By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
Ausra and I are in our summer cottage right now. It's beautiful out there and it's good to escape the noise of the city. Very green. This morning while I was helping prepare the bread that Ausra's parents will bake in an oven with a real fire-wood I was listening to James Altucher's conversation with stand-up comic and actor Jim Morton. At the end of it, Jim shared his 3 steps in being a better comedian. Afterwards I thought about what would it take for someone to master the art of organ improvisation. So here are my 3 steps: 1. Write down musical ideas every day. Have an idea notebook. Take it with you everywhere you go. Use it for sketches or complete compositions. Doing this on computer isn't very practical at least to me. I have to have a physical thing in my hands to hold. I use Sibelius for something else. But maybe I'm different from you. 2. Perform live every day. I don't suppose you have the privilege to play for a church service every day. That would be an exciting musical laboratory for you (and funny thing is so many organists I know don't even think about it). Also playing recitals every day is kind of above the limits of a mortal person. But you certainly can live-stream your improvisations wherever you practice on FB with your phone. This counts too. You get a built-in live audience and immediate feedback. 3. Record yourself and watch/listen to it. It's difficult to watch yourself play. Sometimes I'm so embarrassed that I can't stand listening my own pieces. But you have to. It's very important for growth. Learning from your own failures and successes. In one hour of improvisation I might find 3 minutes of music worth writing down for composition. That's a lot, actually. Many times, I don't. But it's not for me to decide, you know. My job is just to do it. I don't filter anything. Good or bad. I don't care. So just write down, show up and learn. That's all for now. Have to finish editing and uploading the podcast.
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Welcome to Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast #98!
Today's guest is an American organist Edward Landin who began his intensive musical training at the St. Thomas Choir School under the direction of Gerre Hancock. Upon his graduation from St. Thomas, he entered Interlochen Arts Academy where he began his organ studies as a student of Thomas Bara. After high school, he attended the Eastman School of Music for two years; he then transferred to Westminster Choir College where he completed his BM in organ performance as a student of Ken Cowan. While at Westminster, he also studied harpsichord with Kathleen Scheide. Further organ studies and coachings have been with Roberta Gary, David Higgs, Susan Landale, Marie-Louise Langlais, Kimberly Marshall, Paula Pugh Romanaux, Kathleen Scheide, and Carole Terry. Edward has been recently appointed Sub Dean of the Philadelphia Chapter of the American Guild of Organists. Currently Assistant Director of Music at Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church, his duties include directing numerous children's and handbell choirs and serving as principal accompanist for the 65-member Sanctuary Choir. Edward has previously held positions in New York City (Christ Church, Methodist), Morristown, NJ (St. Peter's Episcopal Church) and in the Mt. Airy neighborhood of Philadelphia (Grace Epiphany Episcopal Church). In addition to recitals at The Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine and St. Thomas Church in New York City, and Old West Church, Boston, he has also performed in Germany and Wales as well as on the historic 18th century Andreas Silbermann organ in Strasbourg, France. Edward’s achievements as a church musician and performer were most recently recognized when he was named as a member of the “Class of 2017” by The Diapason magazine’s program, “20 under 30,” which lifts up young professionals in the world of organ, harpsichord, carillon, and church music. A major interest in contemporary organ music, particularly by American composers, led Edward to commission "E," "Fantasia," and "Parodies" by Kathleen Scheide; "Praeludium" and “Psalm 139” by Pamela Decker; "Prelude on the Carillon d'Alet" by Craig Phillips, and "Exordium" by Carson Cooman. A composer himself, “Flourishes and Reflections – Organ Music for Service or Recital” was recently released by Lorenz. In this conversation, Edward and I talk about his organist career and about his graceful strategy of dedicating his own compositions to other organists and composers. Enjoy and share your comments below. And don't forget to help spread the word about the SOP Podcast by sharing it with your organist friends. Thanks for caring. Listen to the conversation By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
