Calvin worship symposium

This was the 2nd year I had been to the worship symposium at Calvin College in Michigan. It's a really good event: lots of student groups are present giving a youthy vibe to everything. It's also a very large event on a rather small campus, so it get a little crowded sometimes. While I've enjoyed the event both times I've attended, I'll probably try for something different in 2018. This year the trip back was a nightmare. It began with a damaged window on the plane I was supposed to fly GR-ATL. I was delayed, missed connections, and then Delta had a massive tech incident which brought everything to a halt. I finally crawled into bed at home at 530am! I had to drive from AVL in snow! An international travel ban was put in effect while I was in GRR; there was a protest at the airport while I was awaiting my later flight. They disrupted car traffic but nothing in the airport was really affected. Eli was going to be heading out for AmeriCorps a few days after I returned, and he had lots of questions about air travel, so I took lots of pictures for him

W&M Friday

Today Mark Sedio did an anthem reading session. Most of the music was "global" in nature, with a heavy dose of his own stuff. (I realized I need to get on the mailing list for Concordia Publishing to get information about their new releases).

Paul Huh talked about baptism in his session today and didn't flinch as the conversation circled about to re-baptism and re-affirmation of baptismal vows.

David Eicher talked about the Presbyterian hymnal project, now officially called the Presbyterian Committee on Congregational Song (PCOCS, pronounced "peacocks"). He shared in written form the committee's statement on theological framework and foundation. It's a very nice statement that reveals that the guiding framework for the new congregational song resources will be the construct "history of salvation." It will be interesting to see how that is fleshed out in hymns and liturgy in the new resources.

W&M Wednesday

Work responsibilities curtailed my participation today somewhat, but here's a brief run-down.

Mark Sedio worked some more on Latin rhythms in the Global Music seminar. Seeing a clearly delineated description of various rhythms was very helpful. I was struck by how much work the new Lutheran hymnal resources have contributed to Hispanic music for worship.

This afternoon I attended the Caring for Creation seminar, which was trying to make connection between our conference theme, "Come to the Waters," and ecological concerns and a renewed interest in the stewardship of creation. This session was pretty exclusively devoted to ecological facts, with some theology added in. I've heard from sources that other sessions have been a bit more balanced. It was an interesting 50 minutes.

Bob Hobby spoke about hymn introductions and registration this afternoon. Lots of stuff I already know and practice, but it was gratifying to hear someone else discuss the theory and the practical applications.

I hope to attend the hymn festival service tonight, but we'll have to see how things are on the home front.

W&M Tuesday

This morning in Global Music with Mark Sedio we worked on "Come all you people" (Uyai mose) paired with "Praise to the Lord, the Almighty." New for me was taking the African song in 6/8 instead of 4/4. But that made pairing it with Lobe Den Herren in 6/4 AWESOME. What that does is make it possible to set up a drumming accompaniment on the African song, and carry it over to the old German tune. We'll be doing it this way at our services very soon!

Later I listened in on the Bible Study with Paul Huh. He dealt with passages from Romans and ended with a 10 minute cello (and piano) piece.

David Eicher introduced us to hymns incorporating NT water images today. One of the coolest was a text by Leith Fisher, with music by Timothy Redman. It was a very sparse text, almost haiku-like in its imagery and meter. The music was tuneful, with a crush of seconds that leant a modern, soulful sound. It was reminiscent of music from Taize. I found myself wishing that the tune ended on the dominant instead of the tonic though. We also read through a hymn written by Eliabeth Stilborn, "By the well a thirsty woman." We sang it to the author's original choice for tune, Ebenezer, and then to a tune by Diane Wilcox which, according to Eicher, the author never heard before it went to print. It, the second, newer tune, was the preferred choice by our modest crowd. It had a nice contemporary sound without sounding trite. This paired with a powerful text makes for quite hymn.

Morning worship included Orff accompaniment (plus recorder) for BEACH SPRING. The preacher used as her text the story of the Samaritan woman at the well. She had a powerful word of challenge to the youth in attendance, that the woman at the well attends their school, figuratively, and that every student who participates in shunning that ostracized student is wrong. The preacher followed that with a powerful word of grace targeted directly to any youth who sensed that maybe they were the woman at the well at their school, figuratively: that Jesus meets them with life-giving water also. It was an incredibly powerful preaching moment; one could hear one thousand worshipers not breathe nor twitch for those few moments. We sang a very pretty setting of the Lord's Prayer using a Philippine melody. Some of the folk-iness of the melody was subsumed in the rather contemporary-sounding accompaniment, the sort of cross-over I can really appreciate. It was a neat, new setting I'll be trying to incorporate soon.

