By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here) This evening I'm playing an organ recital "More Palatino" which is the 19th part from my cycle "7 Centuries of Organ Music" at my church. I went to practice early in the morning and later on took a walk in the woods to complete my daily 10.000 step practice during which I recorded a live training on Facebook about how I spent my preparation time in church. I hope it will be useful to you, if you're getting ready to play some organ music in public. If you're not on Facebook, enjoy it on YouTube.
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By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
We all have been there - family members get sick, we ourselves get sick, work responsibilities unexpectedly are imposed and on and on. On top of that we have a deadline of a recital coming up soon. Yes, it does help to stay motivated to practice in difficult times but those unforeseen situations may throw you off track. Instead of being ready 4 weeks before your recital, you are left wondering if you'll even make it at all. If life gets in your way of finishing learning the pieces by 4 weeks until your recital, for the next recital change the plan - make it your goal to be ready 8 weeks prior to the public performance just in case - have a dress rehearsal run-through 2 months in advance. Expect the unexpected. [Thanks to John]
In this conversation, Arjan shares his experience as a concert organist, we talk about different instruments he played, how he writes organ registration, how he improvises, and about the importance of preparation for organ recitals.
By Vidas Pinkevicius (get free updates of new posts here)
This morning I had a lesson with one of my students at the church. She is preparing for her upcoming recital. It was tempting to look over her shoulder while she played. After all I could see finger movements, watch the score etc. But one thing wasn't clear from this close distance - the registration. Specifically - the mixture. Was it too loud or normal? I decided to go downstairs by the pews where listeners would be sitting. Immediately all the registration issues became crystal clear (the mixture was OK). 30 steps down the stairs and problem solved. Sometimes it's better to imagine yourself in the listener's shoes. Welcome to episode 12 of Secrets of Organ Playing Podcast!
Listen to the conversation Colin Andrews is an internationally acclaimed concert organist originally from England and currently living in the US. He's mostly known for his extensive concert tours - about 40 a year and he recently recorded 7 CD series of complete organ works of Olivier Messiaen. In this conversation he shares his advice and insights about practicing and preparing for recitals physically and mentally, especially because he will be travelling on a large concert tour to Russia and Italy shortly. "We have this person who wants to sabotage everything and they call it Self One. But then there's the person inside that knows what to do, the Subconscious, the Inner Computer. And that's Self Two. So if you allow Self Two to take over, then you can get in touch with your absolutely maximum potential and all your musicianship and communication is completely without interruption." Relevant links: Concert Artist Cooperative Colin Andrews on Google Colin Andrews on Spotify Enjoy and share your comments below. If you like these conversations with the experts from the organ world, please help spread the word about the SOP Podcast by sharing it with your organist friends. In response to my recent post and videos about the organ at the Holy Ghost Cathedral in Liepaja, Latvia, and impressions of the concert quite a few people had interesting questions. Here are some.
John Jeavons asks: "What is a ventil system? What is a Barker machine? I really appreciate hearing about your experiences on such an organ. How did you select the registration such that it would match with the choir? Did you do it beforehand in anticipation of what they want or did you get some time to work with them and choose the registrations?" Ventils in the mechanical action organ serve at least two functions - to conserve wind and to prepare certain registration combinations in advance. If you put, say 10 stops on a separate windchest than the rest of the stops in that manual, you can prepare any combination of these 10 stops in advance and when the time comes, you simply draw the ventil out and this combination would start to sound. Now imagine that there are 16 ventils on the organ (every manual has 2 but Haupwerk and Pedals have 5 windchests each) This means there might be 16 x 16 combinations to choose from. Huge possibilities to change dynamics and colors and very efficient on a large mechanical organ. Also when you have that many stops on one manual, having just one windchest wouldn't work - the pipes would lack air to sound so you need to separate them. Here is an explanation of how Barker machine works. Basically under each key of a particular manual (in the case of Liepaja organ - the Hauptwerk) - there are miniature bellows which help to depress the keys on that manual. An organist doesn't have to fight the resistance of the action on a large mechanical action organ because these small bellows do the work. When playing with or without the choir, I always prepare my registration before hand (either on paper or in my mind). This saves precious rehearsal time. For the last year's recital in Liepaja, I didn't use much of the ventils, most of the stops my assistant pulled by hand. That's a lot of work. But this year, after following the advice of Janis Kalnins, my friend and organ builder from Latvia who knows this organ inside out, I decided this time would be different. Here's what I did: I looked at the score of the Gounod's Solemn Mass for Saint Cecilia and noticed that there are 8 different dynamic levels: ppp, pp, p, mp, mf, f, ff, and fff. Then I looked at the disposition of the organ in Liepaja and selected certain ventils to go with certain dynamic levels. This I decided after examining the nature of the stops on each manual and windchest. The same I did with the pedal windchests. Then I wrote out the stops and their combinations for each dynamic level on a specific windchest I wanted. This was my starting registration with some of the ventils engaged. During the performance, my assistant only had to operate those ventils which are grouped together on the right hand side of the organ console (plus one coupler). As far as I could tell, it was so much easier for my assistant because everything was so close together. On the score I only wrote the numbers of the ventils and plus and minus signs. What is interesting that I didn't have any additional personal time at the organ, we started rehearsing with the choir right away. So it's good I was prepared. And it worked for most of the ventils. Of course, a few ventils had to be adjusted (reduced or increased sound). John Higgins asks: "Are there any challenges around keeping timing with the choir in a resonant acoustic? I have heard that sometimes certain keys or pitches can be difficult in large cathedrals. I would imagine being mechanical action and having the pipes right in front and above you there wouldn’t be too many problems with a delay from the key being pressed to hearing the note? Also I notice the naming of the manuals and some of the stops seemed to be in the German style. Pardon my ignorance of the culture in this area, is this common that organs in Latvia (and Lithuania) would be named in the German style? Also, would it be more common for the Echowerk to be the top manual rather than the bottom manual?" As strange as it may sound, this cathedral doesn't have a very reverberate room. Acoustics were not dry but moderate, I would say and certainly less reverberate than in our Vilnius University St. John's church. Because the organ is so large and the pipes are all over the place, there was a certain tendency to drag the tempo so I knew that in advance. Leading with the organ helps. If you are following, you are late. But if you are leading - you might be on time. The reason the stop names and manual names are German is that this organ was built by the Curonian organ builder Heinrich Andreas Contius and enlarged by Barnim Grunewald from Stettin and because this Curonian area was German influenced culturally. In Lithuania, we have more Italianate names of organ terms. Perhaps because this is mostly Catholic country whereas Latvia is predominantly Lutheran. Concerning position of the Echowerk - yes, it seemed strange to me that it is the lowest manual and not the top as usual. I had to adjust my expectations with manual jumps as well. Anyway, I hope this helps to clarify the questions people might have about this organ and my experience in playing it. A place in between projects, in between organ recitals is a tricky place to be. For people who are not yet at the level of professionals and who schedule their public performances one by one it often happens that they don't know what to do next.
