Musicians in Catholic Worship ­ Part II Where Have All the Organists Gone?

Adoremus ^ | September 6, 2003 | Lucy Carroll

[Romulus]

Yep; I'm from New Orleans all right, but don't worship at the Cathedral and couldn't tell you what their musical program is. Except that when I was there last spring for the presentation of our parish's catechumens, we were subjected to the worst sort of ecumaniac dreck.

[ninenot]

Ask RajinCajunTrad

[ninenot]

Children learn soccer, violin, sometimes piano. The logical progression is from at least a few years of piano to organ, although one could start on the organ.

Now--where to practice your lessons?

NOT on an artificial organ (a "keyboard.") Nope. You need an AGC-specification set of keyboards AND a pedalboard. So mom and dad should be prepared to drop around $10-15K for an instrument for the house. WHere you gonna put THAT?

Churches are not open, and even if they were, parents aren't going to sit around a church for 1 hour/day to watch Junior practice--it takes two incomes (if you can find them) to maintain the house.

And when you're all finished, you're expected to belt out Fred Rogers and Sesame Street?

Get serious.

You want a choir director? Tell us about real music. If you want pops, hire Henry Mancini or Doc Severinson. They're good at that.

[ninenot]

An old choir member friend of mine told me about their organist/choir director (both, not either/or) job near Atlanta. Evidently the Pastor was amenable to real music and the church had a nice piped instrument.

Only problem: on the salary offered, one could not afford to live in the town, which was a distant and pricey suburb of Atl.--unless one were single, or married/no children.

Catholic choral music is damn near dead. There's a group in NYC, there's Salamunovich's parish choir in LA (and they will be zapped as soon as Paul retires--FAR too Catholic for the Mahony crowd.) A couple in Chicago. There might be a few others--but the point is, there is no one for a young musician to look up to--to say, WOW!! I could do that someday--make a glorious choral sound happen.

Without role models....what do you expect?

[Desdemona]

Well, the piano in my house sits in the living room and the big problem, for me at least and my sister, is that our hands reach a seventh on a standard keyboard.

Fortunately, our parents truly did care about music - at least as they valued it. (We all should have learned the violin) Over the years, among five kids, we've had flute, oboe, clarinet, piano, trumpet, coronet, tuba, euphonium, bass trombone, and percussion. And two of my brothers only played trumpet/coronet. We kept the windows closed a lot.

But, then, our parents are decent musicians, so....

[Desdemona]

Without role models....what do you expect?

Not much. It's a lot of times a rude awakening when Catholics find out just exactly how much this all costs on multiple levels.

[hiho hiho]

Interesting post!

Two points.

1) I don’t buy the theory that there is a shortage of church musicians. When the church wants them (and is willing to pay a “living wage”) they will come out of the woodwork.

2) I think Dr. Carroll stumbled onto the reason that the pipe organ is passé in many churches--

“The organ is still the very best way to lead a congregation. It can be powerful and authoritative in a way no other instrument can.”

The concept of leadership, power and authority are not popular in the current culture. The Church has become timid and fearful of offending by being assertive. The guitar strummers and crooners, on the other hand are more “approachable by the common man”.

[Desdemona]

1) I don’t buy the theory that there is a shortage of church musicians. When the church wants them (and is willing to pay a “living wage”) they will come out of the woodwork.

Very true for the music director and organist position, but for soloists it's a little different. I'm in the symphony chorus here and about half, well more, of the people in the chorus are section leaders in the churches of various sorts and section leader jobs are usually 2nd and 3rd jobs. In a profession where a single appearance is $100, when you can get it, and lessons are $50 on average (in St. Louis it's cheap), a living wage takes on a different meaning. There are no easy answers. Most of us would be happy to volunteer if the music itself was closer to our level.

The guitar strummers and crooners, on the other hand are more “approachable by the common man”.

I don't know if it's more approachable so much as using Mass as a performance outlet. When you're in another group somewhere, that need goes away because it's fulfilled. And performing, at least for me, at the symphonic level with a group that consistantly is good does feed my need for that.

[Conservative til I die]

We had a music teacher at my grammar school who doubled as an organist at Mass. He died under rather sudden and mysterious circumstances, believed by most of us to be AIDS.

[Rubber_Duckie_27]

The current organist filling in at my parents' Lutheran church is a Roman Catholic woman who had been organist at one of the local parishes before they switched over to all this drum-and-guitar stuff. She doesn't have much choice other than to head for mainline Protestant churches.

Both me and my fiance (who was unchurched before we started dating) prefer the traditional liturgy with the organ and hymns and all. It is nice to OCCASIONALLY have the contemporary service, but I think I'd dislike having it every Sunday.