After lunch we listened to a few more composers of worship music in contemporary jazz idioms, Chuck Mahronic and Joe Utterback specifically. We then took off on a long list of "creative" ways to interpret hymns. I was most satisfied to hear a word of "open invitation" regarding WONDROUS LOVE. The presenter noted that the melody is such that truly any accompaniment can mesh effectively. Recently I did this myself, using open fifths that moved all over the place harmonically. I think I hit at one point a chord that was nothing but a stack of tritones!

Bob Hobby spoke about tempo in the organ/hymns session today. What we alluded to over and again but never said outright was that the tempo of the hymn is always contingent upon context: the place in the liturgy, the mood of the liturgy at that moment, the season of the year etc. A good example proved to be DUKE STREET. In some circumstances this needs to be a very stately tune; at other times it can easily bear proceeding at a quicker pace. The context will determine what's right. And the congregation, when they know and trust their leader-musicians, will follow. That was a nice pastoral word from Hobby; a word we do well to dwell on constantly. We also began to discuss playing the various musical styles for different hymns, something near and dear to my heart. More on that tomorrow.

W&M Monday

This was the first full day of the conference, with all the classes/seminars in place. I sat in on the tail end of Mark Sedio's global music session. They were working on an African song which our choir has sung, Nimemona bwana. He had a helpful word to say about long whole notes that I'll need to remember: they don't matter!

I got waylaid by my buddy Kathy Toole and so was late to choir and just listened. Paul Head seems to be off to a good start.

I sat in David Eicher's hymnal lecture. Today it was a survey of hymns that include Old Testament water images. There are more than one might think, especially newer texts. There was one that used the tune of "The Bells of St. Mary's." The music was so trite, I have a hard time remembering what the text was like!

The worship service included a healing/anointing rite. FotG dramatized the Great Flood story and managed to include chanting "we will rock you." Oh, and the organ blew up during the introduction to the first hymn. That was about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

After lunch I sat in on a seminar on "piano in worship." I can't remember when this sort of class has been offered before. Today was a romp through some fundamental repertoire classics to contemporary. There will be more about playing-style as the week moves along.

I have been looking forward to Bob Hobby's class on service-playing at the organ. He didn't disappoint. Today he spoke about using the notion of "pulse" to keep momentum in congregational singing. I think I do that fairly well, but it was nice to be reminded. (The organ was working as least in part for this session; the tech people are supposed to work on it overnight).

At conference

This is the first in a irregularly-paced set of posts from the Worship and Music conference at Montreat, sponsored by the Presbyterian Association of Musicians. It began tonight and will run through Friday evening. I'll be attending as much as I can. Eli and Calvin will be participating in the Montreat Clubs program (Eli more than Calvin, lest Calvin miss his visits with Uncle Carl and Faye and Wade this week).

One word: Lutherans.

Several of the leaders at the conference are Lutheran, including one of the preacher/presider people and the organist. Much of the music and liturgy from tonight's opening service was taken from Lutheran resources.

Of course the PC(USA) and the ELCA have an on-going ecumenical relationship. Maybe this was decided to be the year that we manifest that tangibly at this conference. The Lutherans also have the coolest, newest hymnal. Might we be getting a taste of what a new Presbyterian hymnal could look like?

I liked singing "Halle, halle, halleluja" at the gospel reading. I wished we had used other of the verses ("I am the bread of life...") in other parts of the liturgy.

I liked Bobby Hobby's (sorry, I just had to do that, Bob; you started it yourself in Richmond, VA!) hymn introductions and playing. Sadly, no matter how hard one blows, an un-amplified flute is never, ever going to work in Anderson Auditorium. Call me, you can borrow BMPCNC's flute mic.

Singing with 1000 other folks is great. We all need to remember, however, that we can't hold the last note of the phrase its full value and keep things moving along; make them a little shorter so we can keep up the tempo.

I loved hearing three Bible readings plus a psalm. It's the way it ought to be. Of course that can lead to 90-minute services if you're not careful. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

It's late, so I'm not going to build in a bunch of links tonight. Check back, and I'll try to include them later on.

Worship humor

I took this past week for continuing education, and attended the Worship and Music conference at Montreat. That ended on Friday, but built into my allowance is a Sunday. So I decided to visit the Jubilee community in Asheville. I had heard quite a bit about the place and its leader Howard Hanger and the worship. Libby's cousin Martha attends there, and Andy who plays bass at BMPCNC has a friend in the band at Jubilee. I'll likely review the experience on the church music blog later this week, but there was one humorous thing that tickled me. Howard was discussing trust and distrust and going after the Internet (as he should). He said there was "more crap per click" on the web than anywhere! That turn of phrase just struck me as funny while being fairly true also. Hope it does the same to you.