By Vidas Pinkevicius So you have been sitting on the organ bench during the Communion and wondering what to do at the end of one hymn when there's still time for another?
Of course, you could finish it and start the new one from top. But that's not very musical, isn't it? Why not connect the two hymns with the modulating interlude? Here's one possible scenario: 1. Play the last line of Hymn #1 in the Tonic key on the main manual. 2. Play it in the relative key on the secondary manual. 3. Play the first line of the Hymn #2 in the relative key of the new hymn on the secondary manual. NOTE: If the keys in Steps 2 and 3 are not at all related, you may need to end the phrase of Step 2 with the Enharmonic modulation to the key of Step 3. 4. Play it in the Tonic key of this hymn but finish on the Dominant chord on the secondary manual. 5. Start Hymn #2 on the main manual. Try it this Sunday at church and let me know how it went.
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By Vidas Pinkevicius The process of selecting candidates for an organist position in a church or cathedral is a fairly complex one. In fact, it has undergone significant changes and improvements over the ages.
Remember the 17th century, when Dieterich Buxtehude lived? The guy had to marry a previous organist's Franz Tunder's daughter when he applied at St. Mary's in Lubeck. As much as we love the toccatas of Buxtehude or chorale fantasias of Tunder, that would be a problem, wouldn't it? "Oh John, we loved how you've accompanied the hymns on our organ. If you would just marry the daughter of our Suzy, you could start playing for us the next Sunday." What if the guy was already married and wanted to apply for an organist's job? "Hey John, how did you do during your interview?" "It went well, thanks, Martha. They loved my organ playing skills. That sight-reading test they put me through was a piece of cake. Oh, and by the way, I'll be moving to another town and living with another woman". "What? Why do you want to leave me?" "I'm sorry, dear, I need this 5 manual Kimball. I'm sick and tired of playing those Pachelbel manualiter fughettes. Then I could do some serious Reger stuff." And what sort of classes would you need to take in college or conservatory to meet the requirements of the committee? A fix-up dating class? A family management class? A dealing-with-the-envy-of-former-colleague-organist-who-is-also-your-father-in-law-class? Now the process of selecting an organist is less painful. "Well John, our former organist liked to use too much pedal work and registration changes in his playing so much so that people couldn't talk to each other during preludes and postludes. We need you to blend in. Play with white keys on week-days and on black keys on Sundays and holidays." Good organists want to change themselves.
My goal is to master pedal playing. I want to be able to play major works of Bach fluently. I want to be able to sight-read any kind of hymn setting that is in front of me. Great organists want to change their congregations. My aim is to help my congregation sing better together with the organ. I want my organ playing to be appreciated by my listeners. I wish my congregation (and my boss) would understand the value of the historical organ our church has and take action towards restoring it. Remarkable organists want to change the world around them. I want the people I interact with would see opportunities where others see problems. I want the people I meet would be inspired to take a risk. I want the people who trust me to choose their own path. What kind of organist would you like to become? What kind of organist would you like to work with? What kind of organist would you want to hire? Lots of church musicians are pianists. Their churches might have organs but their instruments are piano. They probably have a fairly well-developed finger technique and an extensive experience playing piano. What they lack is of course organ-specific skills such as pedal playing, hand and feet coordination, articulation, and coordination of releases among others.
