I will sing with the Spirit

I will sing with the Spirit, and I will sing with the understanding also (I Corinthians 14:15)

Our choir sang John Rutter’s setting of this text, the motto of the Royal School of Church Music, at the November Evensong. In deciding whether to post it, I scanned YouTube, which claims “about 10,700 results” for this title. There is the version by Rutter’s own choir, the Cambridge Singers, another by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir, and what must be hundreds or thousands more from every part of the world, choirs large and small, professional and amateur. Here are a few that I enjoyed from the first couple of pages of results :

A girls’ choir from Jatipon, West Java, Indonesia.

Another girls’ choir (with nine members), from Ontario, Canada.

And yet another girls’ choir, this one in a performance that appears to be part of what won the choir a gold medal at a choral festival. It is a place that I cannot figure out where it is, or even what language is on the banner behind them. In many respects, this is my favorite version, even more than our own choir.

On a much larger scale, this performance is with a large festival choir and orchestra, I think in South Africa. It is a place named Kapstadt, and there is a city by that name there, and the wonderful ethnic mix of choir and orchestra could be South African. Thanks be to God; I remember the days when such a choir would have been impossible in that country. “Hope changes everything.”

The above performances are all in English; here is one in the language Malagasy, from the island of Madagascar, in a gorgeous church.

What these five choirs from around the world have in common is the beautiful and intense Connection with which they sing.

I think that we also sang with Connection, and I don’t find anything quite like our version, which is posted here, although (as usual) it is audio only; the photo is of our combined choirs from last year.

I write this essay as a reminder that what we do in our little corner of the Midwest is a very small part of the Song. It is sung everywhere, and unites us across cultures, ethnic backgrounds, language, and time. It is thus a sign of hope. Things will not always be as they are now; someday "they will beat their swords into plowshares," as we heard in the Advent lessons this morning.

Hope changes everything

From the song “Sing, People, Sing,” by Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow, as arranged by Jean Littlejohn:

O hear the banjo ring
Hear the people sing
Hope changes everything
Sing, people, sing.

Jean’s choir, the Family Folk Machine, sang this in their concert this afternoon.

From Russ Feingold, former Senator from Wisconsin who lost a bid in the recent election to return to the Senate: in an e-mail to his supporters after the election, he wrote “… something is happening in our country. I don't understand it completely. I don't think anybody does. But we as Americans have to do the best we can to deal with the pain in this country and get people to come together.”

It looks to me like we are in for hard times. I have said it before: under the label “national calamity” in the sidebar to the left, I see that I have said it in one way or another twenty-one times in this blog. Here is part of one such essay, from 2013:

The final hymn festival, the closing event of the [Hymn Society] conference, was titled "New shoots and buds: new directions in congregational song," led (mostly) by Tony Alonso and Hilary Seraph Donaldson with lots of other musicians -- almost all of them under the age of thirty (Hilary's father Andrew, a long-time Hymn Society leader, was one of the exceptions; it was great to see father and daughter together among the musicians.)

I learned that the organizers had not met in person before the conference. The planning, extending over a year, was done entirely through meetings on Skype and through other forms of electronic communication.

And they see what I see in the world. The penultimate hymn was a call to eschatological hope, which is central to the witness of the Church -- a hymn that they said was hard for them to find. It was sung to the strong shape-note tune "Morning Trumpet," with lines like this:

“Let the banker and the president beware the trumpet's call,
And beat swords of greed and commerce into equal shares for all.
Let the teachers speak in wisdom, let the music-makers play,
Let the weavers weave the tent where we shall gather on that day.

“Lowly eyes shall be lifted, while the tyrants taste their fear,
For that sound is both a gospel and a warning...”
("The trumpet in the morning," by Rory Cooney)

I sang, we all sang, with tears in our eyes, longing for that day when all shall be made right.

Later that day as I drove west through the Alleghenies into one last mist-shrouded mountain sunset, I thought of these brave words and those who sang them. Will they -- will we -- have the strength to stand when the drone attacks and "peacekeepers" kill our friends, spies and informers are everywhere, and all is darkness -- as it already is in parts of the world?

I was taken to task by a commenter after the election because of my hardness of heart and lack of political activism. I was told that I need to get off of my organ bench and live up to my “loudly proclaimed discipleship.”

Well, no I don’t. Instead, I must redouble my efforts to play better, to be a better choral director and church musician.

One part of what I must do - what all musicians must do, young and old – is sing together. My friend Jean has a big role in this, here in our community. In a different way, I have a role, too: there are specific things – true things - that we can sing in a church choir and in a Christian congregation that a community group cannot, and things that I can share through the music of Bach and Messiaen and others, and our work as choral singers, and in my own creations, that are my particular responsibility.

There are times when Music is one of the few ways that we can find hope.
There are times when Music binds up the wounds of the soul and body.
There are times when the Song is what holds us together.
There are times when the only way we can come together is by singing.

It seems insignificant. Impractical. Powerless.
No more than a mustard seed, or yeast in the dough.

But it is what I am called to do. So is Jean, so are countless others around the world, and not just musicians: poets, authors, dancers, artists, anyone who creates. We must put our best stuff out there, and keep on doing it, no matter what. Why? “Hope changes everything.”

I cannot see how it can change anything at all; that is why it is Hope, for it is not based on what we can see.

But “we are saved by hope.” (Romans 8:24)

“Hope” is the thing with feathers -
That perches in the soul -
And sings the tune without the words -
And never stops - at all -

And sweetest - in the Gale - is heard -
And sore must be the storm -
That could abash the little Bird
That kept so many warm -

I’ve heard it in the chillest land -
And on the strangest Sea -
Yet - never - in Extremity,
It asked a crumb - of me.
(Emily Dickinson)

From this morning's liturgy:
To thy heavenly banquet (Alexis Lvov)

… if written down, it would appear as a well-thought-out work.

