When I woke up this morning, my husband said to me, “I heard you talking in your sleep!”

I told him I had just dreamt of playing a service on the Beckerath organ, except that the big problem was that I wasn’t sitting in the middle of the organ bench like I am supposed to–I was sitting on the left side because I was sharing the bench with the former pastor! Consequently I couldn’t find any of the correct pedals and was making all kinds of mistakes (which is not like me!) and things got so bad that I finally had to stop! I tried playing the postlude, which in my dream was Jeremiah Clarke’s “Trumpet Voluntary” and that was also a disaster, so I just stopped and ran behind the organ to hide. (Hmmm….I wonder what this dream means!)

This is what Psychology Today says about nightmares:

A nightmare is a dream occurring during rapid eye movement (REM) sleep that results in feelings of strong terror, fear, distress or extreme anxiety. This phenomenon tends to occur in the latter part of the night and oftentimes awakens the sleeper, who is likely to recall the content of the dream.

Most nightmares may be a normal reaction to stress, and some clinicians believe they aid people in working through traumatic events. Frequent occurrence of nightmares becomes a disorder when it impairs social, occupational and other important areas of functioning. At this point, it may be referred to as Nightmare Disorder (formerly Dream Anxiety Disorder) or “repeated nightmares.”

“Repeated nightmares” is defined more specifically as a series of nightmares with a recurring theme.

I have a recurring dream in which I walking on stage to play a concert. To my horror I’ve never seen the organ before, and trying to find the right stops to pull is impossible! Another time I dreamt of playing an organ in which the keys lit up in different colors every time they were depressed. That freaked me out!

It is so strange that I had the dream about making so many mistakes. My upcoming Bach concerts are just about three weeks away, and I have never felt more prepared. I have never before (at least, in a long time) had the luxury of being able to focus and practice a particular set of repertoire without being distracted by Sunday service obligations.

I feel I am definitely READY to share this incredible music with my friends.