A cure for pianists trying to play the organ would depend on their goals. Some of them might want to learn to play hymns in church while others - original organ compositions. There are also pianists who would love to learn to improvise on the organ as well. Of course, there is a considerable overlap in people dreams - some people who would want to learn hymn playing would love to play organ music as well. Would-be improvisers might also love to learn to play original organ compositions of classical organ masters. Here's a cure for pianists who want to learn to master hymn playing: Take your favorite hymnal and begin learning to play the hymns with pedals. It's best if you practice parts separately first, especially the pedal line. When you can fluently play the pedal line, play two and three part combinations before attempting to play all parts together in a slow tempo. For pianists who want to learn to play original organ music: Find easy but quality collections of organ music and learn a few pieces that you like or that fits best the liturgical season of the church year. Make sure you also learn very systematically step by step in a slow tempo. Try to avoid the temptation to play pieces from the beginning to the end without correcting mistakes and all parts together right away. In most cases, you would still have to go back and learn the pieces the right way and develop correct organ practice habits. Learning the pieces correctly in the first place will save you from a lot of frustration in the future. For pianists whose goal is to learn to improvise on the organ for the liturgy: Start anywhere. Literally. Just choose a theme (a hymn or your own melody), a mood which would work for a specific place within the liturgy, meter, mode, key, texture, and registration and improvise something interesting. Nobody will tell you what to do or how to do it or that you made a mistake. It's your improvisation. The only thing that matters is that you set your goal to be this: to keep the listener transfixed with your playing and that it would fit the liturgy of today. It's important to understand the differences from the piano and organ and learn new skill sets that any organist need to be successful. Regardless of your goals in organ playing, you can use the existing hymns, organ compositions or your own improvisations to acquire organ playing skills which you can later use in church service playing. Have you ever been to a church service only to discover that you really can predict how the next hymn will be played? What kind of texture, disposition of parts, registration, articulation, and even the introductions? Perhaps you play this way yourself? This and other situations are myths that don't have to be true. They only remove the joy of musical experiments and discoveries from the service playing which makes organist feel that he or she is a cog in a machine and not an artist. Here they are:
1. Number of parts in hymn playing is four. No, you can choose any number of parts between 1 and 6. 2. Disposition of parts is SATB. No, any voice can be placed in any part, even the soprano. 3. The part in the pedal can only be the bass. No, treat your feet like an extra hand and play any part you want. Even the soprano. Especially the soprano. 4. Rests between the phrases are only for breathing. No, you can add flourishes and runs of any kind between the phrases (just like Bach when he returned from his study with Buxtehude). 5. Registration is principal chorus with mixtures. No, depending on the size of the congregation and the meaning of the particular stanza of the hymn, you can choose a wide variety of combinations from flutes, principals, mutations, and reeds. 6. Articulation is legato. For hymns created after 1800's, yes, it's best to play legato but for earlier hymns - use articulate legato touch (smooth, singing style - not too choppy, emphasize the meter - the alternation of strong and weak beats). 7. Introduction for the hymn can only be the first or the last phrase of the hymn. No, you can create anything you want for an introduction, even a short 3 part fughetta or the choral prelude (if the time allows). Remember Bach's Orgelbuchlein? Bonus Myth 1: You should always use classical tonal harmony in harmonizing hymns. No, on special occasions, you can surprise your congregation by harmonizing a hymn in chords containing seconds, fourths, fifths, tritones, and even modal harmony as well as jazz chords. Bonus Myth 2: The style of hymn playing should always be chordal. No, you can make use of polyphony as well - make the parts more independent. You don't have to believe these myths, if you want to make your hymn playing and church service playing in general much more creative, brave, and rewarding. Instead always ask yourself, "why am I doing this or that, why am I playing this hymn this way?" and try to challenge yourself with: "What if...?" Sure, not everyone in your congregation is going to like the change in your playing but you are not trying to please everyone. It's not your job. Your job is to explore the boundaries, what works and what doesn't. Your job is to be an agent of change. Let the people take part in your explorations, communicate with them why are you doing this. Then some of them will gratefully cheer you on and become true evangelists for your cause. Don't be afraid to do something that matters to you. They didn't like Bach's hymn playing in Arnstadt after he came back from his study with Buxtehude after that Christmas of 1705 either... Will writes that his dream in organ playing is to play the organ music of Bach well. When he was a teen-ager, his organ teacher introduced him to the Orgelbuchlein, and he fell in love with it. He would like to go back to that, and expand his playing into the preludes, fugues, and other chorales. The most important challenge which holds him back from achieving this dream is finding time to practice.