It has always been known that the greatest pianoforte players were also the greatest composers; but how did they play? Not like the pianists of today, who prance up and down the keyboard with passages which they have practiced—putsch, putsch, putsch;—what does that mean? Nothing! When true pianoforte virtuosi played it was always something homogeneous, an entity; if written down, it would appear as a well-thought-out work. That is pianoforte playing; the other thing is nothing. (Ludwig van Beethoven, as recalled by Wenzel Tomaschek – see the footnote)

Recently, I subscribed to the journal “International Piano.” having learned to my dismay that the old “Piano Quarterly” which I read for years is defunct.

In the current issue (pages 16-17), one of the columnists discusses a recent list of the “twenty-five greatest pianists” of all time, prepared by a UK classical music station. The columnist points out that such lists are always highly subjective, no more than “light entertainment.” He complains that the list includes pianists who died before the age of recordings, about whom we can go only on hearsay – Mozart, Beethoven, Chopin, Liszt, Clara Schumann. Then he claims that none of these could stand up against the current generation of virtuosi. “Beethoven would have made the Top 25 in 1800. But in 1900—let alone 2016? No way. Even Liszt, acknowledged as the greatest pianist of the nineteenth century by most of his peers, would struggle against the talents of today.”

I don’t think so.

Not in the terms described by Beethoven. I would much rather hear him play – wrong notes, broken strings and hammers, deafness and all – than any of the modern players, “prancing up and down the keyboard” with their carefully manicured repertoire. “From the heart—may it return to the heart,” Beethoven said of the Missa Solemnis, and there is no doubt that this characterized all of his playing. Mozart, Chopin, Liszt, Schumann – it was the same with them.

But that is beside my point.

“… it was always something homogeneous, an entity; if written down it would appear as a well-thought-out work. That is pianoforte playing; the other thing is nothing.”

A “well-thought-out work.” That is how I want to play. That is why the constant struggle to improvise inside of a form rather than just “noodling” is so important.

At the suggestion of a friend, I listened to some recordings by a well-known New Age pianist (whom I will not here name). He succeeded in what I think was his aim – music that is intentionally bland. All mezzo-forte so that it can serve as background at home or in the workplace – no pianos that would disappear behind background noise, no fortes that would draw attention to themselves. The typical piece is (to my way of thinking) a mere fragment – two or perhaps three chords carefully chosen so as to never resolve in a cadence, in a simple and repeated left-hand figuration, with bits of melody and a few gentle jazz riffs in the right hand. To put it in the best light, it is relaxing, so long as one does not listen too closely.

That is what I want to avoid.

A convoluted path led me to the work of Mike Garson, a pianist who is best known for his work with the rock musician David Bowie, plus the bands “Nine Inch Nails” and “Smashing Pumpkins.” Not music to which I have until now paid any attention – I knew the name “David Bowie” (may he rest in peace) but had never listened to so much as one of his songs until the other day. For an example of Garson’s work in this context, I would recommend the song “Aladdin Sane.” Garson has a classical piano background, plus a lot of experience in jazz. And he has sought to find his own way of playing. It is a far cry from the New Age pianist who carefully stays in the background.

I can learn from this man. A good introduction to Garson’s way of thinking, which is highly spiritual in its ethos, can be found in this interview. His work is so different from anything I have done as to be extremely valuable for me. Thus, I shelled out $50 for his video “master class.” I am not very far into it as yet, but there are many ideas here. He describes his “Now Music” (his term for solo improvisation), and his beginning with it – a discipline of improvising little “etudes” – at first, just fifteen seconds or so, working at a specific figuration or other musical element. He says that he did more than three thousand of these.

That is a terrific idea for someone who wants to learn to improvise; it is not far from Gerre Hancock’s suggestion to harmonize scales in many different musical styles – those too are a form of little “etude,” or “study.”

But that begs the question: what direction should I go? I have been reading about Beethoven; I could extract interesting bits from his sonatas and make them into etudes, with the goal of making these things my own. Or Chopin – another of Garson’s projects as he developed his “Now Music” was to improvise a Nocturne in every key. Or I could go back to Fux and the Gradus ad Parnassum – this is how to deal with the Gradus as an improviser, and perhaps the key to it I have been seeking – improvise a little phrase in species counterpoint, play it back and check for parallel fifths and other violations, try it again. I never made it past two-part counterpoint; what would happen if I ventured into three-part and beyond?

I cannot do all of these things, and the direction I choose will change the manner in which I will play. For now, I will continue with the Garson masterclass, and my work Sunday by Sunday. That is the context which must guide my work; though I can learn from Garson, I cannot play like him because I must begin the Gathering of the Holy Eucharist. My music must remain linked to the tunes that will be used in the service, and it cannot be so “in your face” as to draw undue attention to itself. But neither can it be bland background music which would imply that what is to follow is without significance.

*******
Footnote: The Beethoven quote is from the biography “Beethoven: Anguish and Triumph” by Jan Swafford, pg. 644. Swafford adds: “What Beethoven was talking about was not playing from score but rather improvisation. [Carl] Czerny noted that Beethoven’s more formal improvisations sounded like a published piece, just as Beethoven here said they should.” Swafford also adds in an endnote (p. 1026) that Tomaschek wrote his recollection many years after his visit to Beethoven, so it might have been distorted by time and memory.

I have been reading the Beethoven biography for several months. It has made me like Beethoven considerably less. But (and I think this is part of Swafford’s point) it is all the more amazing that his music could come into being when his mundane life was such a shambles.

Seid umschlungen, Millionen!
Diesen Küß der ganzen Welt!

Sanders for President, Part Two

At the outset, I must say that I am delighted that Queen Hillary got her comeuppance, alongside the Democratic National Committee and the mainstream media.

I have not forgiven her for the manner in which she illegally torpedoed the Sanders campaign, using the supposedly impartial Democratic National Committee as an arm of her campaign and the news media as mouthpieces for her campaign propaganda.

