blog.sinden.org

Lent, 2024

22 September 2017
Jackson, Francis - 100th birthday of

The birthday celebrations have begun! English organist and composer Francis Jackson will turn 100 on Monday, October 2.

With Heart and Voice, the organ and church music program from WXXI in Rochester, N.Y., begins the celebration with this week's episode, "Comes Autumn Time." The program include Jackson's hymn tune EAST ACKLAM and his Benedicite in G.

Episcopalians have this lovely tune at their disposal at Hymn 424 in the Hymnal 1982.

So often we see a birth date like (b. 1917) in this Hymnal, published over thirty years ago, and mentally assume that the person must have passed on. Not so with Francis Jackson!

Last night, a young chorister asked me if the author of the hymn, Fred Pratt Green was still living. The hymnal notes his birth year as 1903. Green died in 2000.

At St. Peter's, St. Louis, we will sing his marvelous anthem "Lo, God is here" this Sunday. Jackson composed this anthem for the Oxford anthology Anthems for Choirs 1, which he edited. I love this little anthem and its raw, visceral energy.

The anthem is acrobatic. There are no fewer than four key changes. The harmonic twists and turns sound unexpected but are not terribly difficult to manage. There are no fewer than four key changes in this short anthem! I find the consecutive upward leaps of a major seventh at the words "To thee may all our thoughts arise" particularly compelling and memorable.

Anthems for Choirs 1 is out of print, and used copies are cost-prohibitive for choirs that do not already own them, like the Choir of St. Peter's, St. Louis. Luckily, an Oxford "archive print" is available through Banks Music. It is a legally available facsimile of what appears in Anthems for Choirs (the first page is numbered 88).

We'll sing Hymn 424 and hear a bit of his organ music next Sunday.

And I think it's time to dust off his lovely Magnificat and Nunc dimittis in G, too.

Update, 3 October 2017: Pipedreams episode 1740, "Music for a Long While" also celebrates the Jackson centenary. The program is a good mix of Jackson's composition, performance, and includes some of the York Minster choir under his direction.

Labels: , , ,

 
21 September 2017
Hymnal 1982 Errata

At rehearsal tonight someone asked a question about Hymn 307 in the Hymnal 1982: is it supposed to be "thou art here" or "thou are here?". The hymnal prints it both ways at the conclusion of stanza 2.

There are little inconsistencies like this all through the hymnal. Some are musical, some are textual. Some occur in early editions but are fixed in later ones. But it's like a big scavenger hunt figuring out where they are and what the correct answers are.

Isn't it time we had a centralized location for all these things we've learned about this hymnal in its 32 year history?

I think so.

That's why I hope you'll join me in helping to create a Hymnal 1982 Errata.

What mistakes have you found? What do other Episcopal choirs (and congregations, ack!) need to know about?

Let's work together on a list.

It will live as a Google Document until we feel like it might be ready for more formal distribution.

Please add your suggestions in the comments below, or send me an email (dsinden@gmail.com)

You can view the current version of the document here: Hymnal 1982 Errata (Google Doc)

Labels:

 
09 September 2017
David Sinden 2017 Salary Guide for Musicians in Religious Institutions

The PDF document may be downloaded here: David Sinden 2017 Salary Guide for Musicians in Religious Institutions

Labels: ,

 
06 September 2017
2017 AGO Salary Guide

9 September 2017

Dear organist colleagues,

I am a member of the American Guild of Organists (AGO) and have been since about the time my feet were able to reach the pedals. I have performed in Member Recitals. I have served on Program and Executive Committees. I am a Past Dean. I believe in the mission and the work of the AGO, even as our profession and our professional organization continue to evolve.

I also believe that religious organizations should fairly compensate organists for their work.

The AGO published a Salary Guide for Musicians Employed by Religious Institutions for many years. I understand that the AGO no longer publishes this document for legal reasons.

But copies of this document still exist. It was published in The American Organist and surely remains available in academic libraries that received the journal. The AGO also hosted a PDF copy of the Salary Guide on their website. The PDF files of these past Salary Guides remain freely available on archive.org, which is where I retrieved the 2015 Salary Guide and other documents in January of this year.

I am not presently in a leadership position in the AGO. I am a member, and I intend to remain one. The original content of the post you are reading has been removed. The AGO asked that the content of this post be removed. Upon receipt of this request, I took immediate action to remove the content.

But I do wonder if attempted total censorship of this old material is really warranted, or even possible. The Salary Guide and other documents are, at the very least, a part of Guild history. Destruction of this material in libraries and on the internet seems infeasible.

