The Organist is Dead

The Catholic Herald (UK) ^ | 7/31/14 | Richard Ingrams

[marshmallow]

A great English Christian figure is in danger of dying out

The Church organist is in a strange position, half in and half out of the service – partly why I like it. In some churches, if I am lucky, I am hidden away from the vicar and the congregation, so if the service is boring I can do silent practice on the keyboard or read the psalms, helpfully reprinted at the back of the best hymn book: the English Hymnal. The other advantage, from an oldie’s point of view, is that you don’t have to keep standing up all the time.

I have never considered myself a proper organist, although I have been playing in churches for more than 50 years. I am a pianist who plays the organ, but I can’t do the pedals, which is what a proper organist has to be able to do.

My job has been little more than playing hymns, something I have always enjoyed doing so long – that is, that I am allowed to choose the hymns myself. Nowadays, when organists are in short supply, it is easier to get agreement on this point from vicars or priests. Despite my many years as a not very committed Anglican, I am a baptised Catholic and was confirmed four years ago at Douai Abbey in Berkshire, after which I became a part-time organist for a short time in a local Catholic church.

I realised then that the Church of England, which has ruined most of its churches and jettisoned its famous Book of Common Prayer still had one advantage over the Catholics in its vast repository of hymns, many of them the work of famous poets and composers. Not that that has stopped the C of E’s politically correct brigade from moving in on........

[knittnmom]

Ping for later.

[.45 Long Colt]

I love organs both at church and at St. Louis Cardinal baseball games.

Here’s the great Cardinal organist, Mr. Ernie Hays:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aygALzju9yw

[miele man]

for later read

[CrazyIvan]

I am seriously jealous. My choir director turned pages for Biggs when he was 12 and still considers it one of the high points of his life.

[Fast Moving Angel]

Contemporary “song” just turns me off.

I'm with you. Despite the "joyful noise" admonition, I don't think there's anything more out of place in a service than electric guitars and a full drum set.

[slowhandluke]

I don’t mind organ music, and can enjoy it if the organist is young enough. I’m of the belief that as older organists lose hearing in the higher ranges, they just pull out the stops a bit further to compensate. And when played like that, it sounds like someone is torturing cats. They don’t seem to hear the screams, but it can drive me from the church.

[IronJack]

It was the dedication concert for the pipe organ at Eppley Auditorium on the campus of Morningside College in Sioux City, Iowa. I was just a kid taking piano lessons and my mom thought it might inspire me to learn to play the organ as well.

It inspired me all right, but I never learned to play the organ like THAT. I’d give anything to be left alone in that auditorium for an hour after someone “mistakenly” left the engine running on that beast ...