Last weekend was Candlemas, and there was a special High Mass that I played at St. Mark’s which included offerings by the choir, a candlelight procession throughout the neighborhood, and a delicious potluck dinner afterwards. I made another batch of the fresh cranberry shortbread to bring to the potluck!

But what instantly transported me to another place was the prelude I chose by Oskar Lindberg (1887-1955) in a piece called “Gammal fäbodpsalm.” The title means “Old chalet hymn”. The composer was organist of Engelbrekt church in Stockholm, but he came from Dalarna (Dalecarlia) in the north. The nature there is beautiful with high mountains, deep untouched forests, rivers and waterfalls. The tune is from this part of the country and he often describes the dramatic scenery in this part of Sweden in his music.

I never knew this piece until my visit to Stockholm and the Uppenbarelsekyrkan organ by Gerhard Grenzing in 2022. You may remember that I wrote a post about this incredible instrument (“A stunning instrument“) and how I met the church’s organist, Martin Blomquist. Martin let me play the organ for a couple of hours, and then I asked him to play something for me. This is what he played.

I found it so achingly beautiful but somehow forgot about it in all the rash of all the other music I have to prepare every week.

By some miracle, I found the piece in an Augsburg Fortress collection of Epiphany music and programmed it for last weekend’s Candlemas service. Of course I didn’t have the luxury of playing that wonderful Grenzing organ, but I thought the registrations I chose came pretty close to Martin’s rendition.

And — by some strange coincidence, my organist friend Jonathan Dimmock asked me about the Stockholm organ this very week! He’ll be playing a concert in Stockholm but it turns out it won’t be on this instrument.

Not too long ago, I found this meme on Facebook:

I find this to be absolutely true! Because I have TWO church jobs with two different kinds of congregations, I don’t make it easy on myself and play the same repertoire at the two churches. Most weekends I have three services, but sometimes there are weekends with four services, and sometimes even five services! I program different preludes, postludes, and other voluntaries at each church, and except for possibly Christmas and Easter, when the two churches likely choose the same hymns, every weekend i normally play a total of perhaps 10-11 hymns. That’s a lot of hymn verses to keep track of! And a ton of music to learn every weekend.

The question was raised once at a church council meeting: If you already have a large collection of music in the library, why do you need to have a budget for new music? I can say the same thing about my personal collection of organ music. Even though I have a HUGE collection of music, why is it that I am forever on the hunt for new music and constantly spending money on acquiring even more? And if I have such a big repertoire, why is it that I am constantly learning new pieces since it would probably take years to play everything in my personal library? Good question!

I’m looking forward to Lent when, in keeping with the somber mood of the season, I won’t be playing postludes, and that will be one less piece to practice..