Today we had lunch with a long-time friend and fellow church musician, Dana Marsh, who happened to be home with his family in California. Dana is no stranger to LCH, having given several duo countertenor recitals with Carl Crosier in the 1990s, and conducted the LCH choir in a Bach cantata for Epiphany in… Read More Catching up with Dana Marsh
Christmas around LCH takes on the nature of a marathon where endurance and training are the name of the game. I met with former student, Joey Fala, on Friday to review all the music for the three services (two on Christmas Eve and one on Christmas Day). As I handed him “The Book,” which I… Read More Christmas Eve at LCH
After researching the options for fine church music in the Los Angeles area, we decided to attend All Saints Episcopal Church in Beverly Hills. We had a very leisurely dinner in a local restaurant (wow, what a concept on Christmas Eve!) and arrived in plenty of time to attend the 11:00 pm Festival Choral Eucharist. The… Read More All Saints Christmas Eve, 2011
Every day I pass Hawaiian Rent All on Beretania Street, a company which has pithy sayings on its marquee. This month the sign lists the three stages of a man’s life: 1. He believes in Santa Claus. 2. He doesn’t believe in Santa Claus. 3. He is Santa Claus! I could say that there are… Read More Three stages of development
Last Sunday, I felt a tremendous sense of relief as I finished up the last notes of the postlude, which was Bach’s Fugue on the Magnificat. That was because it was my last service before I get on the plane to spend Christmas in California! However, I still played this afternoon’s rehearsal with the soloists,… Read More BC and secco recitative
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eChEWK_4B3Q] I found this excellent performance of Cantata 191 from the J. S. Bach Foundation (http://www.bachstiftung.ch/) on YouTube. Each month, one of Bach’s over 200 cantatas is performed in the town of Trogen, Switzerland. On Christmas Eve at LCH, there will be two fifteen-minute cantatas presented with orchestra in the half-hour before the late… Read More Bach to the familiar
On October 1-2, 2011, the Lutheran Church of Honolulu’s first Abendmusiken Concerts of the 2011-2012 season featured the music of Mozart and the debut of our fortepiano to the Honolulu community. I posted a picture of our instrument on this blog where it caught the attention of the editor of Early Music America magazine, who… Read More Our fortepiano is famous (maybe and maybe not!)
Can you believe that this Sunday will be the Last Sunday in Advent?! and traditionally we in liturgical churches have focused on Mary, and the song she sung when she was visited by her cousin Elizabeth, and “the child leaped within her womb.” The text of the Magnificat is taken from Luke 1:46-55: My soul proclaims… Read More Magnificat, the Song of Mary
Today, the Third Sunday of Advent, the LCH choir sang two motets by German Lutheran composers, “Ich bin eine Stimme eines Rufers” by Melchior Vulpius (1570-1615) and “Ich taufe mit Wasser” by Andreas Raselius (1563-1602). The first motet was sung for the Offertory and was conducted by Renson Madarang, a new voice in the tenor… Read More Young conductors
The 5:00 pm Family Candlelight Eucharist on Christmas Eve will showcase musical performances by our youth, called F.R.O.G.S. (Families Revering Our God in Song), or FROGS. Years ago when Pastor Fritz Fritschel was an Assisting Pastor on the LCH staff, he always used frog puppets to help tell the Children’s Sermon. And oh, all those… Read More FROGS on Christmas Eve