I have not forgiven her for calling my people “deplorables.” It was a defining moment for me when I realized that it is precisely what she would have thought of my parents and virtually everyone that I grew up with.

I have not forgiven her for being in bed with the Wall Street bankers, for being obviously more comfortable with the Goldman Sachs executives than with unemployed coal miners or people at a food bank in Kimball, West Virginia.


I wish that Donald Trump could have lost the election, too. I suspect that his supporters (I am not one of them) will soon discover that, like Clinton, he has both “public” positions and private positions on every issue. I suspect that his views are even more subject to the winds of expediency than Mrs. Clinton’s, and that is saying a lot. I suspect that his anti-establishment talk is no more than that – empty words. He is likely to give an even larger share to the 1% and the corporations in tax breaks, at the ultimate expense of those who will someday, in one way or another, be presented with the bill. These are likely to be the children who sing in my choir and their peers, coming of age in the 2030’s and beyond. I grieve for them.

I suspect that the United States will be a darker, more divided, and more dangerous place in three or four years, most of all for people who are not of white European descent.

Senator Sanders (born 1941) is not young; he will be pushing eighty by the 2020 campaign. Six months ago, I would have said Senator Elizabeth Warren would have been an acceptable second choice as a progressive candidate, but not after her shamefully enthusiastic endorsement of Clinton, when an endorsement of Sanders might have made a difference. “We trusted you,” hecklers cried during her speech at the Democratic convention; I hope that none of us will ever again trust Senator Warren.

But, whoever it might be, I think the stage is set for a genuinely progressive candidate to run against President Trump. By 2020, we will have a good idea what a Trump presidency is like, complete with Republican control of House and Senate and probably the Supreme Court. And I think a great many people by then will be ready for some genuine change.

The trouble is, there are more directions for change than one. The stage may also be set for a more effective candidate from the far right, perhaps a charismatic Iraq/Afghanistan war veteran with a fondness for armbands and torchlight parades. Mr. Trump’s campaign provided a model for how such a person could win an election in the United States. I suspect there are young adults who have been paying attention.

[Edited Nov. 15 to add: I received an anonymous comment on this post, and deleted it. Upon reflection it deserves better than that, and the person raises valid questions which serve as a counterpoise to what I wrote. I continue to maintain, as I did after the Democratic Convention, that I would never vote for Mrs. Clinton even if my vote handed the election to Mr. Trump. I remain comfortable with that decision and consider it thoroughly congruent with my Christian faith. I note that I did take action: I volunteered for the Sanders campaign and gave it financial support, partly because he would have easily defeated Mr. Trump. I gratefully accept this person's prayers for my hardness of heart.

Because there is no way to un-delete a comment, here it is, pasted from the notification e-mail:]

You write: "for calling my people deplorables." I hear that you were personally affronted and that your pride on behalf of your family and old friends was wounded. But, please, help me track both your logic and the juxtaposition with your professed Christian faith.

I have read the statement made by Secretary Clinton to which you refer, along with her apology for that statement. Secretary Clinton called out some Trump supporters for racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, and islamaphobia. The days since the election have offered more than 200 episodes of harassment and violence committed in President-Elect Trump's name and verified by the SPLC and ACLU. It would appear that some followers and supporters of P-E Trump do indeed feel lifted up, validated, and emboldened to pursue acts of racism, sexism, homophobia, and islamaphobia.

Questions for your reflection:

1. Did you engage with Secretary Clinton's apology for the comments that personally offended you and your family? And if you did, how? And if you did not, why not? And what does your response illuminate about your faith and discipleship?

2. Having withheld your vote from Senator Clinton, how will you reconcile your conscience with the harms now visited upon women, people of color, LGBTQ people, immigrants, refugees, and our brothers and sisters who are Muslim and Jewish? You, as a white man, hold a privileged and protected status on the streets our our nation that none of the groups just named are able to enjoy. You have contributed to the burdens heaped upon their shoulders. I do hope you will be somewhere besides your organ bench when it comes to offering tangible protection to those groups. Your loudly proclaimed discipleship calls you to nothing else.

I lament and pray for your hardness of heart.

Amazing grace

This was a hymn for last Sunday, and I have posted three new YouTube settings from those services:

Improvisation on Amazing Grace (New Britain)

Some may wish to compare this with my improvisation on the same tune from a year ago. One of the things I liked about that version was that I incorporated a bit of Howells, for that was the Sunday we sang the Collegium Regale Te Deum.

This year’s version is just “New Britain.” I sought to establish a contrast between a solemn version in the low tenor, in A flat, with a bit of scherzetto in the upper register in C major, leading to a dialogue between the two. But I think last year’s version was better, and perhaps one of the best I have done.


Peter Schickele is a well-known musicologist, the world’s leading scholar in the music of P.D.Q. Bach. But he is also a composer. This setting of Amazing Grace for choir has nothing to do with P.D.Q. Bach; it is a fine, serious piece. I am especially proud of the adult choir, who on this day numbered seven singers. Unlike some small Episcopal choirs, we do not have paid singers; all of them are volunteers, who over the course of a year give a lot of time and energy to the choir.

Here is an organ setting by Kenton Coe, one of six settings of early American hymn tunes.

I could write more about “Amazing Grace,” but instead I refer you to Bill Moyers. Some years ago, he prepared a documentary which can be found here.

A Documentary: Amazing Grace (Bill Moyers, for PBS)

The video quality is poor – someone recorded it on their home VCR. The sound quality is nonetheless pretty good. And the content is amazing. It runs an hour and twenty minutes; save it for a time when you can sit down and listen with attention. At the very least, watch the first half hour or so.

If you would prefer a version with better sound and video quality, many libraries will have the DVD, or it can be purchased. If you do that, please don’t buy it (or anything) from Amazon; get it here, from the PBS online store.

Free Leonard Peltier

As of this writing, Native American activists and supporters are engaged in peaceful protest at the Standing Rock Indian Reservation in North Dakota.