I’m sure that Will, along with my other readers who want to learn to play the music of Bach at some point will find at least some time for practice. As far as I know, for most people at least 15 minutes a day is something they can deal with (perhaps even more on the weekends). More serious obstacle is to decide what to do with that time. Therefore, a challenge which we all will face will be that very soon we will come to such a time in practice when we leave our familiar territory. Crossing the threshold to the unknown and risky state is something that is unavoidable for every curious organist because if you want to achieve anything worth achieving (learn a new piece of Bach, master articulation for his style, or compile a repertoire of various Bach’s preludes, fugues, and chorale preludes to play in church service or recital) you will have to pass beyond your comfort zone. Beyond what you have learned before and how you learned before. If your goal was within your comfort zone, you would have achieved it by now (and that wouldn’t be a very lofty goal). It will feel strange to find yourself in a situation at the instrument when you notice that if you learn these 4 new measures the correct way or analyze a piece in depth or play with articulate legato touch, your mind will tell you that this is something you are not sure will work. Something which you are not sure you can endure much longer. One part of your mind will tell you to stop while the other – to pursue your goal. If you continue to listen to your “adventurous” mind, quite soon you can look back to discover that really you are entering into unfamiliar waters. You won’t know what to expect. You won’t know what’s around the corner. You won’t know at which two-part combination you will be stuck. You won’t know, if that pedaling in extreme edges of the pedalboard you wrote in will work in a fast tempo. You won’t know how you will feel during live run-through at church service or recital. But your curious mind will want to find that out. Because your curious mind is what keeps you on the edge. Because your curious mind can’t wait to see where it all leads. Because your curious mind has helped you to achieve something remarkable in the past. Because your current comfort zone can be expanded and it will still feel and be save. Not by a leap or a jump but by one little step at a time. Will you dare to take that step? Sight-reading: Part I: Vivace from the Trio Sonata No. 2 in C minor, BWV 526 by J.S. Bach Hymn playing: Oh, Blest the House Are you disappointed by your church position? Is your job becoming boring to you?Of course, you may have some perfectly legitimate reasons to feel that way, but very often there is a bright side in this also. In order to help people feel better about church organist's routine, I'm going to explain why church organists are privileged among musicians.
Every Sunday an organist has to go to church, sit down on the organ bench and play something - a few hymns, choral accompaniments, or even real organ compositions or improvisations during church service. Other musicians, such as pianists don't have this opportunity to play in public regularly, this is unique for organists. I don't know of many other professions who have built-in possibilities for public performance. This might be stressful at times, but every Sunday you show up and play something. You could treat this as a burden but you could also view it as a unique and privileged situation for you to grow as an organist and as a musician in general about which I talk in this video. Organists who have some experience in ear training are at the advantage than those who don't. People with perfect pitch and advanced skill at analyzing musical scores can appreciate the compositions at a much deeper level. If you have never had a formal musical education or your education happened a long time ago, you can start improving your musicality and ear training today. In fact, it is possible to combine both ear training and organ practice. In this article, I will give you tips on how to achieve this.
One of the best ways for organists to integrate ear training exercises into their organ practice is to try to play polyphonic music, such as chorale preludes while singing one part and playing the others. For best results, do not double the voice that you are singing on the instrument. If you are new to such practice, take a really slow tempo at first. Aim for at least 3 correct repetitions of each version. If you make a mistake, stop and go back a few measures, and correct them 3 times in a row. Remember that you don't have to play and sing all parts together right away. To make this practice fun and easy, you can first sing each line of the piece without the help of an organ. Then practice 2 voices (one singing and the other playing). Later proceed to 3 parts and finally, learn all 4 parts (singing each line and playing 3 others). Singing separate parts while playing is a strenuous exercise but quite indispensable for a real education of musician. In fact, students sing this way in ear training classes. Of course, at the beginning they only sing one voice but from about 3rd year they start to practice exercises in two voices which are notated on one staff. They sing one voice and play the other and vice versa. With time the exercises get more advanced, melodies are notated in two staves, and the bass clef is introduced. The musical language gets more chromatic, with tonicizations, modulations, complex rhythms and time signatures. From about 9th year into ear training students start to sing in various C clefs. From the 10th year 3-part and 4-part writing is introduced. At the end of air training course, people start to sing polyphonic 3-part and 4-part compositions, which are basically excerpts from fugues. It probably seems like a huge amount of exercise material and it really is. The best way not to get overwhelmed by the complexity of music education is to aim low and set manageable goals. Focus on small achievements but practice regularly. And remember that with each step you master you move closer to your goal one step at a time. By the way, do you want to learn to play the King of Instruments - the pipe organ? If so, download my FREE video guide: "How to Master Any Organ Composition" in which I will show you my EXACT steps, techniques, and methods that I use to practice, learn and master any piece of organ music. |
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Drs. Vidas Pinkevicius and Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene Organists of Vilnius University , creators of Secrets of Organ Playing. Our Hauptwerk Setup:
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