|
Today our new tracker touch Hauptwerk setup has arrived from Italy. The first thing was to unpack the keyboards and prepare them to put it in place on the table. After unpacking our new Hauptwerk keyboard setup Ausra and I put it on the table. It was a difficult task but we made it! Stay tuned for the future updates.
Our Hauptwerk setup can be ordered from PMK: https://www.pedamidikit.org/index.html Thank you for your support! You get early access and I get to keep going.
Comments
Vidas: Hello and welcome to Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast!
Ausra: This is a show dedicated to helping you become a better organist. V: We’re your hosts Vidas Pinkevicius... A: ...and Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene. V: We have over 25 years of experience of playing the organ A: ...and we’ve been teaching thousands of organists online from 89 countries since 2011. V: So now let’s jump in and get started with the podcast for today. A: We hope you’ll enjoy it! Vidas: Hi guys! This is Vidas. Ausra: And Ausra. V: Let’s start episode 649 of Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast. This question was sent by Bob, and he’s taking our Melodic Dictation Course Level 1. He writes, "Vidas, I have a question about 4 kl. 280 in Melodic Dictation Week 9. I thought that if there is a pickup measure in a song that the last measure of the song and the first measure should add up to one measure. But in this case there is a rest contained in the last measure, so the two measures do not add up to one measure. How do I decide whether I should add the rest or not? Or is it one of those times that it does not matter? Thanks. Bob" 
V: Well, first of all, this is not a song, because song has to have either words or to be a vocal piece.
A: Sure. V: So it’s an exercise then. A: That’s right. V: More correct word. But you see what he means, there is a pickup and a full measure in the… A: Well, I get these kind of questions from my students all the time. And because that’s how we teach them how the pickup is. And we say that if there is a pickup, then with the last measure it should be one whole measure. But it’s not always the case, and as it is in this case, it’s not. And it’s okay. It’s perfectly normal. It would be perfectly normal even if in this last measure there would be a half step - half note - yes? And there would still be a pickup of eighth note at the beginning. It’s fine. You could find it both ways in music. It’s perfectly normal. V: Yes. A: Actually no - and that last note, if it’s like quarter, dotted quarter note, or it would be a half note, it wouldn’t matter so much, because in general if we are talking about piano, and I believe you probably played this dictation on the piano, the sound dies while holding it, so. But often you cannot tell precisely how long the last note actually was because of that specification of the piano sound dying. It’s not like the organ. V: You are correct, and also we have to keep in mind that this basically foundational understanding - that if you have a pickup, then the last measure should not be complete - is only taught basically in the first grade so that kindergarten or very early schoolchildren should understand this concept: pickup is part of the last measure. But then when you get to real pieces, real musical compositions or longer exercises, you get all kinds of things. For example, just before we started recording this conversation, I was downloading my own video, “Nine Steps in Mastering Schumann’s Canon in B Major, Opus 56, No. 6.” And I have this long, an hour-long video, and I wanted to cut the last part, the last step basically, and make it a complete short video demonstration of this wonderful canon. And guess what? This canon does have a pickup of a beat, one quarter note in the beginning. And while we were talking right here, I looked up the score, and the last measure, look - this is a complete measure, not two - one half note and a final barline, but dotted half note like ¾ meter complete measure. A: Yes, that’s often the case. So it’s not an exception actually, it’s quite normal. V: Yes. But as Ausra said, when you play it on the piano, it’s difficult to understand when exactly the sound ends, especially at the end, when the last note is sounding. If you had like 3-note or 4-note chord playing with both hands, it’s easier, because more sounds are depressed all sounding at the same time, right? And you then can pick up the ending of the sound more easily. A: Well if I would be a teacher that would have to grade this dictation, I would find it correctly if it would be written half note at the end, or as is given in this case where it’s a quarter note with a dot and then the rest of eighth, and even if it would be only dotted quarter note, it would be fine with me. V: Mmhm. I see. You could say that this measure could be complete, incomplete - either way is fine, right? A: Yes. V: I agree. I guess Bob can find many more exercises like this in this Melodic Dictation Course, and he seems to enjoy writing those dictations. Do your students enjoy writing dictations, Ausra? A: Some of them do, but most of them