Hymns Old & New

I dislike Hymns Old & New. It has some crass arrangements in it. I am due to play one tomorrow. Some of these arrangements were made by a composer who I would have thought knew better.

Will this continue in 2023

Exhausted as Christmas makes one feel, I woke at 10:56 this morning. Yesterday was not a great day for me personally, although the Communion service I played for went well and there was some strong singing from a particular family.

I am wondering if I shall continue this blog next year; perhaps I will, but with far less regular posts.

Seasonal greetings to my reader.

Global Majority Heritage

I have recently seen an advert for musicians in a church in London which carried this text. I admit I had to check that I fully understood some of the terms.

"... We actively welcome applications from people who are currently underrepresented in our community including people with global majority heritage, people with lived experience of poverty and people who identify as LGBTQ+.

Candidates do not have to identify as Christian or belong to a religious faith, however we are looking for candidates who connect with our ethos and values."

So there you are.

POV

I have watched many of these 'Point of View' videos this year. It is the one Christmas pleasure I allow myself. It is great to see young people playing.

Christmas Organ Music

Organists are traditionally very busy at Christmas but, oddly, I do not have a very large Christmas repertoire. That said, I have recently bought a couple of Christmas books and single items from online retailers. One composer I am following is Phil Lehenbauer and, as I write, I am listening to the piece below.

Carol Service

From a note in the tuner's book, it turns out that the 4 foot flute stop is broken at the slider end and is a difficult repair which needs pipes to be removed. I managed to find a good deal of variety in my registrations because the swell has a 16' stop which, when combined with 8' and/or 4' stops and played up an octave, gave a very satisfactory selection of sounds which I shall use more.

The choir sang their carol but, as I suspected, it ought to have been transposed down a tone. Nobody ever listens to me.

Far too cold

As I suspected in a previous post, it was very cold this morning and the organ bench was like a block on ice. The church heating had gone on at 0900 for a 0930 service which is not really sufficient. The rising cost of fuel must be a factor. A long sermon was not really appropriate.