Over the weekend, they were attacked by a heavily militarized force of police and national guards from several states, in action reminiscent of the old-time union-busting work of Pinkertons, FBI agents, state police, and the U.S. Army in the Appalachian coal fields (examples: the Battle of Matewan, the Battle of Blair Mountain). It is also very much in the spirit of the “Peacekeepers” from the Hunger Games books.

It also recalls the American Indian Movement and the 71-day siege of their encampment at Wounded Knee on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1973, an event that is now hardly a footnote in the history books.

As a part of the aftermath of this “incident,” the activist Leonard Peltier was framed for the 1975 murder of two FBI agents. In a highly irregular trial, he was sentenced to two life terms and remains in prison, over forty years later. Among those calling for Peltier’s release over this period: Amnesty International (which considers him a prisoner of conscience), the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela.

Several presidents have failed to pardon him, most notably Bill Clinton, who instead on his final day as president pardoned his buddy Marc Rich, reportedly in return for $1 million in gifts to Clinton-related groups, such as Hillary’s campaign for the U.S. Senate and the Clinton Library Foundation. Peltier had no rich friends to match such an “offer.”

Our presiding bishop, Michael Curry, has visited the Standing Rock encampment. He has called this standoff “another Selma.” But that was in the middle of a movement where a great many people, black and white, cared what happened, and the scenes of police dogs, tear gas, and brutality inflicted on the marchers did much to change public opinion. The Native Americans are a much smaller minority group, and I often think that most people in the mainstream culture simply do not care what happens to them. They are essentially invisible.

They have been trampled by the U.S. government from the beginning of this nation. It looks very much like it is going to happen again at Standing Rock. Yes, there may be public outcry for a while – as there was during and after the Wounded Knee incident. And yes, most people will forget and move on.

And, more than likely, there will be one or more Native American scapegoats to join Leonard Peltier in federal prison.

Lord, have mercy upon us.
Christ, have mercy upon us.
Lord, have mercy upon us.

****
Today is the Feast of All Saints.
I am not at all saying that Mr. Peltier is a saint; I have no idea.
And I am not saying that all of the people encamped at Standing Rock are saints.
But there are quite a few of them -- including at least one of my friends, a priest who reads this blog -- that are out there in the desert because of their faith, whether they see it as faith in the Christian God or by some other path.

Some of them may become martyrs before all is done.
Martyrdom or not, the path to sainthood can take you to places like Standing Rock, and to situations where it is not at all clear whether you will walk away whole in body, or at all.

The fruit of these days and weeks, however it turns out, may lie dormant for a long time, as it did after Blair Mountain, when it looked like the United Mine Workers of America was dead and gone. It was many years before they again became strong, and the memory of Blair Mountain and Matewan was a part of that.

Part Three: "A first step"

[With the Celviano hybrid piano], we have developed something entirely new… which is a first step. (From the CEO of the Bechstein piano company in this video.)

What are the long-term prospects for the flagship pianos: the nine-foot Steinway D concert grand (list price: about $150,000), the Yamaha CFX ($180,000), the Bösendorfer Imperial ($250,000)?

What are the prospects for the somewhat smaller 6’11” Steinway B and its cousins of various sizes from Steinway and other builders? Will this be the “next step?” for the hybrid builders?

The answer may turn on the function of such instruments. The concert grands are almost always purchased by institutions, and such a piano on the main stage is a statement that “we are important.” But $150,000 (and up) is a lot of money, and music is a low priority for most schools. When will some budget-strapped college take the leap and put a Yamaha N3 on stage?

More to the point: Can the best of the hybrids be the solo instrument for a piano concerto with the top-level orchestras of the world, and the top concert artists? Can they do the job for chamber music, again with world-class performers? Can they satisfy pianists whose career is on the line, and their fellow musicians, collaborators in music such as Schubert’s song cycle Winterreise, the Brahms violin sonatas, Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time?

Here, I draw on my experience in church music and organ. The “king of instruments” has for decades faced the challenge of electronic substitutes, starting with the Hammond. Pipe organs are an order of magnitude more expensive than even the flagship pianos. They make large demands on the architecture of any space they will occupy – and sometimes dominate, visually and aurally. They are immobile. Many of them are as much at the mercy of electronic component failures as the lowliest electric “keyboard.” The electronic builders, such as Allen, are reaping the benefits of computer technology just like the makers of electronic and hybrid pianos. And they are doing good work, but their best customized work is almost as expensive as a similar pipe organ. Despite the disadvantages and expense of pipe organs, the electronics have not driven them from the field and there is no evidence that this will change anytime soon.

One reason that the pipe organs have maintained their place is this: I have yet to hear an electronic organ that supports congregational singing as well as even a modest-sized pipe organ, such as our Pilcher – if it is a quality instrument. This last is important, for there are many pipe organs that are not much good, especially from some of the “factory” builders of the mid-twentieth century, and I would take an Allen over such an organ any day. And there are many acoustic pianos that are not much good, including quite a few grand pianos. I have been comparing the Yamaha and Casio hybrids to the best of the grand pianos and finding it a tossup. Given the choice between the hybrid and a used (or new) piano that was never of high quality, the choice would be obvious: go with the better sound, the better action feel, and that would be with the hybrids.

There seems to be something about the sound that comes from a good pipe organ that blends with the human voice in a way that the electronic sounds from speakers – even the large arrays of speakers scattered through the room that one finds in top-level electronic installations – cannot match.

