In my last posting about Jeremy Wong, Naomi Castro, Karol Nowicki, Michal Nowicki and Keane Ishii leaving Hawaii, I didn’t include several other key people in the choral music community who are also moving away. I certainly knew about these other people and the omission certainly wasn’t deliberate on my part —but it’s simply not… Read More More goodbyes
In spite of only coming back to Hawaii on Tuesday, I’ve had to hit the ground running and will be playing several different organs within the week. Next weekend will especially be busy because of a Friday night rehearsal and Sunday concert at St. John Vianney, playing the prelude for Pastor Fritz Fritschel‘s funeral service… Read More Planning ahead for a busy week
This afternoon I reconnected with Diane Amidon, who lives in nearby Raleigh, NC. She and I first became acquainted when we were both freshmen at USC School of Music—she was a soprano voice major, and I knew her then as Diane Rose. I lost track of her after sophomore year and didn’t find out that… Read More Reminiscing and reconnecting
In the tower of Duke University Chapel is a 50-bell carillon, played on weekdays at 5:00 p.m. and before and after Sunday worship services and special events. There are about 200 winding steps to the top but yesterday I was privileged to ride the elevator up with the University’s carillonneur, Samuel Hammond. This was my… Read More The view from the top
As I was listening to my former student Joey Fala play Choral Vespers at Duke University tonight, I thought he must surely be in hog heaven! I thought back to a day sixteen years ago when I first met Joey at Iolani School, who used to always come to chapel to hear me practice. His… Read More Hog heaven
What is the seating capacity of Duke University Chapel? That’s the question I typed into my phone at the concert by the Tallis Scholars last night. The answer I got was 1600, and although I couldn’t see all the way to the back, the building looked pretty full to me. The Tallis Scholars is a… Read More Heavenly sublime
And I haven’t even gotten to Amsterdam yet! I left Honolulu on Tuesday afternoon and stopped briefly in Los Angeles and Houston before arriving at Raleigh-Durham airport about noon on Wednesday. Of course I didn’t sleep a wink—what was running through my head was Olivier Messiaen’s L’Ascension suite from Steven Severin’s recital on Sunday! Even… Read More Tulip-crazy
What time is it in the U.K.? I typed this in my browser repeatedly last night to make sure I knew what time it was in England. You see, I was counting down the minutes it would be exactly April 4th at 10:00 am in England—that was when tickets would be available for this year’s… Read More 11 time zones away
When one steps inside St. Mark’s Cathedral Seattle and attends a worship service, one is immediately struck by the fact that … “this is a sacred and holy space; something mystical and magical happens here.” It is the huge space, the magnificent Flentrop Organ, it is the rolling acoustics that make music so extraordinary in this… Read More Mysticism and the sense of the sacred
The following speech was given by Karl Bachman at the Oahu Choral Society’s Vivace! fundraising dinner at the Bishop Museum, March 3, 2018. We are here to honor Katherine Crosier this evening, but I would like to begin by thanking the Oahu Choral Society for asking me to speak a word on her behalf. In… Read More “Cain’t say, No!”