Organ Music: Chorale Preludes
Church musicians are often in a quandary when selecting sheet music to add to their libraries: a finite budget and seemingly infinite choices from music publishers. The musician needs a discerning eye to determine what will be useful at their skill level and worship context. Random selection might yield a few gems, but also result in a bloated collection. A quality library doesn’t necessarily have to be large. It does, however, have to be well chosen.
To that end, I would like to share with you a recent acquisition to my organ music library which I think will be quite valuable: the six volume series “Choralvorspiele Zum Evangelischen Gesangbuch.”
Diving into Hymnody
If you like hymnody, and Lutheran hymnody in particular, there are several blogs you should visit.
Heirs of the Reformation CD Set
Today the good folks at FedEx delivered one of two long awaited items I’ve had on preorder from CPH. Hot off the press is a “sequel” (for lack of a better word) to the 4 CD set Martin Luther: Hymns, Ballads, Chants, Truth. This next 4 CD set – Heirs of the Reformation – focuses on Lutheran hymnody after Luther during the 16th and 17th centuries. Audio samples are available on the CPH product page.
This evening I copied the CDs over to my iPod and have been listening to them as I walked the dog and did other evening tasks. The music is glorious – a melding of instrumental and vocal settings – some old and some new – some on period instruments and some on the organ. This set is truly a feast for the ears; a proclamation of the Word through some great texts and music.
Singing Difficult Hymns
It is unfortunate that many of Luther’s hymns and other Lutheran chorales have fallen out of use in the typical Lutheran congregation. I have been told more than once that those old chorales are difficult to sing. My response: These hymns have to be taught to be appreciated. Otherwise we get in an endless circle of: we don’t sing those hymns because they are unknown/difficult and they are unknown and seem difficult because we never sing them.
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