It is clear to me that AGO members have very practical employment concerns, and I know that many who visit Sinden.org will be frustrated by my decision to remove this material. I hope that AGO members, chapters, and regional and national leaders can find more ways to openly discuss employment and salary without running afoul of federal regulatory agencies.

All of the material I have removed today is scheduled re-publish on Sinden.org on Tuesday, May 26, 2037, the day the Federal Trade Commission order terminates.

David Sinden
Editor, Sinden.org

p.s. I hope you’ll check out my new podcast on Liturgy and Music from an Episcopal/Anglican perspective called All Things Rite and Musical. Listen at riteandmusical.org

Labels:

 
03 September 2017
Smith, George Wayne - on the importance of keeping the liturgy for the Ordination of a Bishop in the Book of Common Prayer

Recently, I was listening to From All Points a podcast from Episcopal Cafe, specifically "Episode 8: The Prayer Book".

In this episode, the suggestion was made that we need a "pew edition" of the prayer book that takes out some of the lesser used elements. The service for the Ordination of a Bishop, it was suggested, would best be moved to The Book of Occasional Services since it is, quite literally, a very occasional service.

This did not sit well with me. But I couldn't really articulate why.

Luckily, I didn't have long to ruminate on it, because I've been reading Admirable Simplicity: Principles for Worship Planning in the Anglican Tradition by George Wayne Smith. Smith wrote this book in 1996 when he was an Episcopal priest. He was ordained a Bishop of the Diocese of Missouri in 2002.

As Smith so clearly articulates, the reason that we keep this service in the Book of Common Prayer has to do with the role of the prayer book in our belief as Anglicans (lex orandi lex credendi: "the law of prayer is the law of belief;" or, in the title of another book on Episcopal liturgy, "Praying Shapes Believing").

But for Anglicans the consensus achieved through common prayer does provide a center point not only for practice but for belief. Thus the Book of Common Prayer bears scrutiny for all aspects of Anglican believing. And so BCP 1979 includes, for example, the order for the ordination of a bishop, despite the fact that this service will be used about once every decade or two in a given diocese. It is even then a matter for diocesan worship, not parochial worship. But this infrequently used service tells us what Anglicans believe about bishops in a way no other resource can. The way faithful people worship when gathering as the church to ordain a bishop tells Anglicans what they believe about bishops on all occasions. And so any practical concerns about omitting a little-used service from the book in order to save on printing costs has to give way to the principle of lex orandi lex credendi.

Smith, George Wayne. Admirable Simplicity: Principles for Worship Planning in the Anglican Tradition. Church Hymnal Corporation, 1996, p. 38.

Labels: , , , ,

 

©MMXVII Sinden.org: a site for fun and prophet

Organ and church music, esoteric liturgics, and a site that changes color with the liturgical year.

Archetypes

Looking for Carol Spreadsheets?

Hungry? Try the Liturgical Guide to Altoids Consumption

Thirsty? Try the Tibia Liquida

The Eric Harding Thiman Fan Page: The greatest composer you've never even heard of.

Infrequently Asked Questions

picture of a chicken

Questions? Problems? email the sexton.

Archon

The author of this website is an organist whom the New York Times calls “repeatedly, insisting that he pay for his subscription”. He likes to read parking meters, music, Indianapolis Monthly, and weather forecasts in Celsius, particularly whilst wearing cassock and surplice. He serves lasagna, overhand, as an example to many, and on ecclesiastical juries. He mixes salads, drinks, and metaphors. He takes photos, lots of dinner mints, and a little bit of time to get to know.

about

contact

Archbishops

Anglicans Online
Alex Ross: The Rest is Noise
Book of Common Prayer
Brain Pickings
The Daily Office
The Lectionary Page
Sed Angli
Ship of Fools
The Sub-Dean's Stall
Vested Interest - Trinity Church in the City of Boston

Archenemies

Andrew Kotylo - Concert Organist
Aphaeresis
Anne Timberlake
Bonnie Whiting, percussion
conjectural navel gazing: jesus in lint form
Friday Night Organ Pump
Halbert Gober Organs, Inc.
in time of daffodils
Joby Bell, organist
Musical Perceptions
Musings of a Synesthete
My Life as Style, Condition, Commodity.
Nathan Medley, Countertenor
Notes on Music & Liturgy
The Parker Quartet
Roof Crashers & Hem Grabbers
Steven Rickards
That Which We Have Heard & Known
This Side of Lost
Wayward Sisters
Zachary Wadsworth | composer

