Rock Musicians and Real Organs

[michaelhoddy]

There's also truth that organ music of any age is a genre within many genres, and at any point in history, you can find more developed, complex genres of music living alongside very simple, pedestrian ones. When Franck was composing, there was certainly much simpler, different music happening right outside on the streets of Paris at exactly the same time. That was true in Bach's time as well, and it's true today.

Today, there are some incredibly challenging modern popular forms of music being written in the progressive rock vein, and there's also a whole lot of banal, disposable commercial garbage. There are amazingly poetic writers in the folk/americana genre, and there's pedestrian pop/country. There are some incredible musicians and some real hacks.

I think the thing that raises some hackles here is that currently, the simpler forms of contemporary music are in vogue in the church. This has the potential upside of connecting and involving the current youth generation (at least it does in my church), and the potential downside of creating disposable theology and disposable music just like the culture.

What's interesting is that in Biblical history and church history, this whole issue is like a pendulum that keeps swinging. In Pre-Temple OT Israel, it seems that the musical culture was very much oriented to the masses. Once King David came on the scene, a higher form of music that involved a lot of specialists, training and complexity was born. In the first and second-century church, music was much simpler. By the Middle Ages, it was once again very complex (although very simple theologically!). In the early Reformation, it became simple, but with rich theology. In 18th Century Protestantism, it had become more complex. In the 19th Century revivals, gospel song with emotional sentiments to rival the most sappy praise choruses abounded. In the 1950's, the golden age of traditional American church music was at its height. In the 1970's, the Jesus People introduced very simple songs and lyrics at the beginning of the praise and worship movement. And by the 2000's, praise and worship was floating out of the range of easy, singable, playable songs back into the realm of the specialists, and requiring a high level of technology to interpret correctly.

So the Bible and church history give us precious little guidance regarding form or style, but a lot regarding the heart behind it. Every swing of the pendulum throughout history has had its supporters and vocal detractors.

I'm sure it will swing back at some point. We've been here before several times. I'm just not sure the next swing will involve the organ, and if we keep kicking the unwashed masses off the bench, I'm sure it won't.

[ShadyJoe]

And throughout all of this time there were people complaining about it because it didn't fit into what they thought had to be done. People complained then and they continue now. Through it all it keeps changing and at the same time keeps staying the same.

There is quite a difference in not liking different styles and outright dismissal as bad anyone who disagrees with your beliefs. Whether its real life or it is music, there are those who insist their own way is the only way and those who understand there are different ways for different people. To me, the most offensive of these people are the ones who insist their own way is the only acceptable way and all others are absolutely wrong.

I've been listening to my teenage daughters music. Because I let her play it around me. It's not my thing and I really don't enjoy a lot of it. She knows it. But I also tell her that's OK. Not everybody likes everything. I tolerate her music, she tolerates mine, and we do find some areas in both sets that please us both. I don't insist that her music sucks, only that it doesn't work for me, yet I do find some occassional pieces I like. It's just like it always has been for me, some of it's good but most doesn't move me in a positive way, regardless of the genre. I find ways to repeat the better stuff and try to ignore the bad stuff.

[regeron]

Really! This "college" has set the mark high!: Two semesters of strummin' a geetar, and you have earned your "BA Minister of Music"!!

What will they learn next decade for the same degree? A semester dedicated to how to work the on/off switch on a CD player? :-(

In your original post, you said nothing about a "BA Minister of Music". You simply said that:
"Canadian Christian College, a really low end theological college in Toronto area has lowered their musical training standard".

That could have been an optional arts course for all we know. If you provide incomplete information to support a bias, it's not very helpful to the rest of us. As far as the BA goes, if that is true, you also need to let us know what the complete music-related coursework is.

You don't tell us, for example, that to graduate with a "Bachelor of Sacred Music" (which is NOT a performance degree), the candidate has to pass a Royal Conservatory Gr 6 exam (or present a 30-minute graduation recital) for Guitar, or Voice or Piano. They take a songwriting courses, English grammar and composition, music fundamentals and theory (at least 6 courses), Worship theology and leadership (something I was never even OFFERED as an organ student), plus a variety of other courses pertinent to their style of worship.