That makes me wonder how a hybrid piano would sound with, say, the Cleveland Orchestra. I would be very interested in the answer to that. [Edited in August 2018 to add: Hybrid pianos revisited]

My closest personal experience for comparison would be from graduate school, when our choir sang with the New York Philharmonic. On one occasion we sang in Carnegie Hall, a space that does not have a pipe organ (neither does their “home,” Avery Fisher Hall – now “David Geffen Hall,” after they sold the name to the highest bidder in 2014: price tag, $100 million). The program began with the Berlioz Te Deum, which has a large and important organ part. Leonard Raver on an Allen electronic did his best (and, given the setting, the Allen people surely did their best as well), but in passages such as the beginning of that piece, where organ and orchestra trade off fortissimo chords, the Allen was clearly the loser. It was sufficiently loud, but sounded cheap and tinny in comparison with the orchestra, and in the tuttis, the organ sound, loud as it was, entirely disappeared under the orchestra and chorus [“Cheap and tinny” does not apply to this performance from King’s College, Cambridge, but it shows how important the organ part is to the piece.]

That was thirty-five years ago, but even then the electronic builders were claiming their instruments were equal to the best pipe organs. When played solo, they sounded pretty good; it was only in a situation such as that poor outclassed instrument in Carnegie Hall, or a church organ with a vigorous congregation singing, that their limitations became obvious.

Pipe organ (and traditional piano) technology have not changed much since then while the electronics have made great strides, thanks most of all to massively improved computing power for sampling and signal processing. But I would bet that an electronic organ in Carnegie Hall would still disappear under an orchestral tutti.

I would guess – and it is no more than that – that compared to any of the “flagship” concert grands that I named, the Yamaha N3 hybrid would likewise fall short in a pianistic equivalent such as the beginning of Beethoven’s “Emperor” concerto.

But not by much.

The best I could tell, with the volume turned all the way up the N3 and Casio hybrids have exactly the same loudness as a large grand piano, vigorously played – and that is enough to balance a symphony orchestra. I think that the sound quality would be close enough to fool most of a concert audience. The visuals of the pianist sitting at what is hardly twice the size of a little spinet – as opposed to a nine-foot black ebony piano, its lid up – would be dismaying, and that alone might be enough to keep the hybrids at bay. For now.

The lockdown of “Steinway Artists” is also a factor. Most of the concert pianists in America are on that list, and they are bound by contract to play only Steinway pianos. But there are plenty of Yamaha Artists, especially in Asia. One of them might give it a try – perhaps at first in concert with a lower-tier orchestra in a hall without a quality piano. Again, I would very much like to hear the result.

Quality mid-sized grands like the Steinway B will continue to be demanded by piano faculty for their teaching studios and for school auditoriums and other venues where a full-scale concert grand would be a bit much. One example would be our parish church. I lead our weekly “middle” service from our Steinway Model L. It does not support congregational singing in the same manner as the Pilcher organ across the way, but when played with intelligence it does a good job in its own way. Would the N3 hybrid do as well? Again, I do not know.

My guess would be that again, it would fall short of our Steinway, but not by much. I am confident that it would surpass the large majority of church pianos in this role – probably ninety percent or more of them, from my experience -- and I would encourage a church that is seeking a piano to give the hybrids a serious look and listen, perhaps a “test-drive” if that can be arranged.

For a church, one factor that would favor an acoustic piano is the longer view. In the previous posting, I noted that I will not be playing the piano in fifty or sixty years. But at the church, I would hope that someone is. I doubted whether the hybrid pianos would still be usable that far down the road; our Steinway is over a century old, and there is no reason why it will not be viable when it is two centuries old, if it is cared for properly and rebuilt a couple of times along the way. The same goes for mechanical action pipe organs, whose enemies in the long run are most often war, fires and other natural disasters, and change of fashion – not irreparable breakdown of the instrument on its own account. The potential longevity of pianos and organs of traditional construction – and other instruments, such as quality violins, many of them centuries old – is a significant incentive for a church to purchase the best instruments and then take care of them. In the long run, that is good stewardship, better than buying something new every few decades. For a piano in the main worship space, I would counsel: Save up the money, seek donations over whatever length of years that it takes, and buy a Steinway or Yamaha acoustic grand, of a size suitable to the worship space. Or consider a quality rebuilt piano, such as the ones sold by Tom Zasadny, who did the renovation on our Steinway. If chosen carefully, such a piano is every bit as good as a brand-new Steinway, and less expensive. If it is clear that it will take a long time to gather the funds, one of the hybrid pianos would be a fine interim instrument, with the plan of eventually moving it to another space in the church, such as a choir room or chapel.

But what about my more humble purpose: a home piano? A mid-sized grand would be a worthy expenditure for a professional pianist who needs a top-quality instrument, especially if she also teaches at home and rehearses with chamber ensembles or singers. For a retired church organist? Not so much.

A used piano is a possibility. I am a piano technician, so I could do quite a bit of renovation work myself: things like hammer and damper replacement and regulation. I have restrung pianos, including two quality grands back in the 1990’s, and I could do it, but it is hard work, and requires either a large workshop or turning one’s music room or living room into a workshop for several months. And I am not so confident in my skills as I would have been twenty years ago; there would probably be some work that I would have to do a second (or third) time to get it right. So, unless it were a used piano needing only relatively minor renovation, I don’t think that I should consider it.

And there remains the issue of disturbing neighbors and spouse. For me, that would be the deciding factor. If I were to retire today, I would like to go with the Yamaha N3, but it would be hard to justify the $15,000 to $20,000 price, either to my wife or to God. That leaves the lower-priced Yamaha N2 or N1 and the Casio Celviano GP-500 and its lower-priced siblings. They are all good, and within this group it appears to me that “you get what you pay for” – the higher-priced instruments are incrementally better, but even the lowest-price instrument, the Celviano GP-300, would suffice. I would worry a little about long-term reliability – in essence, a race as to who breaks down first, me or the piano – but would otherwise be thoroughly content with any of these pianos.

***
Again, if this is “a first step,” where might it go? The piano has had periods of rapid development, especially from around 1800 to 1860. Since 1900, it has remained pretty much the same – there is little difference between our century-old Steinway at church and the brand-new ones in the showroom. Might the hybrids move beyond imitation of the finest acoustic pianos to lead the way toward a different kind of professional instrument, as different from the current piano as the piano of our time is from the eighteenth century fortepianos?


