There are indeed fewer organ students in college today, and there are increasingly fewer colleges offering organ study. But there is truth to the organist shortage in that far fewer children are taking piano lessons any more. There’s no one coming up the ranks, folks! The very people in the congregation who claim to have appreciated Alice’s work all these years have not been paying attention to what they’ve been doing to their children by not training them in the arts. Parents were not paying attention to the future of church music when they sent their kids to soccer rather than piano lessons, to the youth service rather than the traditional service, to math camp rather than youth choir, and when they modeled screens instead of hymnals. It’s their own fault, and I can’t fix it by sending students to fill the gaps.

Our “Alice” above certainly served a lot of years. But rare is a 50-year tenure of any church musician in a single church any more. Many long-serving church musicians either grew up there, or their primary breadwinner took them there, and there they stayed. But today, everyone is fair game for departure to greener pastures, better pay, and higher rungs on the ladder. If Alice had not had such a good heart, she might not have stayed so long. There was a different mindset in those days. As a child, I always heard, “I do it for the church. I do it for the Lord.” “She would never make this about money.” Our organists and pianists were faithful church goers, just like everyone else. Playing was their service to the church, like that of other folks in the congregation who provided childcare, volunteered with today’s endangered species called “children’s choirs,” baked cookies for Vacation Bible School, and set up tables for Wednesday night dinner and chairs for choir rehearsals. There was always someone in the church who was there “every time the doors were open.” It was their service, yea even their contribution, to the congregation.

While I now tend to stand on the side of “pay your organist or do without,” I do understand this struggle many churches are experiencing, insofar as I understand (not accept) the historical model. Many churches have never put “organist” and “pay” into the same sentence. But musicians work as hard as the pastor, and they spend as much time preparing music as the pastor does preparing sermons and ministering to the sick, the friendless, and the needy. Whether or not it’s their primary job, service playing is worthy of an appropriate retainer because it is a time-intensive job. It is also worth an appropriate retainer because not just anyone from the congregation can step in and take over – as many churches have discovered. (Curiously, no one bats an eye when someone un-ordained takes over the pulpit to share a word that the Lord has laid on their heart. Funny that it’s easier to replace the boss/pastor than to replace the organist.)

Recently, I subbed in a church with a large four-manual organ. Although it is some distance away, I have played there in the past because I love the organ and how the congregation loves (loved) to use it. But on this particular Sunday, I discovered that their services had evolved to the point that my only official duties that day were the prelude (short, please), postlude (no one listens), the opening hymn (play from this arrangement, while the minister of music conducts and sings into his microphone), and the anthem (along with piano). Otherwise, I merely “chorded it” during praise choruses with the band, one of whose members is an associate pastor, who wore his less-than-best jeans and un-tucked open-collar shirt for the occasion. That church has been seeking an organist, but I don’t think they really need one at this time. They just need someone who knows how to turn it on and which piston to hit to provide background fullness for the band. If they continue to search for “real” organists, then they will encounter a real “shortage” of organists, until they go back to a service that actually requires an organist.

Now, a certain shortage of organists does exist. I live in a small-ish college town, the hub of a ski resort area, located in a glorified retirement and seasonal residence community with mountain scenery. That’s three levels of expensive I just named off! At my last reckoning, it’s the second most expensive real estate market in North Carolina. I have begun to propose some new models to these churches. I advise them to embrace the fact that they are located in a resort area and that real estate would be a problem for anyone who moves to this area to play for that church (should they even find such a person). I advise them to advertise nationally, in hopes that they might find a recent retiree who is looking to relocate to a resort area such as this. I also caution them to stop defining the position as part-time, because it just isn’t. And it is skilled labor, not a form of congregational donation.

And so to answer the question, “Do you have a student who could …?” yeah, I have eight students this year (2015), the same four of whom are still spoken for with good church posts, and the other four of whom are either not quite ready for regular service, or I just don’t have the energy to inform the church that my students are being trained as professional organists, not as Sunday bench warmers. 

Rinse, repeat, part 1

Another recording: Gutbusters in Houston

Picture it: the Jongen Sonata Éroïca, the Reubke Psalm 94, and the Brahms Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel transcribed from the piano by Rachel Laurin, all recorded on an organ similar to – or at least suitable for – what those composers might have known. But in HOUSTON, not in Europe. Such was my second recording project for summer 2015. [The first was two Widor Symphonies recorded at St. Mark’s Cathedral in Shreveport, La., narrated here.]

Summer 2015 will go down as the very busiest of my life so far. Four recitals, three conferences, two recordings, a studio recital on the road, and only two brief vacation periods. When I agreed/planned to do all this, I did so with a strange confidence that had not been present in the past. It all just felt good, and I’m glad I did it all. (And nothing was double-booked!) Apart from the professional thrills of the performances, I believe having not one but two recordings in the hopper for future release might be one of the smartest things I have done as a professional. Now I can record every year and stay one recording ahead. [Update: our next project next spring might be some Howells on a “Perriola,” Roy Perry’s pet name for his Aeolian-Skinner installations. Stay tuned.]

