John Keble, and Fr. S.

I recently read a biography of John Keble. He was a saintly vicar of the country parish at Hursley, and one of those responsible for the Oxford Movement. It seems to me that he was the “glue” that held it together, especially after the defection of Newman to the Church of Rome. And he did most of this simply by observing the Daily Offices and the Holy Eucharist in his parish church, visiting the sick and the needy in the parish, diligently catechizing the young people, and encouraging Pusey, Newman and others behind the scenes. Two quotes from the biography (by Georgina Battiscombe: p. 354):

In spite of his obvious limitations, in moments of difficulty or crisis men's minds turned instinctively to Keble: “when all else had been said and done,” Liddon [another biographer] declared, “people would wait and see what came from Hursley before making up their minds as to the path of duty.”

It was not John Keble's wisdom which drew men to him, but his holiness, a very understated, English type of holiness..

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As I read, I recognized that I had the privilege of working with a priest who followed in Keble's saintly footsteps: Fr. S., who was priest-in-charge of this parish during an interim, then assisting priest for a few years. The likenesses are many, and I dare not begin naming them, for time is short.

But I do wish to honor Fr. S., and what he has meant to me, even after his departure for other work. He instituted the Daily Office in this parish, over the objections of the Vestry; with my collusion, he instituted monthly Choral Evensong. He was at the church for Matins and Evensong six days a week (I covered the seventh, Friday), and celebrated a midday Eucharist on every major Feast, even the three Feasts that follow hard on Christmas Day, when most clergy are scattered far and wide on holiday.

I do not doubt that Fr. S. knew of Keble. Whether he was conscious of following that great example, I do not know. More probably, the likeness between them stemmed from the One whom they both followed and served.

Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren...

A few weeks ago, I played for the funeral of an older lady of our congregation. Today, I found a note in my church mailbox from her inseparable friend and companion, with a check for $25.

What should I do with this? I suspect that this lady can hardly spare $25. I could return it, with the observation that I was paid by the funeral home, but that would be an insult to her generosity. Yet, I cannot simply pocket the money. It is, in my view, a “widow's mite,” and of great value in the eyes of our Lord, so it must be used well.

On top of this, someone else whom I helped a little bit financially a few months ago has repaid the money in the form of a gift to the church, “to help the next person.” And all of this came on the day when the Gospel [St. Matthew 25:31-46] applies forcibly to such matters. What should I do?


Three answers to that question came my way this afternoon. After church, I was able to give a gentleman $10 to get a prescription filled for his wife. I did this grudgingly, for reasons I won't describe here, but thinking of that $25 dollars, I did it. “I was sick, and ye visited me not” is close enough to “I was sick and in need of medicine, and ye helped me not” to influence my actions.

Later in the day, another gentleman came by asking for $5 to get something to eat. Here again, I begrudged the gift, for the same gentleman came by last Sunday evening with the same request, and he could go to the Salvation Army for a free dinner, as I told him. Is he headed straight for the liquor store? Quite possibly. But I gave him the money and said a prayer with him. Fifteen dollars down, ten to go.

Not half an hour later, yet another gentleman came by, a young man. He had papers to show that he has just been released from the state prison in the next town. He had his final paycheck from the prison hospital where he was working as an inmate, but no one would cash it, because his only ID was his prison ID -- a perfectly fine photo ID, but not one that someplace like Wal-Mart or Target is going to honor. I gave him the remaining $10 plus a bit more, directed him to the Shelter House so that he has a roof over his head tonight, and suggested that he go get a proper ID from the DMV tomorrow, which he can do for $5. Then perhaps he can cash that paycheck and get started on a new life. We said some prayers to this effect; his manner of talking with our Lord suggested that he is not unfamiliar with prayer, so I was pleased to recognize him as a Brother.

I say none of this to claim any personal merit. But I say it to give witness to the strange and marvelous ways that the Lord works. Sequences of events such as these are too common in the Christian life to attribute to chance. If there is any merit, it belongs to the lady who remembers her dear friend, as do I.

May she rest in peace, and know that her works follow her in the life of her friend.
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Bach went fairly well. I was thoroughly prepared, and should have played it better, but I commit it into the hands of the Lord, mistakes and all; it certainly seemed to be the right music for this day's liturgy, and I gave it my best effort. With the fugue, part of the problem was that I got too emotionally caught up in it, along the lines of what I described in the previous essay, and my mistakes disfigured the most climactic moment of the piece. Psallam spiritu et mente. I must keep working on this. Emotion is good if it energizes the playing, but not so good if it leads to wrong notes.

What did go very well today was the communion improvisation at the contemporary service, and that was sheer gift, as improvisation always is, no matter how much one prepares and practices for it. Also, the hymns went well, as did the two choral pieces. Given a choice as to where the mistakes would be, I would be well content to have them in the voluntaries rather than the hymns and anthems.

Toccata and Fugue in F Major

I asked myself in the previous essay why it would be inappropriate to play the Craig Phillips setting of Sine Nomine as a prelude because of its virtuosity, but the Bach Toccata in F is perhaps more appropriate.

Most often, my decisions about the appropriateness of an anthem, hymn, or voluntary are based on an inarticulate sense of the rightness or wrongness of an item for a particular point in the liturgy, based on my experience with music and the liturgy, my sense of the people in this place, and the capabilities of choir, organist, and congregation.