don’t. V: Why not? A: Well, they can’t do it very well. V: Can’t or can? A: Can’t. V: So they don’t want to improve? A: Sure. Especially now when we have online teaching. You know, just like two days ago I asked them if they could tell me which way they like my dictations more, because I was using two different programs. One, at the beginning I was actually using the Rode Mic, and was recording them with my phone. Later I switched to recording through OBS Studio and was using our new mic, very powerful one; and later I switched to Piano Tech program. And then I asked them if they could tell the difference between Piano Tech and the earlier recordings with the mic. Only one of my students could tell me why she liked Piano Tech more, that the recording is better quality and she might do it as loud as she wishes. Everybody else couldn’t tell the difference. So I realized they would just keep rewriting these dictations from somebody else. V: They’re not listening to your dictations. A: Sure. V: That’s terrible. A: And all this effort that I put in and all those hours that I spent recording those dictations they are just going nowhere. V: Except when you’re telling it. Now maybe if somebody from our subscribers can go to your channel on YouTube and start writing these dictations, yes? A: Sure. Yes, there are multiple choices, because I have big list starting from last spring. There are dictations that I listed like A, B, C, D, E Levels dictations, A being the easiest, one voice dictations, B and C two voice dictations, and then D and E being the three-part dictations, so, and there was also a section of ear training on my YouTube channel, where you can also find various types of dictations. V: So you just have to find a playlist called “Ear Training,” right? A: Yes. V: And obviously, for obvious reasons, there is no music, score on the screen for people to look at while they are writing dictations so that they only use their ear, but if you would like to write dictations and then have answer key, then check out my Melodic Dictation Master Course, Level 1. The one that Bob is taking. And then you will have not only all your files, but also answer keys with scores. A: Yes. V: All right guys, this was Vidas. A: And Ausra. V: Please send us more of your questions. We love helping you grow. And remember, when you practice, A: Miracles happen. V: This podcast is supported by Total Organist - the most comprehensive organ training program online. A: It has hundreds of courses, coaching and practice materials for every area of organ playing, thousands of instructional videos and PDF's. You will NOT find more value anywhere else online... V: Total Organist helps you to master any piece, perfect your technique, develop your sight-reading skills, and improvise or compose your own music and much much more… A: Sign up and begin your training today at organduo.lt and click on Total Organist. And of course, you will get the 1st month free too. You can cancel anytime. V: If you like our organ music, you can also support us on Patreon and BMC and get early access to our videos. A: Find out more at patreon.com/secretsoforganplaying and buymeacoffee.com/organduo Last weekend we moved our Hauptwerk setup to our friend's apartment and now are waiting for the delivery of 3 tracker keyboard block and pedalboard from PedaMidiKit.
We are keeping only 1 Nektar MIDI keyboard. Today I setup our new Mac Mini, installed touch base driver on the Dell touch screen and tried it out.
Vidas: Hello and welcome to Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast!
Ausra: This is a show dedicated to helping you become a better organist. V: We’re your hosts Vidas Pinkevicius... A: ...and Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene. V: We have over 25 years of experience of playing the organ A: ...and we’ve been teaching thousands of organists online from 89 countries since 2011. V: So now let’s jump in and get started with the podcast for today. A: We hope you’ll enjoy it! Vidas: Hi guys! This is Vidas. Ausra: And Ausra. V: Let’s start episode 649 of Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast. This question was sent by Doug, and he answered my question, What is your goal in organ playing, and what are some challenges that he faces when he tries to reach this goal. So the goal is to become a church organist, and basically advanced in hymn playing. And the challenges are three:
