Issue 14 - The Augsburg Organ Library

You'll all be happy to know that Bonnie Corron will be at the St. John's organ bench this weekend. Thanks to Bonnie for giving us an opportunity to hear her again! Since Bonnie will be preparing something great for this week's prelude and postlude, I thought I'd take this opportunity to share with you an exciting aspect of my work at St. John's.

Part of my compensation as organist is a music allowance. I've never before had the luxury of a music allowance (except from my parents when I was young!) --- so this is a great gift, especially since scores are so very expensive.

So, how to spend it? Buying just one Bach score (of the highly esteemed Barenreiter edition) can cost upwards of $50. It's such a dilemma, trying to get good value and also good music. As it happens, I'm already close to owning all 9 volumes of the Bach, but it didn't seem like that would be the best way to use the churches money anyhow. (I mean, I'd love to play Bach every Sunday, but maybe not everyone wants to hear Bach every Sunday!)

Earlier this spring, I came across "The Augsburg Organ Library". Published by our ELCA publishing house Augsburg Fortress, "The Augsburg Organ Library" is a collection of 9 volumes of organ music containing mostly hymn-based repertoire. Each volume is dedicated to different seasons/occasions of the church year (Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Summer, Baptism & Communion, Autumn and November).

Once I started researching the composers and music contained in the volumes, I knew that this would be a great resource of music for our St. John's organ. I went wild and bought 4 volumes! I just counted eight pieces that I've already played from the "Augsburg Organ Library" as preludes & postludes. The variety of composers include Vaughan-Williams, Rutter, Manz, Mark Sedio (who's hosting a Hymn Festival at St. John's next spring!), and many more. What a treasure that Augsburg Fortress would put together such an outstanding collection for us organists!

So, thank you to the members of St. John's. What a treat to have a music allowance to buy great music for our worship services! Thank you, thank you, thank you!

(Image: Augsburg Publishing House, Minneapolis, 1891.)

Issue 13 - Third of Three

The organ music this Sunday helps us celebrate Pentecost - don't forget to wear red! The prelude is by Dieterich Buxtehude (1637-1707) who was organist in Lübeck and the postlude is by our great Lutheran ancestor, J. S. Bach (1685-1750). There's a great story that all organists love about Bach's admiration of Buxtehude. In 1673, Buxtehude helped bring to national prominence his Abendmusik (meaning: evening music), which was a series of concerts paid for by local businesses, and therefore free to the public. In 1705, Bach (who, at that time, was a young twenty-year-old working in Arnstadt) walked nearly 250 miles to Lübeck to hear Abendmusik and hear the great organist Buxtehude. He stayed there for three months to learn from the master.

Come, Holy Ghost, Lord God (LBW 163) is the tune upon which Buxtehude's chorale-prelude is based. Although modern Lutherans may not know the tune anymore - it's a Lutheran favorite upon which many composers wrote chorale-preludes. Buxtehude's setting employs vorimitation which literally means "imitation before". The accompanying left hand usually gives a hint of the chorale melody to come by improvising on the tune, creating a gracious overture to the entrance of the highly ornamented melody which is played on a brighter sound in right hand. Vorimitation is a technique that's been passed down through the ages (you may notice that I use vorimitation when improvising on hymns during communion).

The hymn tune upon which the postlude is based is Come, Holy Ghost, Our Souls Inspire (LBW 473). This German hymn is a metered version of the famous Pentecost plainchant Veni, Creator Spiritus (LBW 472). (At 8:45, both offering and communion music happens to be based upon this chant). In Bach's setting, the melody is declared twice: first in the soprano line and then again in the pedal line. In the first, soprano statement of the melody we get a glimpse of how Bach illuminates the Holy Spirit in the music:

1.) The meter is 12/8. So, while the melody is in dotted quarter notes, the accompanying voices underneath are essentially triplets. While this gives a gigue-like feel to the piece, it also symbolizes the Holy Trinity.