This was a rewarding project, but it was also a difficult project, for reasons I’ll explain below. Nevertheless, each time I record, it gets less stressful. For that, I credit producer Keith Weber, whose laidback approach and understanding of the [imperfect] human condition make this fellow in the spotlight relax more and more. Keith's talents as a producer are just now coming to light to me, and I am more pleased all the time. He also has what he calls “the secret weapon,” which is the formidable engineering and editing talents of Ryan Edwards and Shannon Smith of Houston. The three of them are quite a team.

The other two major players for this project were page turner and registrant Kirk M. Rich, doctoral student of Robert Bates at the University of Houston, and the rather arresting Paul Fritts Op. 29 at St. Philip Presbyterian Church in Houston.

I knew what I wanted to record, and I knew where I wanted to record it. Keith went to work to arrange the location, but delays and some disorganization at our first-choice venue eventually forced us to walk away for now. (The good news is that we will be able to go back for a future project.) As Keith and I began casting about for other venues, the Fritts at St. Philip came up, and both of us paused for a moment on the phone while the light bulbs went off above our heads. OF COURSE! Perfect choice. Keith got right on the phone with Dr. Thomas Goetz and Dr. Matthew Dirst at St. Philip, and we were off and running. St. Philip was not our first choice, but it was the best choice and the right choice, no doubt. Just as St. Mark’s in Shreveport was perfect for Widor, so was St. Philip in Houston perfect for Jongen, Brahms, and Reubke.

St. Philip Presbyterian and I are no strangers. I was their organist from 1995-1997, on the previous organ in the un-renovated building. It is by far the smartest and most affirming congregation I have ever worked for. What a pleasure in 2015 to sit in that beautifully renovated space, capturing the first solo recording on that nearly-new organ, enjoying the gracious hospitality of Tom Goetz and Matthew Dirst and the professional guidance of Keith, Ryan, Shannon, and Kirk. I am a better person for it, just as I became a little better for having served that church all those years ago. The only way this could get even better would be if Tom and Matthew were pleased with the result when the CD is released next summer.

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The corner of the church sits about fifteen feet from a six-lane surface street through one of the most over-developed areas of Houston. Finding quiet time was going to be a challenge. We conquered that challenge by scheduling three consecutive evening sessions, July 20-22, from 9 pm to 2 am. With that plan, it wasn’t difficult to decide to ask fellow night owl Melissa Givens to house me those few days. I practiced Saturday and Sunday, July 18-19, met with Kirk on Sunday to go over some registrations and page turns, and then went into rest mode. Melissa and I gallivanted during the days, I napped in the afternoons, and then recording began each night.

We "knocked out" Jongen the first night and got started on Reubke. We finished Reubke the second night and got a quick start on Brahms, whom we then finished off the third night. I believe we were all surprised that it took pretty much all the budgeted time to complete the project. We were working against a few mechanical and musical issues, but we prevailed. Apparently, the church is still at battle with the HVAC system for the renovated space, and the humidity had climbed just enough to start wreaking a bit of havoc in the organ. (Conquering 98-degree weather in Houston is one thing, but 90+% humidity on top of that requires some rather heavy-duty machinery to manage.) The box had a horrible squeak when closing, there was a very mild cipher on the TONIC note (of all things) of Brahms, and some of the pallets were wheezing a bit during quieter moments. Some other issues normal for Matthew but which I had to get used to were short pedal keys, a flat pedalboard, short manual keys, a feather-light suspended action, 58-note manuals (Brahms needed 59!), and a music rack that was too small for the paste-up boards I had made for the project.

In spite of all that, it is a beautiful thing how the human body can adapt and adjust to an unfamiliar instrument, but it is equally enlightening just how manageable this music is on a non-radiating/concave pedalboard – after all, these composers had pedalboards like that! This was the perfect organ for the perfect set of repertoire. The feather-light manual action was easily solved in many cases by adding a coupler for increased resistance and fewer cracks. As for the music rack issues, Kirk saved the day with page turning. He also helped out with some troublesome piston punchings. We even toyed with having him play a few notes in one spot that didn’t want to “clean up” under my fingers, but we made it through without it, after all.

Well, then there were the musical issues. I have to hand it to Keith. He pulled some good playing out of me. It wasn’t that I played poorly, but the time was right for me to re-discover some phrasing techniques that had apparently been pushed a little (only slightly) to the side over the years. Had Keith been less of a producer, we might have been finished in two days, not three; but the project would have suffered in the end. Keith knew me and knew my work, and he knew that he could push me into higher levels of excellence, and for that I am grateful.

The organ will speak for itself on the recording, but it is a veritable masterpiece of voicing and specification. Each division has its own plenum and reeds, and generous ones, at that. As with organs of this style, you have to conserve wind by removing flutes as you build up to full organ. You can get a rather arresting full organ by omitting all flutes and even a few of the principal stops (don’t tell!), allowing the reeds and mixtures to work their magic. I even threw in the Cornet in a few climax moments. But if you ask me, the real gem of this organ is the Pedal Posaune, which is rich enough so as not to require the 16-foot flues with it. It is absolutely thrilling to hear this stop “do its thing” in the ensemble. The voicing of the organ is beautiful, but the winding shows real genius.