Here is the page for the Bachelor of Sacred Music requirements:
http://canadachristiancollege.com/cc...-sacred-music/

By the way, there are also courses for Song Production and Song Recording, so we can assume that the CD player's on/off switch will be adequately taken care of.

Also, when you state that they have "lowered their standard," I couldn't find anything to tell me what they taught before this, so I have no way of knowing how their current program compares to anything previous.

[paulj0557]

douçaine, that's why maybe the classical/theater pipe purists should maybe check into one of them analog electronic jobbies. I hear they FREAKING SMOKE PIPES FOR THAT KIND OF WORK! Uh', ask Mr. Floyd...:-P

Pink Floyd is not a musician, it's the name of a band of musicians. I have played guitar 36 years and organ for the past 18 so I hate to break the news to you, but I can do just about ANYTHING on an ANALOG ELECTROMECHANICAL ORGAN [HAMMOND TONE WHEEL, and WURLITZER ELECTROSTATIC REED], and ANALOG DISCRETE COMPONENT VACUUM TUBE AND /OR TRANSISTORIZED organ that I can do on an electric guitar from a timbrel, tonal, and solo point of view. Don't you know that a Hammond tone wheel organ IS an electric guitar!?

-INSTANT ATTACK , YES! No lags in these organs, however the first Wurlitzer electrostatic keyed reed organs of 46'-53' mimicked the gradual attack of pipes, as do Conn classical organs, and Baldwin organs. However, getting back to INSTANT ATTACK, that's the name of the game with electronic organs! The Hammond organ set the stage with an instant attack because the tone source of each individual tone wheel spinning in front of it's pick-up is continually available. Hammond TW organs are EXACTLY like an electric guitar in it's operation, but instead of a string vibrating in front of a wire wound electromagnetic 6 pole pick-up the Hammond has 91 wavy edge metal disks spinning in front of 91 individual wire wound electromagnetic 1 pole pick-ups. So what were you saying about chugga chugga? You just have to learn to play the organ like you play a guitar!

BENDING NOTES, YES!- Since you seem to be able say what an instrument that you have never explored for squat can or can't do very well ( playing types of music you seem to have little real regard for) maybe you should know that organs can do far more than play in "matter of fact ways". Analog electronic organs from the very instant a tone wheel is spinning, a tube is glowing, a transistor is amplifying, or a reed is vibrating in perfect electrostatic harmony, IS ALIVE WITH ELECTRONIC ENERGY that can be harnessed, but rarely tamed in the hands of the players who wants to make it screem, cry, whisper,bark,wail, or even bend! Sure you can do great bending effects on a Hammond TW organ, but I'm talking about the bending effects that you can do on any post 61' Wurlitzer, or about any Lowrey model as well. These two brands equipped their organs with a 'pedal edge pitch bend'. So you want to hear a great Wurlitzer organ sound like a great jazz guitar have a listen at 3:03 [ in fact listen to the whole darn record! John isn't 'making it do anything', he is PLAYING it not unlike how any great artists gets something from their instrument- because they KNOW IT! And saying " the effort is disproportionate to the result" is a load of crap IMO. The accomplished electronic organist, or accomplished organist on nearly any decent organ renders exponential results to the effort put in!