2.) The accompanying alto and tenor voice are mostly in 3rds throughout, once again underscoring not only the Trinity - but also the 3rd person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit.

3.) Finally, the pedal line only plays on every third eighth note. This clearly accentuates the relationship of the Holy Spirit within the Trinity.

In the second iteration of the melody, the accompaniment in the hands has been interpreted as tongues of fire whirling above the heavy hymn tune in the pedal. Again, Bach uses three voices to create the fiery accompaniment. While Bach's music is so challenging to play, the rewards are great --- not just in music, but in spirit, too!

(Image: "Pentecost" by Dr. P. Solomon RAJ)

Issue 12 - Not all canons are rounds!

This Sunday's prelude is based upon the sermon hymn, LBW 206, "Lord, Who the Night You Were Betrayed". The hymn tune was composed by Orlando Gibbons (1583-1625), a famous composer and organist at Westminster Abbey and the Chapel Royal. David Cherwien composed the organ chorale prelude based upon that tune.

This prelude setting of the hymn is a canon. While the right hand plays a soft accompaniment of running triplets, the left hand and pedal play the melody of the hymn in canon. It's a really beautiful arrangement, very peaceful - and the canon creates a delicate duet between the left hand and pedal.

So - what is a canon? Most simply put - a canon has a melodic leader and a imitating follower. The leader (in this case, the left hand) begins "singing" the melody and follower (in this case, the pedal) sings the same melody but one measure later. We've all sung rounds like "Row, row, row your boat"... well, a round is the simplest form of a canon. In a round, the follower voices sing the exact same melody as the leader... round and round it goes. All rounds are canons.

However, NOT all canons are rounds. Canons can be much more complicated than rounds. For instance, in a canon, the melody may repeat at an interval four or five notes higher than the original melody. Or a canon may have the follower invert the melody (meaning that if the leader sings five climbing notes, the follower would sing five descending notes instead). Or a canon can be in retrograde (meaning that the follower would sing the melody backwards!). The crab canon is where the leader and follower sing at the same time but the follower is in retrograde. Mensuration canons are where the follower's melody may be lengthened or shortened by some proportion of the original (for instance, quarter notes might become half notes for the follower).

Of course I had to write some canons while in school. It is NOT easy. To compose a melody that's beautiful and interesting, but will also work in canon is quite difficult. And to compose a canon that would work in inversion, retrograde, mensuration --- well, I don't think I ever succeeded in writing one of those!

Composers of the Renaissance (like Gibbons) embraced the challenge of canons and even enjoyed writing what are known as Puzzle Canons. This is where only the leader's melody is written. The composer will then give a clue as to what kind of canon to perform. In Guillaume Dufay's mass L'homme Armé, he gives the clue: Cancer eat plenis et redeat medius (Let the crab proceed full and return half). So, the melody is first performed in full note values and retrograde (since it's a crab), then in halved values and retrograde (which would mean forward motion since retrograde of retrograde would be forward).

No worries, the prelude is a simple canon. You'll easily be able to discern the imitating melody. In fact, one phrase of the melody doesn't work in canon without becoming extremely dissonant --- so Cherwien just breaks away from the canon and sets it in chorale style. Once that phrase is over, it's back to the canon to end the piece. Enjoy!

(Image: "Crab Canon" by M.C. Escher)

Issue 11 - Charming sonatas from an austere father!

The second movement of J. S. Bach's Third Sonata for organ, marked Adagio e dolce (translation: at ease and sweet), is this Sunday's prelude. A few short years after assuming his post in Leipzig at Thomaskirche, Bach wrote six sonatas for the organ. They are affectionately known by organists as "The Trio Sonatas" - accurately nicknamed "trios" because the sonatas have just a three-voice texture (pedal, left hand & right hand playing each just a single line).