Keith, Ryan, and Shannon have been most gracious in their commendation of my work ethic. Apparently, they’re not used to working with people who have actually practiced and are actually ready to record. Although there were some real challenges to get right in some places, apparently these guys have to do less editing with me than with others. I am grateful to them for their professionalism and kindness, as well as to Clyde Holloway, who passed his work ethic on to me.

This was a good and worthwhile project that fed my soul on many levels. I hope that Tom and Matthew and the St. Philippians will be as pleased with this finished product as I am thrilled to have conceived of it and worked on it.

In search of new models, Part III: A blogger's self-commentary

Know thyself.

As I get older, my filter gets weaker. I'm more willing to say things in this blog that I would have considered career suicide a few years ago. (And in this particular series, I'm just getting started!) I'm more willing to speak my mind. I'm increasingly willing to tell the horror stories of how unprofessionally I have seen people behave over the years. (I'll always stop just short of mentioning names, though. I must still have a filter somewhere, and so the perpetrators can rest easy.)

If I were to go back to the beginning and read every post in this blog since its inception, I might discover that it's full of things I may not believe any more or have at least relaxed my standards about. I might also see a gradual upward trend in the rant factor, undoubtedly a product of chasing one outdated model or another.

As we get more comfortable in a particular skin, we start letting our hair down. It happens all the time in new friend circles, counseling sessions, co-worker happy hour excursions, recital pieces played many times, exercise routines, and in what we will allow in our liturgy. This blog is a microcosm of that phenomenon. I choose to get more personal in it all the time. (After all it's my blog. And after all, I have something to say that others are probably thinking or that no one has thought of. And after all, the number of readers is probably not up to world domination level. And after all, lightning hasn't struck me yet for anything I have said here.)

Blogging itself as a model could even be on the way out! Technology and audiences are volatile. This blog is a treasure trove of one person’s ideas, and some really good ones at that, but not everyone who knows me reads it. (It’s kind of like reading the Daily Offices even when there’s no one else there.) But I'm going to continue for the foreseeable future. It's gentle therapy for me. It's entertaining for some and educational for others. And I enjoy writing, so it's good practice with organizing thoughts and teaching the same to my students.

And that brings us to an opportunity to define this blog's existence. I used to write in it faithfully every Monday morning, lest I be forgotten (silly old model). Now, I try to write in it every ten days. But in the summertime, I write in it when I remember to. I'll go back to the ten-day routine when school starts again. This blog's raison d'être has morphed over the years. Some days, I am inspired to write because I hear from a new reader who loves it. Other days, I am "inspired" to rant but usually catch it in time to re-model it into more compassionate writing. Other days, I am inspired to write another installment in a series -- the "Weddings!" series comes to mind quite a bit. Other days, I am inspired to write because I want to tell about another exciting trip -- as of this writing, I'm about to go teach at the Pipe Organ Encounter hosted in Columbus, GA, where I will be working with a student who has already impressed me with his command of the English language and his initiative in learning new music.

The conclusion is that I know myself better than ever. I know what I'm worth, and I know how to live with that, even if it's not sought out by the circles I think ought to be seeking it -- that will be covered in greater detail later in this series. And I am in a groove with this blog. It's not a bad product, and to my knowledge, it is the only one of its kind.

As for those horror stories mentioned above, I just might tell more of them soon. Gird up thy loins. And know thyself.

Masterpieces galore: A Shreveport narrative

I have just finished recording two Widor Symphonies – 6^th and Romane – on the Aeolian-Skinner at St. Mark’s Cathedral in Shreveport. The finished product will be out in a few months. But for now, its tale so far is a joyous one.

After hearing Michael Kleinschmidt perform the Romane at St. Mark’s for the 2014 East Texas Pipe Organ Festival, I said to myself, “That is the perfect piece for this organ!” And then I said to myself, “You know, I play that piece pretty well myself. I should record it sometime.” And then I thought, “This organ is a masterpiece – Roy Perry’s largest; it resides in a sumptuous acoustic, is used lovingly and constantly for dignified liturgy, and it has been carefully maintained for its entire life (sixty years in 2015, by my reckoning). Why has it not been recorded professionally?”

And here we are now!

I contacted dear Houston friend Keith Weber about producing this recording. His enthusiasm was contagious, and his professionalism throughout the entire process is most calming. He contacted trusted engineers Ryan Edwards and Shannon Smith of Houston, and we set dates. I was to arrive in Shreveport on Sunday, June 7, 2015, register, and be ready to record Monday-Wednesday, June 8-10.

Being a traveling geek, I added a quick pre-Shreveport stop to this trip. It was only 70 extra miles to Texarkana to visit the grave of my teacher Clyde Holloway, and so I left home a day early to overnight in Texarkana on Saturday and then drive down to Shreveport on Sunday to begin practicing after church.

Sunday, I introduced myself to Bryan Mitnaul, Canon for Cathedral Music, whereupon I discovered that I was about to be treated as a very welcome guest. Bryan was a most gracious and enthusiastic host, and he saw to it that we were never disturbed. That attention to detail is worth the price of admission every time! Many thanks to Bryan.

So I started practicing Sunday afternoon. After about an hour, the Very Reverend Alston Johnson, Dean of the Cathedral, passed through. He saw that I was a stranger in the house, and he offered a warm welcome. Once he discovered why I was there, he knew immediately that it was a special thing, and he expressed a delightful enthusiasm. It is a happy thing when the boss understands and supports what we musicians are up to! Many thanks to Dean Johnson.