Afterword: Why not an organ?

I am, after all, an Organist. Why choose a piano instead of an electronic organ?

Price. An entry-level Allen electronic “Historique” organ (their home-line of instruments) starts at around $17,000. For a two-manual instrument with lots of limitations, an instrument with which I would be thoroughly dissatisfied.

I played an Allen for several years, and gave the dedicatory recital for an Allen at another parish in the area. They are acceptable instruments. But I would not want to live with one of them for the rest of my life. There are other electronic builders, each claiming superiority, but they would all be similar. For me, an electronic home organ would always feel and sound like a cheap imitation of a pipe organ, and I would long for the real thing every time I played it. It is telling, in this context, to compare that with my experience of the hybrid pianos.

It is possible to put a mechanical-action pipe organ in a home; many contemporary builders would be happy to make one to my specifications. It would be a small and limited instrument, it would disturb the neighbors even more than a piano, and it would be very expensive.

Versatility. On the piano, one can do a lot of the practicing that is needed to continue as an organist – essentially, everything except pedaling and passagework that demands two manuals. It does not work the other way; playing an electronic organ at home does not prepare one to play Beethoven or Chopin on a piano.

Versatility is another advantage of the hybrids over the acoustic pianos. They are MIDI instruments which can be connected to the electronic world. For relatively little money I could add a used computer plus Hauptwerk software with organ sounds, playable from the hybrid piano keyboard and listenable either through headphones, computer speakers, or external amp and speaker. The result would be akin to a one-manual organ with no pedals. It would be exceedingly strange at first to play “organ” with the feel of a piano keyboard, but I think that I would prefer that to the feel of an Allen organ, or for that matter any pipe organ with a non-mechanical action.

Stage of Life. I have played the organ for a long time; forty years and counting. I am a Fellow of the Guild. I have played a lot of wonderful organ literature and performed recitals, including a few “on the road,” enough to give me a small taste of “Concert Artist.” I have been mostly fortunate in my instruments -- I was part of the fundraising and installation for one of Randall Dyer’s signature three-manual instruments and then played it for more than a decade. It remains the finest organ I have played regularly. [A personal note: the first photo on the linked page from the OHS database, an exterior view of the church, was the view from our kitchen window, for we lived across the street from the church. I would see it every time I washed dishes.] I have now played our Pilcher mechanical action organ for many years, and in its way, it is an equally satisfying instrument.


It has been a terrific life – and I have not here mentioned the joys of working with choral singers young and old, nor selecting and playing the hymns.

There are many aspects of my work that I love, as readers of these pages will know. But there is a lot of it, and I have less energy for it every year, especially around Christmas and Holy Week. Readers of these pages will know about that, too. It is a demanding life. That is not just me; every church musician who takes it seriously finds it so.

For now, I think that my playing is the best it has been, and I continue (with ups and downs) to learn and improve. I am not ready to hang up my shoes, not yet.

But all things come to an end.

Solve senescentem mature sanus equum, ne Peccet ad extremum ridendus. (Horace, as quoted by Samuel Johnson at the head of No. 207, “The Rambler,” March 10, 1752, which would be the penultimate number. ) Johnson concludes his essay with these words:

He that is himself weary will soon weary the publick. Let him therefore lay down his employment, whatever it be, who can no longer exert his former activity or attention; let him not endeavor to struggle with censure, or obstinately infest the stage till a general hiss commands him to depart.

Pianos, Part Two

On Monday, I returned to the music store. The Steinway event had ended, but many of the pianos remained, several of them with “Sold” flags on them. I was correct in assuming it would be a quiet day. The store’s piano person, Nelda Wittig, patiently endured me for about two hours (in which I was the only customer in the store), and was very helpful. I started with the Yamaha hybrid piano, the Model N3 AvantGrand, improvising for forty minutes or so. I was entranced.

Regretfully, I left the N3, walking to the Steinway B across the room. It is still the best. And still four or five times as expensive: list price: $93,000 and up. I tried a mid-sized Yamaha acoustic grand, the Model C3X, a fine piano, very clean-sounding and beautiful, a joy to play. It is a 6’1” grand, listing for about $55,000. I went back to the N3 hybrid. And back to the C3X. It was uncanny; the actions were absolutely the same. The sound? Almost the same. It might be simply that the hybrid’s sound is based not on the mid-sized Yamaha grand, but their concert grand, Model CFX. To a person sitting at the keyboard, the sound and feel of the two pianos is very close, amazingly close. In a “blindfold” test, I would not be able to distinguish the actions by feel and response, including the damper pedal mechanism. I would have to think carefully about the sound, and if I did not know the N3 was a digital piano, I would not label it as one.

I tried a mid-sized Boston grand (I think it was the 5’10” Model GP-178). The Boston, from Steinway’s “second level” brand, was perfectly fine, with a list price of about $30,000. I would call it a toss-up between the Boston and the Yamaha N3. Were I in a situation where an acoustic grand would be acceptable – for example, retiring to a country farmhouse with no nearby neighbors and a heated outbuilding or garage which I could occupy as a music room without disturbing anyone, I would give the Boston serious consideration, though its price would be a stretch. But the N3 hybrid is so close to it in quality as to be a virtual toss-up, at half the price. And it has headphones and a volume knob.

Casio is also making a hybrid piano, the Celviano GP-500. It was nearby, so I sat down to give it a try, not expecting much.

It was the surprise of the day.