If you haven't ever heard any of Bach's Trio Sonatas, then I think you'll really enjoy these. They are very accessible for the listener - for those who find Bach difficult to listen to or hard to understand, I would highly recommend a CD of the Trio Sonatas because of their chamber-music quality. Peter Williams, in "The Organ Music of J. S. Bach", aptly describes this virtue which makes the Sonatas so delightful:

"...[the melodies] are even less like most other organ music. Rarely if ever would such a melody be found suitable for a chorale prelude or for any of the usual fugue types ...the quality of the melody suggests either a kind of sparkling, witty line or a somewhat plaintive melodiousness, both of them charming and curiously abstract."

While I would recommend The Trio Sonatas to the beginning Bach-listener... I would NOT recommend The Trio Sonatas to the beginning organist! Any sort of trio on the organ is notoriously difficult. The reason? The organist must engage one hand on each manual and both feet in equal skill. No room for error here... the texture is so thin and the composition so aptly exploits the device of imitation that just a slip in concentration can derail the entire piece - bringing the charming music to a disastrous halt! Most concert organists won't perform a Trio Sonata in public unless they've played them for years in private! (I'm playing a slow movement, so hopefully I can hold my concentration during it.)

J. S. Bach dedicated the Trio Sonatas to his eldest son, Wilhelm Friedemann Bach (1710-1784), who went on to become a great organist in his own right. Obviously his father knew the best regimen of compositions his son should practice. Of course, it was a running joke at school among the organists --- how much did Bach really love his son if he composed these impossible pieces for him to learn?

The postlude on Sunday is the Sinfonia from Bach's Cantata No. 29 - it was arranged for organ by Robert Hebble. This is a postlude that I hope to play at least once a year --- so I'll write more about it the next time I play it. The title of Cantata No. 29 is "We Thank Thee, God" - and the joyful character of the Sinfonia is fitting for that title.

(Image: Wilhelm Friedemann Bach)

Issue 10 - Shaped Notes

The prelude this Sunday was composed by David Cherwien (music director of the National Lutheran Choir as well as a founding member of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians). The piece is based upon the opening hymn "I Come with Joy". This tune was not in our green or blue hymnals --- I'm really happy to see that it made its way into Evangelical Lutheran Worship (our new "cranberry" hymnal). All hymns have a tune name. For instance, the hymn "All Creatures of Our God and King" has a tune name of "Lasst uns erfreuen". This is because different texts can be set to "Lasst uns erfreuen" --- on Easter Sunday, we sang the text "Now All the Vault of Heav'n Resounds" to that tune. "I Come with Joy" has a tune name of "Dove of Peace". The middle staff in the picture above shows the tune (now you can practice it before Sunday!)

Notice anything strange about it? What's that you say? You've never sung notes that have shapes like triangles and squares before?

Well, welcome to shaped-note singing! You've probably heard of solfege (do re mi fa sol la ti do) or at least you remember being taught it by Julie Andrews in The Sound of Music. Well, solfege originates with Guido d'Arezzo in the late First Century. Shaped-notes came along in America in the early 1800's as a written method to correspond with these syllables. For instance, what we know as "do" is the backwards-looking triangle, and so on.

The tune "Dove of Peace" was first published in The Southern Harmony, and Musical Companion in 1835 (now known mostly just as Southern Harmony). It was compiled by the great Baptist song leader William "Singin' Billy" Walker. Walker's description on the book is "A Choice Collection of Tunes, Hymns, Psalms, Odes and Anthems, selected from the most eminent authors in the United States and well adapted to Christian Churches of every denomination, singing schools and private societies." Walker pretty much makes it sound like this is the be-all, end-all hymnal! And truly, it was! This hymnal is the greatest collection of American Folk Tunes yet compiled and is an important document for our nation - as well as for our churches. That we have such an outstanding collection of our early folk tunes (numbering 300 plus!) is an American treasure. Just thirty short years after its first printing, Walker boasted that over 600,000 copies had been sold... we'll see how quickly that happens with the ELW!!!

The postlude this Sunday is a festive Fanfare by Jacques Lemmens. I'll write about it next time I play it!

(Image: "Dove of Peace" from Southern Harmony, and Musical Companion by William Walker)