Keith and the guys showed up later on Sunday to make friends with the room. Setup began Monday morning, and we were off! From there, I can only stare in wonder at how smoothly everything went. Keith’s approach is refreshingly laid back, allowing plenty of opportunity for me to take brain rests along the way and enjoy leisurely meal breaks. Ryan and Shannon are awfully young, by my standards, but that didn’t affect their top-notch professionalism and deep knowledge base. I am impressed, and Keith swears by them.

Between the Romane and the Sixth Symphonies, there are nine movements – five fast and four slow. We had three days to work with. How to split the movements up? Begin with a slow movement to “warm up” to the recording mindset, or begin with a fast one while energy is fresh? And if starting with a fast movement, should it be a difficult one to get it out of the way, or an easier one for “warmup?” How would the energy hold up best across the three days? Keith suggested that making our way straight through a given Symphony would keep its mood intact throughout all its movements. I have the Sixth memorized, and with due respect to Widor, I’d say its musical challenges are not as acute as the Romane. So off we went with the Romane, while energy was fresh. We recorded its four movements in order. Keith’s approach had me play each movement through at least twice, then record short patches as needed. With his kind care with me and his quick work with the engineers, we got the entire Romane done on that first day! Based on Day One’s success, we began Day Two with confidence. I had to stop for a few more brain rests at Keith’s direction, but we got the entire Sixth done that day. We all left Shreveport a full day early!

Along the way, Keith developed a wonderful salutation for each take. On his way from the console back to the recording table, he would stop and ring the Sanctus bells next to the door and invoke the name of some saint or another. "This is to Saint Bernard!" "This is to Saint Cecilia!" Perhaps the best one of all was on the very last take of the project, which was a long patch for the fourth movement of the Sixth, where he said, "This is to Saint Francis. As in Poulenc! [made smoke puff sound]." It was just the smoky atmosphere I needed to get that perfect, laid-back, screw-you French sound!

Widor’s style only occasionally requires unique colors in the registration. I say that to remind the savvy listener that although the St. Mark’s organ is full of beautiful stops, don’t expect a recording that demonstrates them in great detail. Widor paints his loud movements with large swaths of stops. On the other hand, I have made use of as many colors as I can in the slow movements. For example, where he calls for the Hautbois in the third movement of the Romane, I use the Clarinet from the Choir. Where he calls for it again in the fourth movement of the Sixth, I use the 4-foot Oboe down an octave, rather than the 8-foot Hautbois (yes, they both exist on the Swell). And the strings in the second movement of the Sixth are downright delicious.

It was overwhelming to record this historic music on an historic instrument such as this. It is not exaggerating to say that my mind was constantly flitting back and forth from historical figure to historical figure. From Roy Perry’s landmark ears represented in the voicing, to the history of Bill Teague’s musical leadership on this organ for its first few decades, to G. Donald Harrison’s leadership of Aeolian-Skinner, to my teachers, to Widor himself, I felt audaciously seated among greatness. But what a thrill to bask in the sound of that organ in that room! This is a monumental organ, and I am delighted to have been allowed to record on it. Two Widor masterpieces played on a Roy Perry masterpiece in an acoustical masterpiece of a room. It just doesn’t get any better.

In search of new models, Part II: College scholarships

A U.S. college degree has to be paid for. By someone. The price is the price, and the university will get its money one way or another. Scholarship monies are real dollars, not just an abstract cost reduction, but they rarely go directly to the student. Rather, they are usually applied toward the student’s account and resemble more of a discount for whoever’s paying. For the purposes of this series on "broken models," I’d say the interpretation of a scholarship “discount” is where the broken models exist.

 

Hypothetical conversation A:

“Billy is going to HappyDays University, where he has always wanted to go. We couldn’t be prouder!”

“What kind of scholarship did he get?”

“None.”

“Then why is he going there?”

“Because he wants to.”

Hypothetical conversation B:

“Suzie is going to HotShot University. They gave her a good scholarship.” [Variation: “They gave her a better scholarship than DownTheRoad College, where she really wanted to go.”]

Conversation B is probably the most common. Conversation A is rather unlikely, but that would be a very interesting conversation to overhear, with two different models being pursued in it – one of sending a student where he wants to go, and the other of wanting the juicy details of how much the price has been discounted. In either case, a conversation about college always moves to scholarship money very quickly. If you ask me, that is a non sequitur. For whatever reasons, our society is conditioned to treat college as something horribly expensive that has to be paid for with outside assistance, rather than as a place to nurture a young person’s passions and self-discovery, no matter the cost. At the same time, the worth of the student appears to be tied up, however subliminally or subconsciously, in how much discount in tuition s/he is receiving/winning/being offered to attend there. This model is so ingrained that even the super-rich routinely apply for financial aid.

Whom does scholarship money serve? With it, the student feels valuable for any number of reasons, the parents enjoy the discount for any number of reasons, and the university has landed a big fish in its bucket of students. Win-win-win? Only if all three parties are pursuing the same model in their thinking. When those models don’t match up, the games and the bidding wars begin.

