Hello everyone!

[MSchurch]

Hello all,

I am a church pianist in a very small church. I have had eight years of piano instruction, but it was many years ago. I had thought I would just help out one week per month at the new church I joined, but I have ended up being the sole pianist. I am now beginning the switch to the church organ. There is no one else to play, and my church can't afford to pay anyone, so it's either me or dead silence.

I enjoy playing music, but I get very nervous before I play for church. I would like help with that if anyone has any ideas. I do want to help the church out, but I would not be a full time musician if they had someone else to do it.

I'm looking forward to getting acquainted!
Warmly,
MSchurch

[John Watt]

There's a lot of talk amongst musicians lately about playing for free,
especially since one of the biggest and newest venues, a downtown, second story expensive restaurant,
began with open stages, letting musicians play for free.
Considering that cathedral organs might be seen as the first musical technology musicians couldn't afford to own at home,
but would want to get their hands on,
is the practice of churches not paying organists something that goes back that far, like this?

[teddy]

Hello MS and welcome to the forum.
I should imagine that your situation is not unusual. The village I grew up in, population 1,400 including the hill farms, had four chapels and two churches. Not all of them had organs of course, but all had pianos or something. I can not imagine that they could all afford to pay somebody. It must give the congregation great pleasure to have you play, and I suppose it gives you free practise. Also you might start picking up weddings and funerals, which you should be paid for. One thing leads to another.

teddy

[Krummhorn]

Hi MSchurch

Firstly, welcome to this forum. You are among lots of friends here who share your same interest in playing music.

Can you tell us a little something about the organ you are playing? Knowing this will help us direct you towards your goal of becoming a better player.

There are a couple of key publications: 1) Harold Gleason, Method of Organ Playing, and 2) John Stainer Complete Organ Method. The latter is the less pricier of the two, although older versions of the Gleason book are sometimes available at reasonable prices.

I am in awe about a church not being able to pay their musicians ... what I mean is that the musician is giving a "service" much the same as the utility company providing electricity, water and phone services, not to forget church supplies like paper, and printing costs, etc. They wouldn't necessarily not pay the utility company for "services" rendered, imho. Even $5 a week would be something that would help to defray costs of buying music.

As teddy points out, there are extra things you can do to help your wallet or pocket book ... funeral homes and wedding chapels usually need musicians and the pay is minimal, but can only improve with time, too.



Fortunately, there is a huge resource of organ music that is in the public domain, and already in pdf format, suitable for viewing and/or printing.

[JHC]

When I was knee high to a Camel all of our churches used 'free' musicians yet the Churches had loads of money. ???

[MSchurch]

Thank you all for your kind welcome. I wanted to clarify what I meant by not being paid. I can live with that, I only meant it to say that I'm the only one in church who can play, and since they can't hire anyone, my position is very secure. Whatever I do will be appreciated. No matter how good or bad I am, I'm playing.

The church organ is a Yamaha Electone FX-20. I am going to try to take lessons if I can find anyone who can teach me. The pedals look different than I have seen before. They are arranged in a semi-circle, not in a straight line. I know I will struggle with the pedals.

Thank you all for any advice or resources you can offer.

[Corno Dolce]

Hi MSChurch,

I have also had my struggles with Churches that don't pay organists - GRRRRRRR!!! When the Leadership at a Church says they can't hire anyone it really means they don't want to pay anyone and for them prerecorded hymns and music are just as valid as a live music group. Yes of course one can volunteer music services...Anyway, welcome aboard and please feel free to join in on as many discussions as your heart desires.

[wljmrbill]

Welcome to the forum.. Sounds like your pedal board is probably what we call concave ( AGO style ) pedal board as most organs in USA are.. straight boards are many times more European..Here spinets and some larger pop instruments have straight pedal boards. DO not worry you will get used to the curved board with a little practice and is actually in my opinon easier to play. I have played a few Yamaha's in my day but have to look up this model. With the piano background you should not have that muct trouble.

Touch is a more connected lagato style.. I have my students practice lifting one finger just as you place the other finger down..so you have a connected sound for starters( scales work well to practice this ). You do not strike as such the organ keys as that will not make any difference in sound. another rule of thumb is to break between notes slightly if they are the same..as this is the only way you can acheive the sounding of the 2 notes..... i.e. even spacing between... if you use the old (one, e ,and,a)system then release at the "a" and strike at the "one" for an example. With your background practice should help you out the most. Lars mentioned the two most favorite texts for study.

Practice a simple hymn using base line as pedal part for start maybe..you can also obtain pedal exercise books to help you with that also.. practice playing chords and use the tonic as the pedal note i.e. c major = pedal "c" then either c-e-g- in right hand or can use "G" left hand and "C" and "E" in right hand... next work your way up the chromatic scale.This will help you get aquainted with the pedal board and organ touch all at once..
Hopefully this will help you some. Any more questiions just ask as there are alot of polished organist on this site and many that are better than me for sure. Best of luck and I know the Good Lord appreciates what you are doing as well as the congregation.

Many times our payments are not in the form of money. I know in my life I have played at times for nothing to very little and taught many lessons when folks did not have money for lessons as there are alot of poor kids out there with talent that need a little help. I know because I was one of them in my early days

[John Watt]

When I was in the youth choir, in a church my Scottish Highland grandparents and parents were founding and charter members of,
we hired a choir master and keyboardist after auditions, Mr. David Gross, already having a nice Hammond organ.
Being a non-smoker, non-drinker was a big part of that, what I remember most.
This was still in the finished basement, the top not even under construction.

You get what you play for.

[MSchurch]

Thank you all so much again for your help. I am diving right in and practicing 2 days per week on the Yamaha organ, and 2 days per week on the piano. I hope to have the organ ready to perform in January.

[wljmrbill]

My, My you should be ready long before January...www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZRTnMDx8pg is a link for the organ on youtube..... also if you put it into yahoo search you will get a number of articles on the organ

[MSchurch]

I think I could be ready before January, but the holidays are coming so I will be playing music I'm not used to between end of November and January, so I thought I would just wait until afterwards to try it. I appreciate your confidence though!! Thanks for the site and I will check it out.

[teddy]

We want a recording afterwards

teddy

[John Watt]

Video! (This addition font satisfies the input criteria)