It’s interesting, right? Shall we talk about the goal, or about challenges first? A: Well, it’s up to you. V: All right, let’s talk a little bit about the goal: To become a church organist and excel in hymn playing. Obviously it’s a good goal if people want to apply their skills in a church setting. A: Sure, it’s actually a very common goal. V: And obviously hymn playing would be the bulk of what you do in church. A: Sure, especially if you are like in the Protestant congregation. V: Yes. Some other denominations require psalm playing, anthems, accompaniments. If you have a choir then even you have to direct the choir, lead the choir, accompaniments like that are also sometimes important. And it wouldn’t hurt to play some organ pieces, liturgical organ pieces for prelude and postlude at least. A: Sure. V: If not for communion or offertory. But I guess hymn playing can substitute those things, too. But congregation would thank you I think if you played a short piece at the beginning of the service and at the end of the service as well. A: But definitely leading the congregational singing and hymn accompanying is probably the most important tool for church organist. V: Yes. Once you can play hymns, you can advance a little bit further in real organ playing, solo organ playing too. Talk about pedal techniques, I don’t know what he means. What do you think he means with challenge in pedal techniques? A: Well, since most of us come to organ bench after having some piano background, usually the pedal is the most scary part of playing the organ. V: So maybe it’s safe to say that he, in general, struggles to play pedals, right? A: Yes. V: So what can we recommend? Probably recommending Pedal Virtuoso Master Course could be a little bit too advanced for him. If you only want to be church organist, maybe you don’t need pedal scales and arpeggios for that. But we have another smaller course, Pedal Playing, I think Workshop it’s called or Mini Course - 10 days I think Workshop basically, where you play for 10 days basic pedal exercises, and can afterwards, I think, play bass lines of any hymn without much difficulty. A: That might be very useful. V: So that’s one recommendation. Another challenge he faces is that he wants to take a hymnal, and his hymnal only has soprano line if I understand correctly, and then he needs to convert or harmonize it in four parts, swell, great, and pedals. First of all, you don’t need to play on two manuals, hymns. A: Definitely not. You could do that with accompaniment sometimes but really not always. V: Yes. Just one manual is fairly sufficient. A: Because most often you play on one manual you do like soprano and alto voice with your right hand, and then tenor voice with your left hand, and bass line with the pedal. V: Exactly. So for this, obviously we are talking about the skill in harmonization. Well, if, you are obviously an advanced harmony teacher, what would you recommend? A: Well, I don’t know how well he knows music theory in general, but definitely that’s a challenge. If you are uneducated in music, haven’t had any music theory lessons, then I wouldn’t recommend for you to harmonize hymns for yourself. Because there are so many hymnals. Maybe you could use the harmonization for a particular hymn from the other hymnal that has all the four parts written in. V: Well exactly. Let’s say you need to play four or five hymns that week. Your pastor or priest selected hymns for you, and you need to figure out the accompaniment. If you are proficient in harmonization, you could supply alto, tenor and bass parts yourself, but if not you could look up that kind of the same hymn setting, let’s say online. Just Google. Cyber Hymnal I think is one of those sources you could find a lot of useful hymns and different harmonizations too. So you just print it out and play what’s written over there. A: Sure, because if you look at any given hymnal, you could find hymns written in, composed in various styles. And being able to harmonize them yourself, you really need to understand the difference between the styles. Because if it’s four-part hymn let’s say from 17th century Germany, it would be harmonized in one style, but if the melody is based on Gregorian chant, then completely different rules of harmonization would apply. So basically, it’s always a challenge, and if let’s say the melody of the hymn is composed at the end of the 19th century, then definitely your harmonization will have more advanced and more chromatic. So it’s a challenge really, even for professionals. V: And we can’t forget contemporary melodies, right? Which work well with let’s say, jazz style chords or pop-oriented music chords. That’s also a different style, right? A: So I guess the best suggestion would be really try to obtain those hymns that would be harmonized for you already and you wouldn’t have to worry about it. Because learning to harmonize them yourself, it’s a long process. V: Yes, but if you really want to learn to harmonize, don’t jump into our I think Organists, Harmony for Organists Level 1 Course straight away if you don’t know basic chords yet. If you don’t know three-, four-note chords and their inversions and how they are resolved into tonic chords and the rules for resolution, then you need to take Basic Chord Workshop first, where I teach those chords in one hand setting, basically all those chords could be played with one hand, not two hands like in four part setting. In closed position basically. So that’s the preliminary skill you need to master, foundations of those course, and then you can move on to Harmony for Organists Level 1. A: Yes. It’s very, it’s a long process, but it’s worth trying, because you will get really useful skill for your future. V: And the last thing he struggles is to find Grand Orgue or Hauptwerk conversion for home organ to practice on. Obviously it’s very nice to have