Let’s pause here and acknowledge those students who put themselves through college. Those stories are real, but they are usually celebrated as sensational, not “normal.” “Normal” usually involves the glory of landing a big scholarship, but anyone who figures out how to self-pay for college has already discovered broken models and come up with new models of their own. They don’t need to read anything I have to say about it!

So, Suzie and her parents apply at two colleges. The school they prefer doesn’t offer as much as the other, so the Suziefolk ask for more. Then the other school counters, the game is on, and higher education takes another step toward becoming a commodity straight off the shelf. Meanwhile, Suzie feels more and more valuable all the time, the parents feel more and more affirmed for their hard work in raising her, and one of the schools is about to forfeit the game, whether by being outbid or by coming to its senses and dropping out of the game. Once all the cards are on the table, Suziefolks all across the land appear to make their decision based on dollar amount, rather than on percentage of costs covered. Ten thousand dollars will go a lot farther at the mid-sized state institution than it will up an ivy-covered wall. But watching that money roll in is spellbinding to so many, and they will choose the more expensive school with its larger dollar amount of scholarship, even though the prize represents a much smaller fraction of the costs of attending there vs. the other place. And at some point during the next four years, the winning school may wonder if Suzie was worth it. But as I said in the second sentence of this paragraph, Suzie already has a favorite picked out. But she's willing to let it lose the game based on the broken model of the bottom line.

Lest I sound idealistic in suggesting that money ain’t everything, I must acknowledge the broken-but-realistic model that college is indeed horribly expensive, and it’s getting worse. The amount of money being funneled into state universities from public sources is higher than ever, but when it’s divided up student-by-student, it’s pitifully low. Mommy and Daddy: be prepared -- you knew this day might be coming when you got pregnant. The college fund should be started when the engagement ring materializes. [Better yet, the college fund should be started in lieu of the engagement ring. Another broken model, but I digress.] Another model to examine is the one that says college should be automatic after high school. I'll deal with that one in a couple more posts.

Will the university award monies to the student who demonstrates the stronger past or to the student who demonstrates the stronger future? Will that money be used to give the professors the privilege of teaching the “best” student ever, or will it be used to help the future U.S. President get his chance at the table? And to what end is all this money offered? Some state schools are having to use scholarship dollars to appease state legislatures by keeping numbers up in some programs (another broken model). Or the schools of music are trying to keep large ensembles fully staffed (another one) or weaker studios populated (yep).

Many schools are credited with graduating only the finest organists. But I have to point out here with all due respect that many of those schools accept only the finest organists. There are some schools one does not attend to learn how to play the organ – you already have to play well to be admitted. Then there are others that will teach anyone, just to keep the program going. Then there are the middle-ground folk (like me) who will teach anyone with the passion to play, the passion to learn to play even better, a thorough command of written and spoken English, and the ability not to fall off the bench at the audition. In short, I teach people how to play, how to practice, and how to foster their passion.

In some perfect worlds, Billy would attend tuition-free. But in a true utopia, Billy would attend where he can pursue his passions at his highest performance level, money or not. I’d say the passion-nurturing model, not the richest model, is the one we ought to be seeking. That would be the ideal, even though we’re nowhere close to attaining it. We haggle over price at flea markets, car dealerships, home buying contracts, and wedding organist consultations. And now over higher education, I’m sorry to say. What’s wrong with just going where you want to go? Asking for the scholarship is fine, but if you have your place picked out, then go. And stop playing games.

When I was applying for grad school, I had a choice. Was I going to go where I was a small fish in a big pond but where I would be exposed to a very important boot-camp style of teaching and technical attention? Or was I going to go where I could be a medium-sized fish in a big pond and where the faculty all but asked at my audition, “Where have you been all our lives?” I chose the boot camp; I knew I needed that more than I needed more stroking. Best decision I ever made. But the irony is that I probably would have been more famous, had I gone to the other place. Money never entered into the conversation until it was time. We figure out ways to pay for what’s important, and I did. But I also got some generous scholarship. Somehow.

So about the only new model I can offer here is a change of thought, idealistic though it may seem. While I'd be a fool not to acknowledge the bonus of getting a scholarship, a choice of college is about what’s available there, not how much discount you receive to discover it. It’s about following passions. It’s about earning a seat at the table of self-discovery, not at the mythical table of guaranteed success.

Franck-ly speaking, Part XII: Fantaisie in C

This is the twelfth and final installment in a series on my take on playing the twelve large works of César Franck. Today’s topic is the Fantaisie in C. See the first post in the series for background information.

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This is the first of the big twelve that Franck published. Clearly it is also the most primitive. You can see him trying to expand things, which he did in spades in the next piece, the Grande Pièce Symphonique. Here we have a mini-symphony, three short movements played without pause.

Measures 7-8, 11-12, 47-48: Those hairpins should be tiny. Listen carefully to the effects there. All Franck had to do was tap a bit on his spring-loaded swell lever, and the box would swell and shut in a short moment.

Measures 17-40: The canon should sound the same in both voices. Don’t make one voice linger for the other; each has to carry its own baggage!