Archenemies Aviary

@DanAhlgren
@dcrean
@ericthebell
@jwombat
@larrydeveney
@nmedley
@samanthaklein
@sopranist
@voxinferior

Arches

Advent (Medfield MA)
All Saints, Ashmont (Boston MA)
All Saints (Indianapolis IN)
Atonement (Bronx NY)
Broadway UMC (Indianapolis IN)
Cathedral of All Saints (Albany NY)
Christ Church (Bronxville NY)
Christ Church (Madison IN)
Christ Church (New Haven CT)
Christ Church Cathedral (Indianapolis IN)
Christ's Church (Rye NY)
Church of St. Stephen (Hamden CT)
Congregational (Belmont CA)
Coventry Cathedral (UK)
First UMC (Lancaster SC)
Gloria Dei ELCA (Iowa City IA)
Immanuel Lutheran (St Paul MN)
Immanuel Lutheran (Webster NY)
John Knox PCUSA (Houston TX)
St Andrew (Marblehead MA)
St Andrew's, Oregon Hill (Richmond VA)
St Bartholomew the Great, (London, England)
St James's (Lake Delaware NY)
St James's (Richmond VA)
St James Cathedral (Chicago IL)
St Mary's Cathedral (Memphis TN)
St Matthew and St Timothy (NYC)
St Paul's (Cleveland Heights OH)
St Paul's (Indianapolis IN)
St Paul's Cathedral (Buffalo NY)
St Paul's, K Street (Washington DC)
St Peter's (Lakewood OH)
St Peter's ELCA (NYC)
St Stephen's (Richmond VA
St Thomas (New Haven CT)
St Thomas ELCA (Bloomington IN)
Second PCUSA (Indianapolis IN)
Towson Presbyterian Church (MD)
Tremont Temple Baptist (Boston MA)
Trinity (Indianapolis IN)
Trinity on the Green (New Haven CT)

Auraling

BBC Radio 3 Choral Evensong
New College (Oxford, England)
St John's College (Cambridge, England)
St Thomas (New York NY)

Argyle

Like the site? Buy the shirt.

Areyou . . .

selling diphthongs?
Yes, but they're not the kind you buy on Wheel of Fortune.

the owner of a bower at Bucklesfordberry?
Full daintily it is dight.

interested in touch lamps?
And fountain pens.

Archives
this site used to be better:

March 2004
April 2004
May 2004
June 2004
July 2004
August 2004
September 2004
October 2004
November 2004
December 2004
January 2005
February 2005
March 2005
April 2005
May 2005
June 2005
July 2005
August 2005
September 2005
October 2005
November 2005
December 2005
January 2006
February 2006
March 2006
April 2006
May 2006
June 2006
July 2006
August 2006
September 2006
October 2006
November 2006
December 2006
January 2007
February 2007
March 2007
April 2007
May 2007
June 2007
July 2007
August 2007
September 2007
October 2007
November 2007
December 2007
January 2008
February 2008
March 2008
April 2008
May 2008
June 2008
July 2008
August 2008
September 2008
October 2008
November 2008
December 2008
January 2009
February 2009
March 2009
April 2009
May 2009
June 2009
July 2009
August 2009
September 2009
October 2009
November 2009
December 2009
January 2010
March 2010
April 2010
May 2010
June 2010
July 2010
August 2010
September 2010
October 2010
November 2010
December 2010
January 2011
February 2011
March 2011
April 2011
May 2011
June 2011
July 2011
August 2011
September 2011
October 2011
November 2011
December 2011
January 2012
February 2012
April 2012
May 2012
June 2012
July 2012
August 2012
September 2012
October 2012
December 2012
January 2013
March 2013
April 2013
May 2013
June 2013
July 2013
August 2013
September 2013
October 2013
November 2013
December 2013
January 2014
February 2014
March 2014
April 2014
May 2014
June 2014
August 2014
September 2014
October 2014
November 2014
December 2014
January 2015
February 2015
April 2015
May 2015
June 2015
July 2015
August 2015
September 2015
October 2015
November 2015
December 2015
January 2016
February 2016
March 2016
April 2016
June 2016
July 2016
August 2016
September 2016
October 2016
November 2016
December 2016
January 2017
February 2017
March 2017
April 2017
May 2017
June 2017
July 2017
August 2017
September 2017
October 2017
November 2017
December 2017
January 2018
February 2018
March 2018
April 2018
May 2018
June 2018
August 2018
September 2018
October 2018
December 2018
February 2019
March 2019
October 2019
December 2019
September 2020
December 2020
January 2021
September 2021
October 2021
December 2021
November 2022
December 2022
March 2023
July 2023
March 2024