How not to make a funeral service music sound depressing? Yesterday I went to play for a memorial service of a young journalist and politician Rokas Zilinskas at my church who died a few days ago. It was a solemn state funeral. I live-streamed my improvisation for the Communion on FB. I hope you'll enjoy it. I didn't want to make it very sad. The event was sad enough already. Rokas died young, being just 44 years old because of pneumonia. He was known to be very honest and good person. People will miss him a lot. So I figured to play something more uplifting but meditative. Maybe remind people of angels who will meet him at the heavens door. Here's what happened. By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here) I was at the lunch recital today at Vilnius Cathedral. My colleague Agne Petruskeviciute played works of Tournemire, Marchand and others which I live-streamed on FB. A couple of days before I suggested Agne would live-stream this event but she said others better do it. So I decided to be this "other". I did it while walking around the Cathedral. It's beautiful. After the event my colleagues said they were following me with their eyes as I recorded it. They look strangely at me, something like I'm different species. I can't help it. I see opportunities everywhere where they see limitations. It doesn't mean I'm failure-proof. No, I make mistakes just as everybody else. In fact, I deliberately try to make MORE mistakes than them. Because I know that mistakes won't kill me. They only help me grow. What does it take to have this optimistic mentality? Maybe realization that life is short. Maybe understanding that each of us are given some talents which we shouldn't hide. Maybe the fear of not reaching my own potential. Maybe all of the above. What about you? When you have an opportunity to share your organ practice or performance, do you hide in fear or do you jump in right away? Or perhaps you get started no matter what you feel because it's the right thing to do, because you can? Then when you get a message like this (from Victoria, our Total Organist student)... Dear Vidas and Ausra, ...Then you see that it's not for nothing. That actually your work means something to people.
But the first step as always is to care. To care enough to make mistakes, to fall flat on your face, to make a fool of yourself. Because you can. By Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene (get free updates of new posts here)
Vidas and I are preparing to perform in Sweden this summer. We will be playing an instrument from Sweelinck's time. It stands in Stockholm's German St Gertrude church (the Duben organ) and has all kinds of features of old organs: mean-tone temperament, split keys, high-pitched tuning, and short octave. A short octave in this case are the 3 diatonical keys in the bass octave - C, D, and E. This means music with C# and D# in this octave cannot be played. So we chose our repertoire very carefully, avoiding pieces with more than 1 accidental. But it's still a challenge to master the new layout of this type of keyboard. In the above picture you can see how a similar keyboard with CDE short octave looks like. It works this way: The lowest note which looks like E is actually C. D looks like F#. E looks like G#. F looks like F. Great! F# is the additional semitone on top of the 1st sharp. G is G. Great! G# is the additional semitone on top of the 2nd sharp. From A everything looks normal again. You might already feel that adjusting to this short octave will take some time and will require some special fingering. It takes more than that. We will be circling with pencil all our notes in the bass octave of our scores which would require re-positioning. And then we will be practicing on the modern organ or piano the way it would work on the old organ in Stockholm. The result will not be pleasant (when we need C, we'll play E; when we need D, we'll play F# etc.). But this is the only way to get used to the short octave on the target organ and shorten the time needed to adjust. By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
I'd like to share what some of the students are saying about my various courses and trainings: "The sight-reading course has helped me tremendously. Thank you very much for your essays, courses and all your help." (Hugh) "I found the fingerings, registration ideas, and general comments to be excellent" (Robert) "I have found your download very helpful! It was really excellent! I have watched some of your teaching videos, and when I read your instructions, I try to imagine you are there teaching me! You may feel disappointed that I am ~2-3 days behind, but I am a slow learner, and I have committed to taking the time to get it right as you say. But the other night my wife commented that she had never heard me play such a detailed melody in the left hand so well! (my left hand is generally poor!)" (John) "Dear Vidas. I just got through learning your practice score of Benedicamus from Tabulatura Nova, by Scheidt. I used your practice schedule and it is an excellent approch to learning any composition. I like all the performance practice information you include in this score. Best wishes." (Frank) "It has been a great pleasure in my life of having discovered your courses and material as well as the YouTube work of recordings. You have a calm and pleasant way of teaching." (Robert) "I have just learned that I passed the CAGO exam, and am now a Colleague of the American Guild of Organists! I have had excellent coaches, lessons, and mentoring here in the United States and an outstanding teacher, but I also want to thank you for your assistance in answering my questions and in providing some excellent