Measures 29-40: The right-hand melody is a counter-melody. I would make its contour fit in with the canon still going on in the other voices. In other words, don’t dwell on this melody at the expense of the more structural activity going on under it.

Measures 58, 60: Keep counting. No fermatas.

Measure 73: I would be very conservative with the box and the fermata here. It’s only a half-cadence, not a sandwich break!

Measures 82 and 162: I would suggest that after the fermata, cut off the chord in tempo. That would help propel the melody into the next measure.

Measures 213-end: No 32-foot stop? Play the entire Pedal part an octave lower. (Interesting that Franck wrote it the way he did, as if he knew it could be an option to play it 8vb.) But then you’ll need to figure out what to do about that low B in 233. Look around and see if you’d like to move to the tenor range for more than just that one note. For example, you might play loco from 229 and then switch back to 8vb from the third beat of 233.

And with that, Franck’s first piece has been covered last in this series. And his Final was covered first. There is nothing dramatic about any of that – I just learned and wrote about the pieces in the order I wanted to!

Help Yourself XVI: Last ones

Here are the last free offerings from my little cache of re-harmonizations and other works. As with all works in this tagged series, you are welcome to click, print, and use freely.

DIADEMATA

FAITHFULNESS with descant

HANOVER

LYONS

Franck-ly speaking, Part XI: Grande Pièce Symphonique

This is the eleventh and penultimate installment in a series on my take on playing the twelve large works of César Franck. Today’s topic is the Grande Pièce Symphonique. See the first post in the series for background information.

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I love that cop-out title Franck came up with. He was trying to help the organ grow up as a recital instrument, and he composed here what became the French prototype of the solo organ Symphony. And the best he could come up with for a title was “Big Symphonic Piece.” I just love that.

This piece (the GPS in my casual references) seems to be the most experimental piece Franck wrote. It continues an idea of short, multiple movements played without pause, which he explored in his first published organ piece, the Fantaisie in C, which I cover last in this series). The GPS is the only one of its kind in Franck’s output, and it was early in his oeuvre, yet it was in a new style that his successors seized on and took the organ world by storm with. Because it is so experimental, it is full of…uh…experiments. Franck was testing this idea here, that idea there, pulling here, pushing there. As a result, this twenty-some-minute piece is absolutely full of melodic fragments, repeated ideas, and expanding formal structure. The greatest danger lies in all the fermatas (of which I count 23, an average of one every 25 measures, plus an additional 7 instances of Franck writing a pause via extended rests without fermatas). Franck is constantly coming to a halt here, pausing there, lingering there. The piece is much like an improvisation, an approach to which could be a life-changing experience. The number of fermatas is not excessive, but I have heard performances where we could order pizza during the pauses! And so if you’re not careful, this piece could end up sounding like a glorified organ demonstration, which would kill not only the piece but also the listener.

Technical difficulties aside, the GPS is so motivic and fragmented that it may represent the biggest musical challenge of the entire series. I have performed this piece only once. I learned it in college in 1990 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of Franck’s death. My teacher and the studio were able to perform all twelve works in three recitals during a wonderful weekend of study of French music for organ and for organ and brass. I also wrote a paper on this piece in grad school. I was using it in a Grundgestalt analysis, as well as a complete formal analysis. (Made an A+ on it. Still have that paper, of course.) But I have not been moved to re-present the piece in public since then, until I started on my way through all twelve pieces. It’s a tough piece to pull off due to the difficulties discussed above, and I have never been satisfied with live performances I have heard, so I have been slow to try my hand at it as a professional.

This piece is long, but it recycles themes. Therefore, it might help you (and your listeners) if you have an overarching goal in mind. Decide exactly where you want the piece to make its thesis statement. There are several choices, such as the first appearance of the main theme in 64, the re-visitation of all primary themes beginning in 424, the only appearance of the main theme in major mode beginning at 472, or the tenor solo suggesting a Tuba (which Franck didn’t have) beginning in 540. In any event, if you can keep looking ahead (or back) to the “thesis” you define for the piece and keep fermata overload in check, your audience will survive it better.

Beginning: This is not the main theme. It’s a “stitching” theme that introduces the whole piece here and ties various sections together later. Because it is important background but not primary foreground, don’t dwell on it too much; the real meal will arrive in 64! Nevertheless, this introduction has some beautiful moments in it – measures 43-56 are perfectly ravishing.

Opening registration: You may need to adjust registration to make the melody audible.

Measure 6: This, too, is introductory material, but it will be elevated in status later on by being given its own intermezzo of sorts beginning in 192.

Measure 25: The introductory theme finally gets to roll along without stopping. If you discover that you tend to move the tempo here, then consider using that same tempo at the very beginning, at least as a subtle background guide to everything up to this point.

Measures 35-41: Be sure the left hand and Pedal trade off evenly, without blurring or breaks between notes, and without changes in tempo.

Measure 60: Franck says non troppo e maestoso!! Sometimes I want to stand up and say that aloud in live performances.

Measure 64: Notice that Franck is notating in exact rhythms what later composers would do with staccato marks, with the directive in their teaching and publications that staccato notes to the French organist are simply (and exactly) half-value. Since Franck uses exact notation, then the more exactly those notes and rests are presented, the better.

