Will they or won’t they? What I’m talking about is my Easter Day postlude this year—I will be playing an arrangement of Handel’s Hallelujah Chorus for organ and three trumpets, no choir. Tradition has it that people stand for the Hallelujah Chorus, because “it’s tradition.” At the end of the service, the pastor gives the… Read More Will they? Or won’t they?
My organist friend, Barbara Adler, suggested that on my tour of London churches, I include St. George’s Hanover Square on the itinerary. So that’s where Joan Ishibashi and I went first! St. George’s is known because George Frideric Handel was a parishioner at this church for 35 years, although there was no mention of his… Read More Handel-Hendrix-Haydn?
One of the pieces that I accompanied last Sunday at the Punahou Chapel 50th Anniversary celebration was Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus,” from Messiah. The piece was done at the dedication service 50 years ago, and the chaplains wanted to include it in the 50th anniversary service too. Now, you have to understand that when I am… Read More A formidable task
“I hate this piece!” That’s what one of my organ students told me at her lesson yesterday, not just once, but several times.”I hate this piece! It’s just so hard!” Yes, this is a difficult piece for an organist to play, but one of those “must learn, must do” pieces for organists, since so many… Read More “Hallelujah” Chorus
If there is any way you could spend an hour (really, 59 minutes and 10 seconds!) between now and Christmas, I invite you to watch this fascinating BBC video about how George Frideric Handel composed Messiah to raise money to support the Foundling Hospital. Based on my offhand comments in my last post on Handel being… Read More The story behind Messiah
Last week was a week of calm for me since I wasn’t able to teach any organ lessons — the reason being was that we hosted organbuilder Hans-Ulrich Erbsloeh from Hamburg, Germany and his colleague, Bernharndt Becker, while they replaced the worn pulldowns on the pedals on the Beckerath organ. It turned out to be… Read More A week of calm before the storm
No, that’s not a typo. I’m referring to Jakob Handl (1550-1591), also known as Jacobus Gallus and even Jacobus Handelius, a Slovenian composer who wrote a lot of sacred music and whose music the LCH choir is singing this Sunday. Named Jakob Petelin at birth (meaning “rooster”), Handl used the Latin form of his name… Read More “Handl” with care