I do like having my brother around (Hi Mark!). I put off my evening martini last night until he got back from the Festival of Faith and Writing. Then we both had martinis and chatted until late. Eileen sat and listened and did the phone thing. She is very patient with the Jenkins brothers.
Mark got up later this morning than he had planned and decided to blow off the early sessions so we had some more time this morning before he left. Admittedly he spent a good portion of it sleeping in a chair while I quietly read and did my Greek.
After he left and after breakfasting/boggling with beautiful Eileen I went to church to work. We have new offices. I got my key yesterday. So I was able to get in and make the program for tomorrow’s recital and publish the poster for the May recital.
By the time I got to the organ bench it was past noon. It’s still weird to have such a good organ at the church I work. It’s a pleasure but it doesn’t quite feel real a lot of the time. Preparing for tomorrow’s Eucharist I discovered some bell parts in the Hymnal 1982 on Hymn 193 , “That Easter day with joy was bright .” I laid out 8 tone chimes with the idea I will have the choir help me with these parts.
A benefit of a good acoustic is that it carries the sound of the tone chimes well.
I also checked out the original scoring of “Flocks may safely graze” by Bach. I discovered that the bass line pulses eighth notes all the way through. The Oxford Easy Anthem arrangement we are learning changes this piece quite a bit. It makes it more like an English anthem and substitutes longer note values for the lovely pulsing notes in the original. I decided to restore Bach’s original bass line. If I end up using strings on it I will redo the cello part so that it fits the original line. I still haven’t heard from my violinist.
In addition i examined some of John Alcock’s music online.
The anthem that we are doing tomorrow is “based” on a voluntary by him. It may very well be the one pictured above. Wednesday the instrumental tag in the organ accompaniment caught me surprise. Suddenly the arranger, Mark Schweizer, wrote some ascending chromatic lines. I thought it was weird. In looking at Alcock’s work, I think Schweizer based his little choral anthem very loosely on an Alcock voluntary. The one above does have harmony in it that is vaguely suggested by Schweizer’s piece. But I decided to change ending and not use the weird ascending chromatic tag, just substitute one of the previous interludes in the little piece and cadence to the tonic.
So my boss’s life partner, Elizabeth Trembley, takes notes in a very unique way. She and Rev Jen are attending the same conference Mark is. The poet Pádraig Ó Tuama retweeted one of her sketches. Very cool. Note the Krista Tippet tweet as well. I almost know some famous people.
I’m not sure what I think about Pádraig Ó Tuama’s poetry. My brother left me a couple volumes which I have been reading in a bit. However, I do love this retweet he did:
This is a link to Beth Trembley’s blog.
Common Reader
This is an online essay journal. I think it looks kind of interesting.
Major Papers Urge Trump to Kill Syrians, Risk World War III | FAIR
Once again we are failed by the New York Times and the Washington Post. The attack has happened. I wonder how many died.
aw man – your brother was at the Festival of Faith and writing!? I was too!
I could have met him, which I would have enjoyed, and heard what he was there to check out, and what he enjoyed – always fun at that festival.
Maybe we were sitting beside each other at a reading at some point!
Rev Jen and Beth Trembley were also there. If I think of it, next time, I’ll try to connect you all.
I saw them, (and sat with them and chatted with them) but that’s also because I know what they look like!:) And I expected to see them there.
The mysterious Mark Jenkins could have been sitting beside me listening to a poet read, and I wouldn’t even have know it…
Though had I know he was there, I could have looked for older men who look like you, walked up behind them and said, “Mark!” and looked if they flinched.