Measures 70, 90, 100, 123, 131: You’ll need to decide for yourself if you want to separate those half notes like the separated eighth notes and eighth rests throughout the rest of this main theme. I can go either way and have no biased advice.

Measures 113-117: Be sure all cutoffs are consistent among the parts!

Measures 139, 141: Notice that the manuals cut off, but the Pedal continues legato.

Measures 192 and following: This might not need to go as fast as you might think. I believe that your desired tempo at 231 should guide selection of tempo for 192. Throughout this entire section, be sure the right hand stays absolutely steadfast in its rhythm. We don’t want the higher note of any given beat in the right hand to be mistaken for the beat. Cleanliness is next to godliness.

Measure 261: It is so very tempting to play this movement Largo, but he marked it Andante. The quarter note must rule the tempo, and if you trust that as you go, then the movement makes more sense. Use your preferred tempo at 277 to determine tempo at 261, and then don’t speed up in 277 just because the texture gets easier! This movement is also difficult because Franck registers the melody on a non-expressive division (at least for the organ he played regularly).

Measures 277-281, 297-301: I don’t break between manuals, but I have no objection to breaking.

Measure 303: Strange registration! Go with it and see how it sounds. Don’t take this section as fast as it looks – those sixteenth notes are not textural – they are melody! Perhaps your preferred tempo at 343 should dictate the tempo for 303.

Measures 343-374: If you discover that this section keeps slowing down, it’s probably the left hand’s fault. The initial sixteenth rest on each beat tends to get overblown after awhile, which grinds everything to a halt. A good fix is to listen to the melody and require the accompaniment to keep up, rather than try to move the accompaniment along on its own steam.

Measures 410-415: The right foot has a decision to make between lunging for each note and just breaking proudly and gently between notes. I’ll take detaching over panicking any day.

Measures 417-418: It’s rare to see an accented note in organ music (how do you execute that?). Franck could just tap his box lever open, and the box would swell and then spring shut again. You can experiment with your own swell shades and see if you can achieve the same effect. Depending on the organ, the room, and your creativity, you may be able to play the accented notes on two manuals and then release one of them before the second beat. But that seems much ado.

Measures 422-423: The Pedal notes will disappear if you don’t have some independent 8-foot stops drawn for them. (Franck doesn’t call for pedal couplers there, anyway.)

Measures 472-500: Some performers just can’t seem to play this section fast enough to suit themselves, and others of us are blue in the face from pointing out that Franck wants this theme played much more grandly than it has been up to this point. This is the only time this theme appears in major mode, and it’s in the rather grand-but-dark key of F-sharp. I beg you – don’t confuse this section with the Sowerby Pageant! You can pick a faster tempo at 502.

Measures 540-569: The left hand part in this section begs for a solo party horn of some sort (which Franck didn’t have). But if you do and it’s not too brash, go for it. I recommend playing it through the downbeat of 570 and then moving off of it.

Measures 582- 587: Legato pedal and detached manuals seems instinctive to a lot of players. Go with your instincts.

Measure 592: Those three beats of rest bother me. I’m always afraid someone will mistake them for the end and start to applaud. On the other hand, the piece is over, and so I had better prepare those rests perfectly. The choice of tempo from 582 will be very important for pacing through 592 and for proclaiming that the piece really is over.

Measures 593-594: Franck’s voicing of those chords has been discussed by others. They are indeed strange, and it can leave the listener wondering if it’s really over. I do not advocate adding extra notes to “fill things out.” I believe your handling of all that has come before will be crucial toward making this last page make sense and concluding this most epic of all of Franck’s organ pieces.

In search of new models, Part I: Models explained

My thinking on some matters has changed. It did not come about gradually; it hit me in an instant, like a rogue baseball.

I’ll begin my explanation with a confession: I have been bitter for years. I have been bitter about not winning that competition (nor that one), not getting that job (nor that one), not being invited to play here (nor there), not being invited to join that roster (nor that one), not being invited to play for that conference (nor that one in my own backyard). I have been bitter about being treated like the hired help here or like a novice there. I have been bitter about the publicity for one of my recordings being completely bungled out of my control.

But one day I partook of the perfect cocktail of a readiness to understand mixed with talking to one person who understands these kinds of things better than anyone else.

In my profession, some things don’t work the way they should. Some things never worked in the first place. Some things have evolved into serving too few people to be of any continuing service to the rest of the community. This series will discuss some disserviceable models in organ/musical-related matters of teaching, job searching, advertising, performing, career management, and conventions.

It’s easy to look around outside our own profession and notice that some things have changed. Flight attendants are no longer respected as the in-flight authorities and well-trained safety agents they have always been. Physicians used to be respected as the final word in a patient’s healthcare. Professors used to be listened to as authorities in their field and as real-world resources; nowadays they are treated as degree dispensers and viewed suspiciously as greedy participants in that radical agenda known as higher education.

Chalk it all up to a loss of respect of authority and crumbling of decent society? Sure. But it’s also not helpful that many of those flight attendants, physicians, and professors are waiting around for things to get better, for things to get back to how they used to be. Waiting is passive and therefore futile. We should do something to command the respect we still deserve, right?