For keyboard musicians, Casio has some history. We tend to think of the company in terms of $100 battery-powered keyboard toys to pick up at Target or WalMart for a child, such as the ML-1 of the 1990's, a two-octave portable with illuminated keys – though some creative pop and alternative musicians have taken the very cheesiness of such instruments as the basis for good work, almost always tongue-in-cheek. More than that, people of my generation remember when “Made in Japan” was a synonym for “Cheap Junk,” and Casio was part of that era with a variety of inexpensive products. That was before Toyota and others – including Yamaha – made it their mission to turn it around and make “Made in Japan” a badge of quality, the finest in the world. Casio has been part of that, too, seeking especially to bring increasing quality to the lower-priced end of their markets. Their wristwatches, for example, are highly regarded, and they produced the first pocket calculator, and the first inkjet printer. They have been making electronic keyboards since 1980 (mostly portables, including instruments for stage use), and introduced the Celviano line of digital pianos in 1991 as a competitor to Yamaha's Clavinova, and the Privia line in 2003. Their website speaks of the goal of one of their founders in 1946, Toshio Kashio, to eventually "create electronic musical instruments that were also affordable for hobby musicians," and to "allow amateurs to participate in the big music business – without having to spend the equivalent of a new car."

I realized quickly that, despite my prejudice against it, this was a Serious Piano. Casio has partnered with the German piano builder Bechstein to develop the instrument, with Bechstein’s flagship piano sound and action feel -- the epitome of a German piano, as Mendelssohn and the Schumanns and Liszt played. It is not quite the acoustic grand piano action in the manner that the Yamaha instrument uses, but Casio and Bechstein have made it equally accurate in feel, and in some respects it might be an improvement. The best I can tell, the whippen, jack, and repetition lever of an acoustic grand action have been replaced with less complex – and less likely to need repair or adjustment – components, balanced and weighted to feel like the Bechstein action. The sound is terrific. Or rather, sounds. Besides the “Berlin Grand” that is the Bechstein, there is a “Hamburg Grand” (read: Steinway imitation) and “Vienna Grand” (Bösendorfer imitation), both exceedingly fine. Plus harpsichord and various other sounds. [The Yamaha also has multiple sounds, most notably their equivalent of the “Vienna Grand” – with sound samples from the Bösendorfer, which is owned by Yamaha. I was so entranced with their default sound, based on sampled sounds from the Yamaha CFX concert grand, that I did not even try the Vienna sound.]

After fifteen minutes or so, I found Ms. Wittig at her desk. “Tell me about that Casio,” I said. She did, explaining much of what I just wrote, and telling me that her jaw-dropping reaction was similar to mine when it first arrived in the store this spring. Most jaw-dropping of all is the price: $6,500. One-third of the Yamaha N3’s list price. Less than one-tenth of a big-time Steinway’s list price. And there is a similar model, the GP-300, that lists for $4,000, and (I gather) a GP-400 that is somewhere in between. I went from the GP-500 back to the Steinway B. There is precious little difference in sound or feel for an order of magnitude of price difference.

Upon a few days’ reflection, I recognize that the Yamaha N3 is more refined than the Casio. But (again) it is three times as expensive. And the GP-500 is definitely not a toy. I think that Toshio K. would be very pleased.

[Edited Nov. 11, 2016 to add: Kawai, a long-time builder of acoustic pianos and competitor with Yamaha in this field, also has a line of hybrid pianos introduced in 2015; details can be found at their website here. In some respects, they appear to be similar to the Yamaha and Casio hybrids; their unique feature is using a wooden soundboard as sort of a "subwoofer" speaker. Prices appear to be around $6000 and up. There are likely to be many other such instruments in the coming years.]


Some thoughts:

The spinet piano, the type of piano on which I learned to play, has been dead for a generation. For that matter, the traditional acoustic studio upright might be dead. It is as expensive as the Casio and the Yamaha N1 hybrids (certainly the NU-1, an entry-level version of the hybrid based on the Yamaha upright piano action, listing at $6,500. I played this for a while, and it is a delightful little piano), and the musical experience of playing anything short of the best uprights is decidedly inferior to playing a grand.

There has never been much reason for a musician to consider “baby” grands with their small soundboards and short bass strings; they are sonically inferior to a quality upright. And (again) they are at least as expensive as the Casio and Yamaha hybrids. The baby grand might hang on to a market niche as an expensive furnishing for a large living room or hotel lobby.

The practice room upright? That jury is still deliberating. By light-years, I would prefer to play either of the hybrids over any piano that I have encountered in a practice room, and the potential for headphones is a huge plus for practicing in tight quarters. The question will be how well the hybrids hold up to years of heavy and occasionally abusive playing. The Yamaha should be fine, for its action has been proven in such situations; the Casio is an open question, though it is clear that they have gone to considerable lengths to build an equally durable action.

Then again, there might remain a place for what one of our former choristers calls “The Tank” – the blonde Hamilton upright piano that used to be the choir room piano, and now is used mostly for the annual “Cocoa and Carols” event in the undercroft. The Baldwin company specifically designed those Hamiltons and their twins sold under the Baldwin name as practice room and school pianos – not elegant musically, but extraordinarily durable and easy to repair, even more so than the Yamahas (and a lot more so than the Steinways, which can be finicky. Steinway versus Hamilton is somewhat like comparing a Ferrari with a Toyota Corolla). Our Hamilton is probably fifty or sixty years old and in the prime of its career. It will be interesting to see how the hybrids look and sound at that age. My guess is that by then, the electronics will have broken down. Or the speaker cones might have failed, for they are likely to deteriorate with age. If the speakers cannot be replaced, they can be bypassed via the line out into external amps and speakers, so long as the electronics are viable.

But I am not going to be playing the piano in fifty or sixty years.

The closest current equivalent to our Hamilton is the Baldwin B-243, which they describe as the “best selling studio model of all time.” It retails for just under $9,000, pretty much in the middle of the hybrid price range. Their least expensive piano of any type, the BP-1 console upright, is not much cheaper, clocking in at $8,625. As with all Baldwin pianos since 2008, it is built in China.

to be continued: “A first step”

A visit to the piano store

It began with a guitar string. My wife needed one, so the two of us went to the excellent local music store, West Music. We went to the guitar and pop music end of the building, she got her string, and we spent a few minutes in the guitar room, where she tried out an instrument.

