Subject: Adventures in Creative Futility: Organ Lesson 25 and 3 1/2 Easter Services in 6 hours Date: Sun, 12 Apr 1998 14:27:43 -0700 To: {The Adventures in Creative Futility Network} Ladies and Gentlemen, Maestras and Maestros: Yesterday, I had my twenty-fifth organ lesson, and had to keep a lid on it, as the Rector, Deacon, Altar Guild, and various volunteers were decorating for Easter, before, during, and after the lesson. No comments from the "peanut gallery," but no rotten fruit, either (but that might have simply been because the people who might have thrown it would have been the ones who had to clean up the mess). It started to rain, just before I arrived, and since I still play in street shoes, and didn't have my rubber boots with me, it was rather fortunate that we saved everything with a pedal part for close to the end of the lesson. We worked on "God, my Father, Loving Me" and "Now, my Tongue, the Myst'ry Telling" for quite a while; the progress (in part, because of my limited time and energy for practice, and the need to devote most of that to my piano class) is slow, but definite. We then worked on various pedal exercises, and finished with one of the pieces from my next piano test, a March, by Daniel Gottlob Turk, which I'm still sight-reading. Trying it on my makeshift lash-up at home, it seemed to want a full Prestant chorus, with mutation and mixture, for both hands, but in a church full of people trying to decorate for Easter, that was kind of out of the question. This morning, I managed to get to three complete Easter services, in three different churches, in three different denominations, and about the last forty per cent of another, in six hours. First, the 6:30 Sunrise Service at University United Methodist. The original plan was to hold the service outdoors, but low temperatures and threatening skies convinced the Pastors and musicians to fall back to "plan B", holding the service indoors. It was remarkable mainly because Maestra Puhl sang two solos with a new headset microphone, which allowed all present (rather than just those in the "organ geeks' section) to hear her lovely voice. From there (after talking shop briefly with the Maestra, and otherwise taking time out only to grab some breakfast at McDonalds), I rushed down to Laguna Hills, for Geneva Presbyterian's 8:00 service. They had an (evidently mostly amateur) brass group for their services. Maestra McGee was playing at her best. Then, after barely enough time to say "Hello," I rushed back to Irvine, for the last 20-30 minutes of University United Methodist's 9:00 service. A very nice service, with the Widor Toccata (yes, from the fifth; what else?) as postlude. It was actually rather a good thing that I did show up; Maestra Puhl's page-turner deserted her for the biggest page-turning job of the whole service! I ended up volunteering, at the last minute, to turn pages for a piece that's far, far beyond my sight-reading ability (after the first one or two page-turns, I was following her eyes, and knew when to stand by, but she still needed to cue each page turn. I was happy (indeed, thrilled) to help, but I have little doubt that it would have been more fun to watch if I'd been far enough away to see her feet as well as her hands, and had not had to constantly stand by for page turns. Finally (after a bit more time to "talk shop"), up to Long Beach, for the 11:00 at St. Luke's. They had a professional brass quartet, and it was an Anglican service at its best. After all that, I was tired, hungry, and had a splitting headache. No rest for the pan-denominational. But I was happy. -- James H. H. Lampert http://www.hb.quik.com/jamesl