Not so fast. As soon as the professor seeks to instill the old sense of respect in the student by insisting that the student stop being late to class and stop being sloppy with assignments, the student cries persecution to someone in authority. As soon as the physician tells a noncompliant patient, in the old way, to get off his backside and change his own situation, the patient moves on to another doc and spreads the word that Physician A lacks compassion. As soon as the flight attendant enforces the rules with a recalcitrant passenger, she gets labeled as grumpy and unprofessional, and it ends up in some online evaluation (that only the bitter read, apparently).

The old ways appear to be ... old. "Their" model and "our" model may not match up any more.

Well, so now what do we do about it? We need more common ground between old ways and new possibilities. We need more win-wins.

We can seduce people.

Seduce them into doing better. Seduce them into wanting to learn more, into contemplating change, into considering the big picture. Appeal to their passions and not to their waywardness. This series is about passions, serving the greater good, channeling what makes us tick, and helping others do the same.

Undergirding the series will be the idea of changing models. There are some old models of doing things that we would be well served to stop chasing. We can do something new with some of those models, something that seduces an old modeler to join you and move things along more serviceably for many more people. I have no advice for the physician or the flight attendant, but we professors, performers, accompanists, and conductors are in for an even rougher ride if we don’t make some changes ourselves.

The point of examining my bitterness is that I discovered the common ground among all those things that anger me. Once I discovered that my bitterness was coming from mismatched models and goals, the bitterness evaporated instantly and I was able to see things differently and start changing my approaches. My bitterness had been aimed at people, but I realized that every time I revisited an old grudge, I saw that both of us had been chasing a disserviceable model in the first place. The very moment I realized it, I just walked away from the bitterness and started fresh.

Sour grapes? No, more like recognizing my own grapes. Sure, I would have enjoyed achieving some things along the way that I’ve seen others achieve with less effort and sometimes less talent. But it was a most liberating moment when I realized that I wasn’t going to (or wasn’t willing to) achieve some things in the old ways. Real satisfaction in what I’m doing will come more readily when I’m no longer chasing outdated models.

To be continued.

Little-known facts, Part 4: My ecclesiastical history

Born Southern Baptist, Front Street Baptist Church, Statesville, N.C. The organ was a 1971 Greenwood, 9 ranks. But it was a pipe organ!

First organ gig: Supply Organist, First A.R. Presbyterian, Statesville, N.C. The organ was a thrilling (to a young kid in those days) Zimmer. With exposed pipes and everything! In Statesville, N.C.!

First Mass played: Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, 1985 or so, St. Philip the Apostle, Statesville.

First Episcopal Eucharist played: Trinity Church, Statesville, 1983 or so.

First regular church job: Junior year in college, 1988-1989, Crossnore Presbyterian, Crossnore, N.C. Eminent organ.

Next regular church job: Senior year in college, 1989-1990, Boone United Methodist Church, Boone, N.C. Schantz organ, 17 ranks. The largest pipe organ in a church in the county. And I had the keys to the building. I felt like the hottest thing on two legs.

Next: Grad school, 1990-1994: St. John the Divine (Episcopal), Houston. I was the Assistant Organist/Choirmaster to Richard Forrest Woods and then to John Gearhart. I was confirmed there by William Sterling, Bishop Suffragan of Texas. Have been an Episcopalian ever since. Big Wicks organ that played a mighty service on full-ish organ but had no individually lovely sounds on it. It has since been replaced by an enormous Letourneau.

Next: 1994-1995: Interim Organist/Choirmaster, Episcopal Church of the Holy Spirit, Houston. Not the happiest time. I felt like Bach returning home from the north and no one knew quite what to make of him. The people and I just didn’t gee-haw very well, and I still don’t know why, but I’m sure it was my fault. Young guy quitting the biggest Episcopal church in town to set out on his own and see what might come along? Yeah, that might be part of it. I also did a bit of battle with tendonitis (Visser-Rowland organ there, as well as a ten-key data entry job to make ends meet), but that was the turning point in my organ playing, because I honed my technique to eliminate the pain. It worked; the pain has never returned, and I did it without medical intervention except Aleve.

Next: 1995-1997: Organist, St. Philip Presbyterian Church. A turning point in my understanding of people, the Church, and myself. One of the most nurturing congregations I have encountered. God love them all. Fort/Visser-Rowland organ, electric action. A rather smooth sound that was oddly endearing. The organ has since been replaced by a perfectly splendid Fritts.

Next: 1997-2004: First Presbyterian, Houston. This was my last church before moving back to N.C. to teach at Appalachian. Also the longest I have served a church (7 years). And so my history there is rich and complicated, but during my time there, I learned a lot about the ins and outs of church politics, air conditioner breakdowns, organ maintenance, choral conducting, and chilling out [not!] over liturgical faux-pas and snafus. I also presided over the most beautiful organs in the state of Texas: Aeolian-Skinner Opp. 912 and 912A.

Next: 2009-2011: First Presbyterian, Lenoir, N.C. Aeolian-Skinner. I left this church because I got too busy on the road, where I really wanted to be anyway. I composed this blog post about my thinking at the time.

Next? Although I joyfully sub around, I have maintained for a few years that I can’t cram regular church service into my teaching and performing schedule any more. But I’m beginning to soften on that stance. Let’s check in with each other on that later.