practice exercises and video explanations which reinforced my U.S. training! I want to continue to improve my skills and will be participating in your courses and exercises and following your video demonstrations." (Judith) Are you not sure if my Total Organist membership program would work for you? Don't worry, for a limited time only, I'd like you to try it out for free. Total Organist will help you achieve any organ related dream faster than you would do it on your own. Hundreds of training programs, thousands of videos and PDF's. You will not find so much value anywhere online or offline. But don't take my word for it. Try it for yourself. Try Total Organist for free for 1 month. If you don't like it, cancel before the month ends and you will not be billed. If you enjoy it, keep training. By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
Ausra and I have long been planning to play an original piece for organ duet. In 2013 I've written my Op. 11 - Fantasia on the Themes by M.K. Ciurlionis for flute and organ and performed in Armenia, France and Spain with flutist Giedrius Gelgotas. Here's the video from our concert in Valencia. So today I've made an organ arrangement for organ duet out of this piece. I numbered it as Op. 11a. My student Egle was looking for an original organ duet piece to play with her colleague this summer during a concert so I suggested this arrangement. We'll see if she likes it. If you have a friend organist, you can play it too. Ausra and I are definitely going to learn it soon. The score is available here (organ duet) and here (flute and organ). I have just finished editing my Op. 39 - Festive Processional for organ which is dedicated to my friend and colleague Paulius Grigonis, Titular Organist at St Joseph church in Vilnius, Lithuania.
He will be performing an organ music concert at the Cathedral in Vilnius this summer and he needed a short 3 minute piece to start the event with a joyful mood. So I thought it would be fun to compose a Festive Processional for this occasion specifically designed for a 3 manual organ (but 2 manuals would work just fine too). If you want to play this piece, you'll find the score here. Enjoy! It starts and ends in C major but who knows what's happening in the middle. Just kidding... It has ABCBA form with C being central and longest episode. PS People who like tricky rhythms and syncopations will enjoy it a lot... By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
Welcome to Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast #97! Today's guest is Gena Bedrosian who is a a lifelong musician and also a retired emergency physician and legal consultant. Sacred music speaks most closely to her. She sees music as worship to the glory of God, not just performance. In retirement she performs in three choirs, on piano and pipe organ. She reached out to me because she has a number of piano recitals coming up and one big organ recital planned for the next year. Gena faces a challenge in communicating with one particular church because they won't let her to advertise this recital using church's internal marketing tools: email newsletter, website promotion etc. It's a strange situation because it seems as though Gena has been scheduled to perform there, the church doesn't want people to come to her recital. So if you are facing similar challenges, I hope this conversation will be helpful to you because together we will find a solution how Gena could go about in solving this problem in a diplomatic way. Enjoy and share your comments below. And don't forget to help spread the word about the SOP Podcast by sharing it with your organist friends. Thanks for caring. Listen to the conversation By Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene (get free updates of new posts here)
I'm in between projects now. It's a dangerous time. It's dangerous because one recital is behind me and another is further away. In fact, besides our regular appearances at our church, this year Vidas and I will be travelling to Sweden (Stockholm German church), Poland (Paslek) and France (La Trinite in Paris) to play recitals. But the closest recital is about 6 weeks from now and I'm already almost prepared for it. If you are in a similar situation, do what I did today: I chose 5 pieces I want to work on for the future. I don't have a date yet. I think I'm going to play them in the fall. The pieces for me are: Fantasia Chromatica by Sweelinck, Dic nobis Maria by Scheidemann, Piece d'Orgue by Bach, Andante in D major by Mendelssohn, and Chorale in B minor by Franck. Now no matter what schedule I have or how far away is my next recital, I know what I'm going to play today. Vidas also selected his 5 pieces: Nun freut euch by Buxtehude, F major Toccata and Fugue by Bach, Chorale in E Major by Franck, Ride in a High-Speed Train by Ad Wammes, and some piece of his own that he is currently composing. Select your own 5 pieces, if you are in between projects. It will give you a peace of mind and a sense of purpose. |
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Drs. Vidas Pinkevicius and Ausra Motuzaite-Pinkeviciene Organists of Vilnius University , creators of Secrets of Organ Playing. Our Hauptwerk Setup:
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