So I suppose if you want to parody non-classical popular music on a pipe organ as if you'd never heard any popular music played on an organ before that would be one thing, but the web is FILLED with countless great organ performances of this type of organ music. It's always so frustrating trying to encourage purists to explore the gamut...because the WHOLE GAMUT of organ styles and instruments have so much to offer the listener of fine music. After 36 years of guitar I can honestly say that I love the instrument, but I'd trade half of those years for just 5 more years on the organ. I am that passionate about organ. It's a beautiful instrument and the electronic organs stand on their own as excellent instruments. If you can't hear it please try harder, you just don't know what you are missing! First of all you have to get it out of your head that a pipe organ is a pipe organ and an electric based organ is somehow inferior. I honestly think the key to good organ listening outside the pipe organ arena, if you are a musician, has a little bit to do with learning what is going on inside the instrument. This helps you understand what you can get out of it. Coming from a guitar background it was a shoe in learning about the Hammond TW organ because of the similarities. Next came understanding how a Vacuum Tube Oscillator organ operates. Once you know that a Conn organ has an individual vacuum tube (or transistor after 68') oscillator on every single note this is cool because you are making music with tubes!

I listen to a whole lot of organ music, but often post the same titles in threads due to the fact that in my opinion they are perfect records every organist should hear. In this case, this is NOT a pipe organ, but it is perfect! Not in spite of it being an electrostatic Wurlitzer ( and probably a Conn when the verdict is in), but BECAUSE of it!

[well, shux I was going to post the EMBED info from a specific randomtube video, but since that didn't work- here, check out the latest updated ' Night time headphone zzz ' Youtube playlist RANDOMIZED :-) !!! Many organ videos as well it the playlist, easy to sleep by.]

http://youtube-playlist-randomizer.v...8AE4C6%3Fv%3D2

[douçaine]

It's really hard to follow your ranting. Are you saying that pipe organs are suited for non-classical music, or are you saying the electronic/electric organs are? I'm confused. IMO, non-pipe organs are just fine. I have nothing against them, nor do I dislike their primary rep (I've even tried playing it, with disastrously funny results). I was talking about playing on pipe organs, a fact which I made clear. Pipe organs, and especially classical pipe organs, have characters which discourage some musical activities (even many classical activities)--that is not up for debate. I did enjoy your recordings, though. It's been a lovely, laid-back Wednesday morning; now to practice some Dupré, *storm clouds roll in*. Dupré's music, incidentally, does push at the limit of what an average pipe organ can do.

An important question that's been bugging me for a while:
Why did organ people become so obsessed with imitating other instruments? Not just hammonds, with their drawbar combinations and so on, but classical organs since the Renaissance, and theater organs. No other instrument finds it so central to its character to pretend to be what it ain't. Furthermore, as a oboist friend told me just recently, "the oboe on that organ sounds just like how someone shouldn't play the oboe".

[majestique]

An important question that's been bugging me for a while:
Why did organ people become so obsessed with imitating other instruments? Not just hammonds, with their drawbar combinations and so on, but classical organs since the Renaissance, and theater organs. No other instrument finds it so central to its character to pretend to be what it ain't. Furthermore, as a oboist friend told me just recently, "the oboe on that organ sounds just like how someone shouldn't play the oboe".

An interesting question, and one that bears scrutiny.

I believe there has actually been a lot of give-and-take in that realm. The organ predates most of the instruments it is theoretically trying to mimic, and many of the voices within the organ are actually being mimicked by their orchestral counterparts, not the other way 'round. But then, during the era of the Theatre and Symphonic organs there were several orchestral instruments with voices that hadn't yet been introduced to the organ that were now being included. In part that was brought on by the introduction of higher wind pressures that allowed such replication, and in part by the type of music that was in favor at the time, though much of that music was inspired by the organs that were mimicking the orchestral instruments. And so it goes.

It is the ever-present question of "which came first, the chicken or the egg?"

Perhaps this forth-and-back relationship is part of why they can sound so good together...

Kind regards,
Shawn

[Sathrandur]

I would suggest that ultimately it is the diapason chorus (including mixtures) which gives the organ its most distinctive sound. Diapasons are not imitative of any other instrument. I suspect in times past new pipe designs were invented and when they had a timbre similar to another extant instrument, it was merely named after it as a matter of convenience and perhaps moreso logic.

