— Organists and Organ Playing —

Reformation at Peace

October 31, 2021

This morning Jieun Newland and I got up early in order to drive to her church job at Peace Lutheran Church in Las Cruces, New Mexico, some 50 miles away. Because of the pandemic, I guessed that there were only about 40 people in attendance, even though the service is live-streamed as well. People who want to attend in-person have to register in advance.

Interior of Peace Lutheran Church

It being Reformation Day, a number of people wore red. Jieun had black clothes on but wore red street shoes before she changed into her organ shoes.

Jieun Newland at the organ console

She played settings of “A mighty fortress” (EIN FESTE BURG) by Johann Pachelbel and Johann Gottfried Walther for the prelude and offertory. For the postlude, Jieun programmed Calvin Hampton’s “The Primitives” from the Five Dances. While I turned pages for her, I was absolutely astounded at how quietly and attentively the congregation sat during the extremely dissonant postlude, which was perfect for Halloween! Jieun received many compliments on her stunning performance.

This was not my first introduction to prefilled juice and wafer communion sets but the first time I experienced it as used within the service. The “bread” is enclosed within a plastic sleeve and the sound of everyone pulling back the plastic wrap at the same time was a little unnerving—I guess I’m just not used to it! However I suppose this type of packaging has all been necessitated by the pandemic.

Prefilled grape juice and wafer for communion.

What I really appreciated was the brief time we spent in the music library. Jieun showed me a lot of organ music she found useful in service playing and when I got back to the house I placed a big order of new organ music. That’s the advantage of two church organists getting together: “What are you playing for All Saints” and “What are you playing for postludes during Advent,” etc. are some of the conversations we had. Jieun has given me a big boost of inspiration and now I’m looking forward to receiving and working on my new music.

After church I took a picture of rabbit eared cactus growing wild in the parking lot. To me it looks like Mickey Mouse ears!
We took a selfie at Sushi Freak where we picked up poke lunches.

On this trip I don’t think I’ve eaten so well in years! Ben and Jieun like to cook and appreciate fine food. Here are just a few samples of the food I’ve enjoyed in the last few days.

  • Ben smoked a big piece of salmon—so delicious!
  • We ate at Kiki’s, a local Mexican restaurant
  • A poke lunch after church.
  • Homemade pizza, with eggplant, goat cheese and portabello mushrooms
  • Homemade pizza with smoked salmon and goat cheese
  • Jieun made a caesar salad

This trip has been a great break and lots of fun for me, but tomorrow it’s back to Honolulu via El Paso-Denver-San Francisco-Honolulu and I’ll get home very late. Back to the salt mines on Tuesday!