Just think about it - you have just finished one recital and nothing visible is on your horizon. For some people this is demotivating. They might lose focus and interest to practice organ (at least for some time). So it's a very good practice when somebody asks you after your recital what's next for you that you could tell them 5 things you will be looking forward to. Then your course is set. Your sails are up and your ship is ready to sail. So long inner dragons... If you want to play a recital where every detail is precisely calculated, measured and perfected, don't be surprised if such recital becomes less spontaneous, creative, and alive.
If you want to play a recital where your performance is free of mistakes, don't be surprised if your performance has little vitality, energy, and enthusiasm. If you want to play a recital where you feel safe, don't be surprised if recital turns out to be boring. If you want to play a recital after which people don't say any negative comments to you, don't be surprised if they don't tell you any comments at all. If you want to play a recital after which people would say positive comments to you, don't be surprised if you also get some negative ones. If you want to play an improvisation recital where you don't know what's coming up next, don't be surprised if you end up playing things that you never played before. If you want to play an improvisation recital where you feel open, vulnerable, connected and generous for entire hour, don't be surprised if people tell you afterwards that it was a life-changing event. This question is much broader than simply playing organ compositions better during recital. It involves things like relationship of the organist to the listener, general musical education level of the listeners and their expectations, among other things.
Having this in mind, here are a few basic ideas which may help you to ensure that your recital will be appreciated by the audience. 1. Know your listener. What are his dreams, wants, desires, problems, fears? What keeps him awake at night? What is his worldview? How do you encounter him in a way that he trusts you? What are you trying to change in your listener? 2. Connect with your listeners through stories. Story-telling during the recital is a powerful tool which an organist should take advantage of. You can give interesting facts and details about the composer, the music, and the instrument which your audience can relate to. This way people can get much more out of your recital. 3. Choose a repertoire in a meaningful way. Remember that it's the listener that matters, not you. If you play average music for average people, there won't be much connection with your listeners. Instead, if you could program a remarkable recital with pieces that your listeners care deeply about, then you might be on to something. Remember the principle of variety - slow-fast, sad-joyful, loud-soft etc. Thematic recitals work splendidly in this case. 4. Keep in mind your instrument. Try not to play the music which doesn't work for your type of organ. Organ repertoire is vast and surely you can find an interesting program which suits your instrument well. 5. Develop your relationship with listeners beyond your recital. Start a blog, write a newsletter, create a video lecture or two, collect emails through a hand-out during the recital, interact with your fans through social media. These things really help you connect and lead your fan base. A final note: less is more. In case of doubt, always program less music than you want. It's better to leave the listeners wanting for more than to be annoying and overwhelming. What things do you use to keep your audience engaged during your recitals? Share your thoughts in comments. If you have an upcoming public performance such as a church service or an organ recital and would like to play your organ piece from memory, you have to understand the importance of proper preparation. In this article, I will share with you my recommendations how to best prepare to play your piece from memory in public.
The easiest way to memorize a piece is to subdivide it in fragments of four measures long. In each individual fragment you first will master every single measure. This means playing about five times while looking at the score and five times without looking at the score. Once you can do your measures separately, memorize combinations of two measures The next step is the memorisation of three measures in that fragment. Finally, you will be ready to play from memory the entire four measure fragment without stopping. Do this for every fragment in your piece and remember to repeat a few times all previously mastered fragments at the beginning of each practice session. The next step is to combine two fragments into 8 measures, 16 measures, 32 measures, 64 measures and so on. You simply will be making your fragments twice as long. So little by little with every step you will be able to memorize this piece. Now the question remains whether you will be ready for public performance after that or not? You see although you have already memorized your piece, it takes much deeper practice to be able to perform it in public from memory. You will need about 100 repetitions of this piece on your own. Remember, at first you memorized a piece but now you have to aim to perfect your piece and progress with it to a whole new level of fluency and play it 100 times from memory. So unless you can play your piece 100 times from memory without mistakes fluently, you will not be feeling secure during the public performance and performance anxiety will be quite strong in you. Therefore you have to give yourself an extra time to prepare for public performance. This means you have to be ready at least 30 days before the date of the recital or church service. This takes careful planning and preparation and keeping track of your goals in your everyday practice but if you want to succeed in memorizing your piece and be ready for public performance and actually perform it fluently in public, then my tips will help you to achieve that. |
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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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