I have been so glued to my computer the last few days that today I feel like I’m coming up for air, finally a chance to breathe.

Last night, I really knew I was overwhelmed with work when I realized it was 9:00 pm and I realize that I haven’t yet read the morning newspaper, or done the daily crossword and sudoku! At least I put in my usual 2-1/2 mile walk and worked on my Spanish lessons as part of my daily routine. To say that I’ve been overwhelmed is an understatement!

In addition to my practicing for two concerts on September 6 and 11, I’ve had two huge projects for the Hawaii Chapter American Guild of Organists and Early Music Hawaii. You see, I’m the webmaster for both organizations and it falls to me to update their websites for the new season of concerts.

For the AGO, following an Executive Board meeting on Tuesday, there was a decision made to convert our mailing list to MailChimp, in anticipation of hosting three major organists in Hawaii this season. Not only did I have the task of learning a new software program (MailChimp) and importing our mailing list but I created a new Facebook page for the Hawaii AGO, with the hopes of expanding our reach beyond a simple mailing list. I also had to learn how to create a newsletter through MailChimp and after many hours of struggle, I finally distributed it last night. (Whew!)

More specifically, we will be hosting organist Katelyn Emerson for two concerts, one on October 10th at Central Union Church and the other on October 16th at All Saints Episcopal on Kauai. Katelyn will actually be in Hawaii with her mother for a couple weeks but will stay at my condo for the three days before her Honolulu concert.

Here’s the postcard I designed for Katelyn’s concerts:

If you do a search through my blog posts, you’ll read that I first met Katelyn at the Church of the Advent in 2015 when I was in Boston to attend the Boston Early Music Festival (“The young like the old music“). We had another close encounter when we were both in Iceland at the same time a year later, she to play an organ recital at Hallgrim’s Church in Reykjavik and me to play tourist! Sadly, we exchanged several text messages but didn’t actually meet in person.

If you’d like to see what I’ve done with the AGO website, you can check it out here. In addition to Katelyn’s concerts in Hawaii, Peter Dubois (of “With Heart and Voice” radio program on NPR) will be presenting an organ concert at All Saints Episcopal in Kaua’i, and Alcee Chriss whom I heard several years ago at the Organ Historical Society convention, will be playing a series of concerts in Hawaii in March 2022.

The next big project was the Early Music Hawaii website, based on the season brochure I designed a couple of weeks ago.

Recently the Early Music Hawaii board of directors (of which I am Vice-President and responsible for all print and online publicity materials) made the decision to switch to Stripe from PayPal to handle all its tickets and membership dues, yet another software program for me to learn. Thankfully, it wasn’t as difficult to set up the payment links as I thought, but it meant changing several pages on the website and updating it for the new season. Take a look at it here.

Hey! Last night I had to dress up in my concert black for a rehearsal/taping session for an Early Music Hawaii concert preview which will happen on August 21st.

However, I can’t relax completely—in addition to practicing for the Sunday service at Nuuanu Congregational Church, I also have to prepare the music for a funeral next week. Because I’m just not as familiar with the instrument at the church, I always need a good practice session to set up the organ.