virtual organ, either Grand Orgue or Hauptwerk for home use, because you can listen and hear the sounds of real instruments produced virtually. Each pipe has been recorded, not generated synthetically like a synthesizer, but organ samples have produced and went to the church, recorded each and every pipe in several different ways: short, medium length, long length of each pipe and then created a sample set, which obviously encompasses the acoustics of the church as well. If it has reverberation, you would get the same feeling as being in the church while playing that sample set. So that’s what Hauptwerk or Grand Orgue uses today. Except Grand Orgue is no longer developed. The basic version of Grand Orgue was developed at first, it was like the first version of Hauptwerk I think, which was made open source, free of charge right now. And then it stopped being developed because it’s free. There’s no incentive for developers’ work on the software if you don’t get any reimbursement. A: Well, but if you don’t want to play repertoire, perform recitals at home, only to learn hymns, then I think it’s quite sufficient. V: Yeah, at least for starters. You don’t know what you will need five years from now, all right? So maybe if you start with free software like Grand Orgue, it doesn’t hurt right now. So you could look up at our tools what we use for Hauptwerk setup on our website we have: organduo.lt/tools and you will see how we have set up Hauptwerk at our home, maybe you will get some ideas for yourself. A: Yes, why not? V: Thank you guys, this was Vidas. A: And Ausra. V: Please send us more of your questions. We love helping you grow. And remember, when you practice, A: Miracles happen. V: This podcast is supported by Total Organist - the most comprehensive organ training program online. A: It has hundreds of courses, coaching and practice materials for every area of organ playing, thousands of instructional videos and PDF's. You will NOT find more value anywhere else online... V: Total Organist helps you to master any piece, perfect your technique, develop your sight-reading skills, and improvise or compose your own music and much much more… A: Sign up and begin your training today at organduo.lt and click on Total Organist. And of course, you will get the 1st month free too. You can cancel anytime. V: If you like our organ music, you can also support us on Patreon and get free CD’s. A: Find out more at patreon.com/secretsoforganplaying  Would you like to master An Wasserflussen Babylon by Johann Pachelbel? I've created this practice score with complete fingering so that our students could master this chorale prelude efficiently, saving many hours of frustration and achieving ideal articulation - articulate legato. Thanks to Juan Osorno for his meticulous transcription from slow motion video. Basic level. PDF score. 2 pages. Check it out here This score is free for Total Organist students. I practiced this sweet piece quite a bit. Couldn't record it in one sitting. Coordination between hands and feet gave me more trouble than I thought it would. But today finally I succeed. Hope you will enjoy Alessandria sample set by Piotr Grabowski!
Score: https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/... Yesterday was Palm Sunday and I mistakenly recorded Hosanna Filio David by Jeanne Demessieux thinking it's her Vexilla Regis. Luckily Matthew Pearson on YouTube commented that it's a wrong piece and expressed hope that I would record Vexilla Regis for real. So today I'm very happy to be able to share with you this video. I'm using Alessandria sample set by Piotr Grabowski and my Hauptwerk setup. Hope you will enjoy it!
Score: https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/... Introit from Dominica Resurrectionis, Op. 65 | Charles Tournemire | Hauptwerk Saint-Jean-de-Luz4/4/2021 For the day of Resurrection I would like to share with you Introit from Dominica Resurrectionis, Op. 65 cycle from L'Orgue Mystique by the French 20th century composer and organist Charles Tournemire. I hope you will enjoy the sounds of Saint-Jean-de-Luz sample set on my Hauptwerk setup!
Score: https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/... In this video I'm playing In manus tuas by Jeanne Demessieux. I'm using Hauptwerk Alessandria sample set by Piotr Grabowski. Hope you will enjoy it!
Score: https://www.sheetmusicplus.com/title/... In this video I'm playing Canon in B Major, Op. 56, No. 6 by Robert Schumann. Hope you will enjoy the sound! I will use Sauer organ from Chemnitz sample set by Sonus Paradisi and my Hauptwerk setup. Hope you will enjoy it!
Score: https://secrets-of-organ-playing.mysh... |
 DON'T MISS A THING! FREE UPDATES BY EMAIL.Our Hauptwerk Setup:
Photo by Edgaras Kurauskas
Authors
Drs. Vidas Pinkevicius and Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene Organists of Vilnius University , creators of Secrets of Organ Playing. Don't have an organ at home? Download paper manuals and pedals, print them out, cut the white spaces, tape the sheets together and you'll be ready to practice anywhere where is a desk and floor. Make sure you have a higher chair. |
RSS Feed