Subject: Adventures in Creative Futility: Organ Lesson No. 27
Date: Sat, 25 Apr 1998 13:53:32 -0700
To: {The Adventures in Creative Futility Network}
Ladies and Gentlemen, Maestras and Maestros:

Big changes at St. Luke's!

    The new wiring in and around the organ is finally finished!  The
console is now fitted with several power sockets for plugging in
lights, metronomes, the tuner's soldering iron, &c., and the blower 
switch has been moved to under the right key-cheek of the console.
All that remains is to slightly change the wiring to the music
desk lamp, so that it can be unplugged to close the rolltop (not that
that happens very often at St. Luke's).
    Since the Bach Minuet in G, BWV/Anh. 114, from the Anna Magdalena
Notebook, is 150 out of the 350 points on my piano final (fortunately,
we're only tested on the first half; if we want to play the whole piece,
we can, but it won't get us any extra credit), we went straight into
"cross-training" on it. There are still quite a few awkward spots in it,
but it's proving to be easier than expected. We spent most of the hour
on the left hand (no problem for me; I recall having once successfully
picked out the right hand by ear, while still in Piano 1); towards the
end, we also worked on the right hand, just a bit. At the very end of
the lesson, just after my hour ran out, he had me put both hands
together, with remarkably good results for so early a stage.
    After the lesson, I was given about 15 minutes to practice on my
own, before Maestro York needed some practice time of his own. I worked
on some pedaling exercises (much needed after two weeks of working on
stuff for piano tests!), then went back to the Bach, experimenting with
registration. During the lesson, we put the right hand in Harmonic
Flute, on Great, and the left in Gedeckt, on Choir, to keep things
fairly quiet, though I'd remarked (and Maestro york concurred) that the
piece called for glittery upperwork in the right hand (not particularly
easy to achieve on that particular organ, especially since I wanted to
try the equivalent of an 8' + 1' combination, especially one with a
fairly fluffy flute for the 8')
    When Maestro York returned (with the electician), I was playing the
Bach with the left hand back in the 8' Choir Gedeckt, and the right hand
on Great, with the 2' stop, the 8' Great-Choir coupler, the 4'
Great-Great coupler, and the Great Unison Off, and experimenting with
coupling a 4' Swell flute into the right hand, either at normal pitch,
or shifted up an octave. Either way, the desired "glittery" effect
wasn't too difficult to achieve.
--
James H. H. Lampert
http://www.hb.quik.com/jamesl