For the record, the chicken came before the egg. And if you're an evolutionist you have way more philisophical issues to resolve before dealing with that question, let alone the flaws in the theory of evolution itself (not that they tell you about them in educational institutions, which is strange as good science can withstand scrutiny).

[Derek inthesun]

When you have a spare moment Sathrandur would you start a new thread explaining your flaws in the the theory of evolution please.

Regards
Derek

[ShadyJoe]

You claim there are flaws but you won't dare attempt to educate anyone about them. Why won't you back up what you say or are you simply trying to annoy people with your ignorance?

[mashaffer]

I would suggest that ultimately it is the diapason chorus (including mixtures) which gives the organ its most distinctive sound. Diapasons are not imitative of any other instrument. I suspect in times past new pipe designs were invented and when they had a timbre similar to another extant instrument, it was merely named after it as a matter of convenience and perhaps moreso logic.

For the record, the chicken came before the egg. And if you're an evolutionist you have way more philisophical issues to resolve before dealing with that question, let alone the flaws in the theory of evolution itself (not that they tell you about them in educational institutions, which is strange as good science can withstand scrutiny).

Interesting, I hadn't thought of the possibility that the names came after as a result of the percived sound ("hey that sounds kind of like an oboe"). Kind of like the fortuitous accidents that resulted in things like the discovery of x-rays.

As to the chicken you are correct about the order but the minute I saw the post I knew it would stir up some trouble. I submit that it would be better to remember that our fellow man is not the enemy and treat those with whom we disagree with respect. The message itself can often be an offense, but we should try never to be offensive in our delivery (I admit I don't always succeed in that regard myself). Remember it is all of God's grace and nothing in us.

The miraculous suspension of entropy required and the ubiquitous instances of complex, irreducable systems such as the bacterial flagellum do pose difficulties when trying to explain what we see but in the end we all are influenced at least as much by what we wish to believe as by the data presented. It is, I think, reasonable to say that it is more of a philisopical issue than a scientific one not only for the evolutionist but also for the creationist. So for me the apologetic is interesting but not something I get bogged down in since it is really more of a heart issue at the core.

Just my take on it... not interested in a long drawn out argument.

mike

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I would suggest that ultimately it is the diapason chorus (including mixtures) which gives the organ its most distinctive sound. Diapasons are not imitative of any other instrument. I suspect in times past new pipe designs were invented and when they had a timbre similar to another extant instrument, it was merely named after it as a matter of convenience and perhaps moreso logic.

For the record, the chicken came before the egg. And if you're an evolutionist you have way more philisophical issues to resolve before dealing with that question, let alone the flaws in the theory of evolution itself (not that they tell you about them in educational institutions, which is strange as good science can withstand scrutiny).

Interesting, I hadn't thought of the possibility that the names came after as a result of the percived sound ("hey that sounds kind of like an oboe"). Kind of like the fortuitous accidents that resulted in things like the discovery of x-rays.

As to the chicken you are correct about the order but the minute I saw the post I knew it would stir up some trouble. I submit that it would be better to remember that our fellow man is not the enemy and treat those with whom we disagree with respect. The message itself can often be an offense, but we should try never to be offensive in our delivery (I admit I don't always succeed in that regard myself). Remember it is all of God's grace and nothing in us.

The miraculous suspension of entropy required and the ubiquitous instances of complex, irreducable systems such as the bacterial flagellum do pose difficulties when trying to explain what we see but in the end we all are influenced at least as much by what we wish to believe as by the data presented. It is, I think, reasonable to say that it is more of a philisopical issue than a scientific one not only for the evolutionist but also for the creationist. So for me the apologetic is interesting but not something I get bogged down in since it is really more of a heart issue at the core.

Just my take on it... not interested in a long drawn out argument.

mike

- - - Updated - - -

Sorry for the double post there. Not sure what causes that.

mike

[Sathrandur]

For goodness sake everyone! I only made a passing comment on the chicken and egg issue because someone else made the analogy. I think there are simply people on here that don't like an opinion I shared and are looking for an excuse to give me negative reputation whenever I state another opinion I don't like. I suppose if I commented differently on the thread about St. Paul's London having a female organist I would have received a negative reply as well.