But, after further thought and practice on the Bach, I think I can articulate the way in which it differs from the Phillips. In the latter, there is a sense in which some of the virtuosity is for its own sake -- “showing off,” if you will. It was composed for an occasion for which that was appropriate. Because it is firmly based on a hymn tune, I considered it appropriate for the Sunday on which we sang the hymn, but not as a prelude. A postlude allows somewhat more scope for virtuosity, mostly because those who are not interested in music can escape to the coffee hour. The Bach is equally virtuosic (and more difficult), with its two extended pedal solos early in the toccata. But every note of the Bach is in service of the musical idea that is laid out in the opening two-voice canon over tonic pedal point, and my sense is that this musical idea is appropriate for the Last Sunday after Pentecost, Year A.

In fact, I am unable to name any mature work of Bach that exhibits virtuosity for its own sake. If there is any virtuosity present, it is a virtuosity of compositional skill in the execution of the underlying ideas, not in the exterior aspects of the performance. This is one characteristic that separates J. S. Bach from a perfectly serviceable composer such as Craig Phillips. To put it in terms of Bach's contemporaries, this is one way in which Bach differs from Telemann, a good musician whom the city fathers of Leipzig would have preferred to Bach. He would not have demanded as much of them as listeners.

So what idea is this that Bach is communicating, and that I consider a good fit for the Last Sunday of Pentecost, Year A? The phrases that come to mind are from Psalm 47: “Clap your hands, all you peoples; shout to God with a cry of joy.... For God is King of all the earth; sing praises with all your skill.” This Sunday is the end of the liturgical year, wherein thoughts turn to the end of days. In the Daily Office, we have made our way to the end of the Revelation of St. John the Divine; in the Sunday Gospel, we hear of the Day of Doom, “when the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him” (St. Matthew 25:31). There will in this day be weeping and gnashing of teeth as the wicked go away into everlasting punishment (v. 46), but it will be as well a day of victory, when the last Enemy, death, is overcome forever (Revelation 20:14). And it will be the day of final and complete answer to the daily prayer of Holy Mother Church: “Thy kingdom come.”

The Bach Toccata in F, with its Fugue, is the best response to this that I can make with the music available to me. The Toccata is boundless joy, the serious and all-consuming joy that is characteristic of the praise of God, the working out of one of the grandest ideas in all of Bach's music. The Fugue is more solemn. In the context of this service, I hope that it can be an expression (insofar as humanly possible) of the majesty of our Lord Jesus Christ at the right hand of God, sitting as righteous Judge of all the earth. When the two subjects combine in the final pages of the fugue, it is inexpressibly majestic, and causes me to consider the completion of the purposes of God, determined before the foundation of the earth.

These words are but a stammering and inadequate attempt to say what cannot be said. Yet, dust and ashes that we are, we must say something. No: we must sing something, and in this case, instrumental music has the advantage that it sings without words. And we cannot, for this occasion, play it safe; we must “sing... with all [our] skill.” This piece is right on the edge of my capabilities; that makes it just about right.

As Bach would say – and did say, at the end of nearly every one of his scores:
Soli Deo gloria.

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Here is a performance of the toccata by Helmut Walcha. For those who attend my parish, he was the teacher of D.D., and this is a much better performance than what you will hear on Sunday.

Apparition of the Eternal Church

I am playing this on Sunday.

I am nervous about it – not so much about getting through it, as about how people will respond to it. I have played it before, and no one has killed me yet. But this is a piece that elicits strong reactions. I love it. But I must remember that many will not.

Is it appropriate to inflict something like this on a congregation? They have come to worship, to pray, not to listen to loud spiky music. I do not have a proper answer to this, whether for this piece or any of the other strange things that I play. This morning after I practiced it, I considered moving it from its place as the prelude to postlude, which would mean moving the Craig Phillips setting of Sine Nomine to prelude. It is a more comfortable piece, but it is long and virtuosic. I do not like playing such a piece as a prelude, especially when it ends with a big loud toccata-like flourish that, in the context of a church prelude, is the wrong way to begin the Eucharistic service. It would be better as a postlude, and there is nothing virtuosic about the Messiaen. Power, yes; virtuosity, no.

(Having said that, I plan to play the Bach Toccata in F as the prelude a fortnight from now. How is that different from the Phillips?)

A few years ago, a gentleman by the name of Paul Festa made a video about the Messiaen piece (the Apparition of the Eternal Church). The body of the 50-plus minute documentary consists of watching thirty-one people listen to this piece with headphones, without being told what it is or what to expect. Their reactions are amazing.

I will not link to the video's website, because some of the content of the website (and the video) is graphically sexual and laced with lots of profanity – but that is how some of the people reacted to the music.

“That‘s a piece of music that just rips right through you. It just feels like my whole body was vibrating, it kind of started in my head and then it moved through into my chest and I even felt it in my legs … Which makes sense for an organ player, right? Because it’s so hyper-embodied. And the tension of the piece must be felt in just every fiber of your being … He clearly did not care what people thought. I mean, what is that? It’s literally assaultive …

Paradoxically, for a musician so associated with theology he’s one of the most sensual and physical and I think corporeal of musicians.” (comments from the transcript of the video, available on the website. The last comment is after the listener(s) have been told the title and composer of the piece)

Is it fair to do something like this to a church congregation?

Is it fair not to do something like this, that does everything possible within the musical art to bring the spiritual vision into visceral reality? Too many times, church musicians back off from the edge and play it safe. We stay in nice cozy major keys, Andante religioso from beginning to end.

But Christianity is not safe.

Here is a YouTube performance of the music:
Link

“A crescendo in granite... the pedal marks the blows of the hammer of grace … chisel, hammer, suffering, and trials cut and polish the elect, living stones of the spiritual edifice.” (from Messiaen's program notes: cf. I Peter 2:5, Revelation 21:2-3)