That was enough excuse for me to drag her to the far end of the store: the pianos. To my surprise, it was the annual Steinway Extravaganza, when the company ships in many of their higher-end grand pianos for a few days. I happened on this event one time a few years ago. That time, I was thinking in terms of the church and its needs. This time, it is for me; a piano of my very own.

But not a high-end Steinway. For the first time in my life, we could in theory drop $80 or $90 grand on a piano, but that would be from retirement savings and it would be imprudent. I played a few notes on the “Legends Tour” concert grands that had been played by a variety of famous people and moved on to a Steinway Model B for a couple of minutes. It was a terrific piano (as I described in the link above). The store was busy and my wife was itching to go, so that was it. In the car, I mentioned that I would like to have a piano when we retire, a thought which I had never dared voice.

Silence.

I dropped the subject. Several hours later, she brought it up, having had time to think about it. First, she reminded me that we are not going to spend that kind of money on a piano. And that the sound of a piano hurts her ears. Second, I am aware that it would be a large imposition on her for me to practice for hours at home. Her instrument – classical guitar – is much kinder to fellow householders than a piano. My playing would impose on neighbors as well, if we end up in a town-house or apartment, which is likely.

Having hosted the jazz department for eight years at the church, I am aware that it would also be an imposition for me to seek arrangements with a nearby church for any serious amount of daily piano (or organ) practice, if I am not working as their musician. One or two days a week might be possible: every day? Not so much.

But if I am not working, why do I want to practice? That is the part which my wife had not considered; she thought (and probably hoped) that I would never want to play again. I sometimes thought that too until a few months ago. For a funeral, I had to learn a Mozart sonata in the span of a couple of days. I had not played that sort of music for decades, and it awakened a longing – I could return to the piano and play Mozart. And Haydn, and Beethoven. Schubert, whom I especially loved. Chopin. Liszt. The Bach suites, the Well-Tempered Clavier, the Goldberg Variations, which I played in concert half a lifetime ago.

It was the first time I had looked toward retirement with any glimmer of hope or vocation. Would anyone want to hear me play? Probably not. There are already too many pianists in the world. But I think of Messiaen’s statement: “An apple tree makes apples. I make music.” I have known apple trees – including one I planted, decades ago, near what is now an abandoned farm house – whose fruit is ignored, left for the wild animals. That does not stop them from doing what God made them to do.

I understand why my wife might hope that I would close the fallboard and walk away. For thirty-plus years she has followed me through several job-related moves. She has almost never had a weekend with me, not since our honeymoon. We go weeks at a time with our paths crossing briefly with hardly a chance for two sentences. I think she would like to see her husband a little more often. I would like to see her, too; she is my favorite person and best friend. And it is true: for medical reasons, piano and organ music does hurt her ears, along with other loud noises. She has reason to dread having a husband who wants to practice.


Well, then: what to do about an instrument? As we passed through the Steinways, I saw the store’s Yamaha digital grand with its price tag of $14,999 (list price: $20,000). I thought about it: Headphones. Volume control. Still a lot of money, but not an impossible sum.

To be continued…

Sparrows and Light

One of the first YouTube clips I posted was my prelude on “God of the sparrow” two years ago on this Sunday, the blessing of animals.

Here is the version from today’s 9:00 service:
Improvisation: God of the Sparrow

This time, for the middle section I quote Royal Oak (All things bright and beautiful), which I think turned out well, and I like the return to the B major tonic that follows, and the coda. In places I am intentionally more free with the tunes than I was in 2014, and the form is more complex.

I cannot say which version is better. I wish I had made more progress in my skill level than what these two improvisations indicate.

Perhaps I have made a little progress; I am considerably more comfortable with “surprise” improvisations than I used to be. There was one in this day’s service at the end of communion when there were several minutes to fill. I returned to “God of the sparrow,” this time in D flat, and I think it was pretty good.

But I still cannot do as well at the organ. I played a prelude on the same tune at the choral service two hours later; it had some moments, but it was not as good as the piano version. There was a sixteen-bar period after the first couple of statements of the tune that I intended as a transition, but it was a boring progression of chords without motivic relation to anything, because I was more concerned for that moment with changing the registrations than I was with the musical content. Anyone who improvises must constantly purge his music of such things.

I take encouragement from C.P.E. Bach: somewhere in his Essay he says that the organ and harpsichord are difficult instruments for improvisation. The pianoforte and the clavichord are better suited for it.

Lord willing, I intend to keep trying.

Here is another clip, from last Sunday’s choral evensong:
O gladsome light (David Ashley White)

It is not without its problems, notably a couple of notes in the soprano. But it has strong connection and I am proud of the choir for the way they sang it. As with much of the choral music I post, I have put this on the Net because there are no other recordings on YouTube.

----
I have been reading with considerable benefit the Dialogue of Catherine of Siena, a few pages at a time. Yesterday’s insight: this musical work that I do is for the love of my neighbors, which in turn is love of God and in fact the only way that I can by concrete action express any love for God. I do the best that I can because I want it to bring people closer to God, rather than driving them away as bad church music can do, and that is because by God’s grace I care about these people. Or, as my motto from St. Augustine puts it, Cantare amantis est. The music can only exist when it springs from love for those who will hear it, and those with whom one is rehearsing and performing, and at root, this is love of God.

That is worth spending some time on the bench.

We are bound to Him, and not He to us, because before He was loved, He loved us. There it is, then: we cannot love Him with this first love. Yet I say that God demands of us, that as He has loved us without any second thoughts, so He should be loved by us. In what way can we do this, then? I tell you, through a means which he has established, by which we can love Him freely; that is, we can be useful, not to Him -- which is impossible -- but to our neighbor. To show the love that we have for Him, we ought to serve and love every rational creature and extend our charity to good and bad -- as much to one who does us ill service and criticizes us as to one who serves us.