I DID NOT COMMENT TO IRRITATE OR CAUSE TROUBLE AS A SMALL FEW KEEP SUGGESTING. I ALSO DON'T GIVE PEOPLE NEGATIVE REPUTATION BECAUSE THEY DISAGREE WITH ME.

Without starting a whole new topic, let it be said as far as evolution is concerned, for those who want at least some statement, if you believe evolution, you implicitly require the big bang notion. Simply put, where did the matte come from for a big bang - science teaches that you can't get something from nothing. But remember, this issue is irrelevant.

I find it interesting that the above posters are wasting their time trying to be critical rather than responding to the first part of the post about diapasons, but then again I think they just want an excuse to be critical.

[Derek inthesun]

Just a thought, maybe leave matters of faith and/or dismissing other styles of music out of your posts and we can all talk about and enjoy or mutual love of music making, and the organ in it's many forms and flavors. Please feel free to continue but don't be surprised if someone takes offence.
And no you didn't get any negative feedback from me and won't in the future.

That's my olive branch, now let's leave it there.
Regards
Derek

[crapwonk]

Perhaps issues of science should be left also. Evolution is completely independent of the theory of the big bang; in fact the theory of evolution was developed more than a hundred years before there was even a notion of the big bang. Science does not teach that something cannot come out of nothing. You just have to be able to wade through some fairly complex math and associated physics concepts to understand it. And while I am at it, the egg came first. The layer of the egg was a proto-chicken. The hatchling would have been the first chicken.

[Sathrandur]

I think Derek is right. I think perhaps such things are better reserved for the grease pit, if at all.

And to crapwonk, I am familiar with such things as the conversion of energy to mass and vice versa (which I assume you refer to), aside from many other facets/implications of Einstein's theory of General Relativity. If you would like to converse we can start a thread elsewhere.

[Sweet Pete]

Let's clear some things up.

FIRSTLY: I do appreciate organ music that is not specifically for a church setting. Much of the works of Bach, Reger, Widor, Vierne, Guilmant, Mendelssohn, Buxtehude, etc. were 'secular' organ works. The fact that many of the organs to play those works on are in churches is irrelevant and does not make it church music by nature. So to suggest that pipe organ music is purely liturgical is plain ignorant.

SECONDLY: as far as I am aware only pipe organs had crescendo pedals. Therefore I assumed that only pipe organists would be visiting this thread, not Hammondists or otherwise. Thus my little poke at rock organists (I didn't think they used real pipe organs anyway) was for the benefit of other pipe organists who know where I was coming from in terms of musical taste.

THIRDLY: my comments did not pertain to any kind of musicians, just certain types of music. Someone tell me of a contemporary pop composer that knows how to write three or four part counterpoint, or even knows what a fugue is and has actually used it in their music. My thoughts on rock/pop music are based on my evaluations in regard to its musical qualities of all types (structure, harmony, voice leading, development, etc). I actually think modern rock/pop music actually has some responsibility for the decline of pipe organ music, but that's another discussion.

Therefore, I APOLOGISE IF ANYONE WAS OFFENDED BY ANY COMMENTS THAT WERE MADE WHICH I SUSPECT WERE MISUNDERSTOOD. I have merely a great deal of frustration towards modern rock/pop music on a number of levels and sometimes it just comes out.

Procol Harum w/ ESO was a fine show IMHO.No pipe organ......the Symphony played their tails off for this recording/concert. No more pretentious than a Virgil Fox concert .....IMHO.
Mind you.....1972 was a while ago.....:P 'Conquistador' has more going on than most 3 chord pop/rock music.'A Salty Dog' does as well......Procol Harum also could play blues like 'Wish Me Well'
with the best of that genre....drummer Barrie Wilson won the world snare drum competition many times over,not too shabby for a 'rock' musician.