When I was in college, I had “socially distant” organ lessons with my teacher, although of course, that term was completely unknown in 1968. It was at the University of Southern California in the “prehistoric” days when my lessons took place in Bovard Auditorium and the organ console was down in front of the stage. Obviously it was not a tracker organ!

My teacher, Dr. Irene Robertson, always sat some distance away from the console. In fact I remember her sitting to my right, at the end of the first row of seats, probably some 10′ -12′ away. She was the complete opposite of “warm and fuzzy,” and after my senior recital, she said something to the effect of, “Well, you didn’t embarrass me today.” (Sorry, she and I never had a warm relationship!)

I do remember her sending me a congratulatory postcard—which I saved somewhere— after I wrote to let her know I passed all my entrance exams in graduate school.) I just now tried Googling her, and found out that she was the first woman Dean of the Los Angeles Chapter American Guild of Organists in 1942, during World War II.)

I went from that rather distant teacher-student relationship at USC to Westminster Choir College, where my teacher, Joan Lippincott, was the complete opposite. Even though she sat in a chair next to the organ bench, often she was practically in your lap, reaching over to demonstrate a passage. I’m afraid that I’ve adopted her style of teaching and frequently say (as she said to me), “Slide over,” so I can demonstrate how to play a particular passage.

Today, in my apartment, I taught my first in-person organ lesson in months. As you can see by the photo above, we were comfortably distant from each other, and we both wore masks. I was able to use the keyboard to demonstrate musical passages as well as to play “duets” to keep the rhythm steady.

The Lutheran Church of Honolulu, where I’ve been teaching all these years, closed its campus for music lessons and other activities from mid-March and I still have not received an announcement on their reopening. Oh, I have had some success in teaching remotely via FaceTime with one of my students, and it was just fine. She and I both have Apple iPhones and Apple iPads.

But I ran into problems when another student who had an Android phone tried to Skype and Zoom with my Apple iPhone. (There is no FaceTime app for Android phones.) We set up the video so I could at least see her hands on the keyboard, but then her playing started and stopped… and started and stopped… and started and stopped … sounding extremely uneven rhythmically—and not at all in the way it would have sounded in real time.

My computer nerd son told me the problem was insufficient bandwidth, whatever that means, in addition to relying upon WiFi rather than a hardwired connection to the internet… and the whole situation was due to her having an Android phone and me having an Apple iPhone. Speech is fine, but the two types of phones are completely incompatible for music. At least, this was my experience.

Out of desperation we tried having her just call my landline so hopefully I could just hear her play over the phone, dismissing any hopes of seeing her via videocall. But then I found out my telephone handsets wouldn’t last more than ten minutes before the batteries died and I had to end up having her call my cell phone after all… and besides, the sound wasn’t much better.

Because the guest parking lot in my building was closed until last week, I couldn’t have my students take lessons in my apartment before now. But now perhaps the game is changing.

I’m happy to say this “Social Distancing Organ Lesson” was a complete success! We both wore masks throughout, and I was able to demonstrate several passages on my own keyboard without my getting close to her. Afterwards, I made sure that she washed her hands before going home.

The new normal!