I got back from Kona last night after a grueling three-hour dress rehearsal and then a short break before a sold-out performance of the Kona Choral Society concert (Schubert, Mass in G and Handel, Messiah). Unfortunately the dress rehearsal and the concert had to be scheduled on the same day due to logistics, and couldn’t… Read More “We are going on a journey…”
This weekend I am looking forward to joining the Kona Choral Society in their performance of Schubert, Mass in G and Handel, Messiah on Sunday, Dec. 7th at 4:00 pm at the Sheraton Keauhou Resort. The concert marks the choir’s 25th anniversary with the same program it sang 25 years ago. Although the chorus numbers… Read More On to Kona
So yesterday I was feeling just a tad smug when I read this posting on the Facebook Organists Association page: So, while having breakfast with my pastor today, he takes out his iPhone and begins playing recordings of me that he has made while standing at the back of church (at masses that he was… Read More The organ whisperer
You remember the legend of Sisyphus, don’t you?Sisyphus was a bad king whose punishment for his deceitfulness was to push a huge boulder up a hill, only to see it roll back to the bottom again. I had recalled this Greek myth in a prior post about playing Jeremiah Clarke’s Trumpet Voluntary over and over and over… Read More Bridging the Centuries
All Saints was last weekend, but it has turned out to be an entire week of remembrance. All week long at Iolani chapel services, students and faculty were invited to bring pictures of their loved ones to be displayed and candles were lit in their memory. Bob Kane, who was last week’s speaker, spoke again:… Read More A week of remembrance
The Lord be with you And also with you. Let us pray: God of Day and Night, Courage and Timidity, Joy and Sadness, Life and Death: You have brought us safely through another day and another week. As the skies have darkened, let us gather together in contemplation and prayer. Strengthen us as we remember… Read More Evening Prayer for Carl
Today Naomi Castro posted this photo of bass Keane Ishii on her FaceBook page with the news that he has accepted the position of choir director of Holy Nativity Episcopal Church. She wrote: Bittersweet times this rehearsal. Saying goodbye to my long-time LCH brother, Keane Ishii, who is going on to do great things as choral director… Read More New beginnings
I’m on the Big Island of Hawai’i for two performances of Handel Messiah with the Kona Music Society, conducted by Susan McCreary Duprey. I was met at the airport by Joann Roberts, a soprano in the choir, whose doctor prescribed singing in the choir to improve her breathing following open heart surgery! We met the… Read More ‘Messiah’ comes to Waimea
Last Friday night, Early Music Hawaii presented a concert called “Oratorio,” 17th century sacred drama from Rome to Handel, in the reverberant acoustics of St. Theresa’s Co-Cathedral. Some of the town’s very best early musicians participated — and the dress rehearsal with choir and orchestra was held on Thursday night. The personnel for whom this… Read More Double, triple, quadruple!
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