I have returned home now, and no matter what my connections, that trip back to Hawaii is l-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-n-g! (over 24 hours). The only thing I regret is that I left my jacket at Charles de Gaulle Paris airport security, and didn’t realize it until I started getting cold on the plane. By the time I… Read More Sights and sounds of Lorraine and environs
Someone on the Historic Organ Study Tour (HOST) asked me, “Did you think that this was a study tour or a playing tour?” and I replied that the reason I signed up for this tour was for the experience of playing all these historic organs. Out of the thirty organs we played on the tour,… Read More HOST insights and miscellany
Today we visited Mirecourt, a town which is known for its musical instrument making, primarily stringed instruments. The Église Notre-Dame-de-la-Nativité is where we went to play the organ and what is remarkable, is that you have to enter the organ loft by an outside stairway, something I’d never think I’d see in Europe! (There is… Read More To go up, you go OUT!
Today’s visit to the Cathedral Saint Dié was pure joy, not only for us Historic Organ Study Tour visitors, but for the town of Saint Dié-des-Vosges where they would install a new Bishop a couple hours after our visit. You see, the building was left in ruins following a devastating bomb attack on November 9, 1944.… Read More The old made new again
When I saw that the first two organs we were going to visit today had French pedalboards (“Pedalier à la française), I said aloud, “Uh oh, I’d better play something for manuals only!” and the person next to me said, “You are just going to have to bite the bullet and give it a try. You… Read More Bite the bullet!
Tonight, many of us on the Historic Organ Study Tour attended the special St. Fiacre mass at the Cathedral Notre Dame de l’Annonciation in Nancy, France, and it was a spectacle the likes of which I’ve never seen! We had visited the Cathedral a couple of days ago and they were just starting to… Read More St. Fiacre, the patron saint of gardening
Today was the first time we heard organs that were in tune and it happens to be the sixth day of the Historic Organ Study Tour! Now, I don’t want to disparage at all the fifteen organs we have heard to date, but let’s just say that they have been “charming,” “quaint” or “so French,” —just… Read More At last—organs in tune!
I’ve been waiting to play François Couperin’s “Tierce en taille” from the Messe pour les Paroisses, and finally got that opportunity when we visited the organ at Sarrebourg’s Église Saint-Barthélémy. Today is Day 5 of the Historical Organ Study Tour of Lorraine, France, and it was not until today that we have heard and played… Read More French Classic heaven
That’s what I heard someone from our tour say as we were climbing yet another spiral stairway up to the organ loft. “OSHA would never allow these dangerous steps!” Apart from our first church visit today, someone counted 67 steps at the Église Saint Sébastien and over 70 steps at the Cathedral Notre Dame de… Read More They’d NEVER allow this in the U.S.!
On this Historical Organ Study Tour so far we have climbed a number of vertical spiral stairways to access the organ console. But today at the Cathedral St. Étienne in Metz was the first time we ever crawled up to a true swallow’s nest organ. In case you’ve never heard the term before, here is… Read More The swallow’s nest organ