Nobody listens to CDs anymore. My son actually said these words to me nine years ago, when we were remodeling our condo and had a contractor build us a huge entertainment cabinet which had storage for an astounding 32 custom-built shelves for compact disc storage, in addition to display shelves for our glassware collection, and… Read More End of an era
There was an extensive interview with my former student, Joey Fala, in the current issue of the Iolani Bulletin, the publication of Iolani School where I was the Chapel Organist for twenty years and where I met Joey when he was in fifth grade. Take a look at the Tag Cloud—either in the column to… Read More Still making news!
I was pleasantly surprised to open today’s Star-Advertiser newspaper to find a gigantic interview with Sophia Stark, this year’s winner of the Miss Hawaii Volunteer Teen. I am going to repost the article here, and add that Sophia and her brother Raphael, have studied organ with me for four years but have had to take… Read More My organ student!
Once in a while the secular world gets a peek into the world of church music … and that happens whenever there is a state funeral. Today the world got a peek into the best of Anglican church music at the funeral of Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth II for 73 years. I understand… Read More Once in a while
On Easter Day in the middle of carrying food and decorations down to the 8th floor recreation deck for my Easter brunch, I received a phone call in the elevator. It was Kathy Hallman, daughter of organist Nyle Hallman, who said to me, “Kathy, you’re probably in the middle of Easter cooking, but Mom and… Read More Perfect pitch not needed
In another move to normalcy, this week I’m hosting Jason Anderson and Sal Salinas as houseguests. You’ll recall that Jason is the second director of the Compline Choir in Seattle, succeeding Peter Hallock in 2009, our former business partner in our music publishing business, Ionian Arts. Jason wrote his doctoral dissertation on “The Life and… Read More Post-Easter houseguests
I was very pleasantly surprised this morning to see that a performance of Bach’s Concerto in A minor for four harpsichords was featured in CNN’s 5 Things to know for today for April 9, 2021. When I played the YouTube video by the Netherlands Bach Society, I was immediately transported to the nights of October… Read More Four harpsichord concerto
Since I can’t travel to Europe at this time, I’m continuing the long process of updating my old posts to relink the photos, a time-consuming task but one which is bringing back many wonderful memories. In many cases, I’m adding even more pictures to those I had posted previously. Luckily, every one of my 43,000… Read More Armchair traveling
Yesterday’s text message from organist Dan Werning, now living in Bangkok, Thailand, introduced us to Okey Okafor, Nigerian organist at Christ Church. I was so fascinated by Okey’s story that Dan encouraged me to write to him! My musical journey started started when I was a kid. My father was an organist in a church… Read More Easter in Bangkok
Today is Easter Day 2021, and we took a step towards normalcy. Oh, this doesn’t mean I played for church as normal as I didn’t play a single note on the organ today, since I recorded my organ voluntaries and the hymns over two weeks ago! What seemed almost “normal” was to see my long-time… Read More A step towards normal?!