I am grateful for the many thoughtful comments (mostly private) on the last post. It's true that, at the moment, the organ is anything but "in." Chamber music and symphonies by Central European, German-speaking composers, written between 1775 and 1925 -- that is in. But look at how the Early Music movement was a mere curiosity in the 1950s. In the 1960s it was derided, but it was becoming prevalent enough to scare people into that derision. By the 1970s it was starting to be trendy; now people were really becoming scared. By the 1980s, Boston had more Early Music happening than the other kind. Today, most all classical musicians of any camp perform Baroque music with some sort of stylistic understanding. In 1950 it wouldn't have seemed possible.
Why can't there be a musical renaissance if there's already been a culinary one? Today you can go to a regular supermarket and find 15 kinds of whole bean coffee, 15 kinds of pasta, 15 kinds of cheese, 15 kinds of olive oil, 15 kinds of wheat bread ... As recently as 20 years ago, you had to go to expensive specialty stores for anything like that. And TV didn't have entire cooking networks -- there were Julia Child and the Frugal Gourmet, and only a couple of other smaller names. The public has become culinarily more sophisticated, more aware. It can also happen for music, and especially for the organ. In fact, I think it will.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Friday, November 6, 2009
The Future of Classical Music, or of Anything Else
Being a "classical" musician (not sure what that means), it's hard not to wonder, at least occasionally, what the future of "classical" music is going to be.
Some corners of the classical music market certainly will fail. The major conservatories have already started their descent to failure, and the reason is a very simple financial one: tuition prices are moving in contrary motion to the salaries being earned by graduates, which means that the #1 fund-raising source of any school -- alumni -- is soon going to be no source at all. To put in layman's terms that even the administrators of a famous conservatory could understand: you can't teach someone to do a low-earning job and charge that person big money for the privilege.
Also on the road to failure are the major symphony orchestras. Again the reason is a simple one: people perceive that "classical music is boring," and as executed in the major concert halls, indeed it is. The last thing on Beethoven's mind -- the very, very last thing -- was a bunch of people wearing crisp tuxes, playing long programs, requiring the audience to sit for long stretches in total silence -- no one speaks to the audience, the audience speaks to no one. And, for this privilege, the ticket prices continue to climb. It defies all logic, and if fewer people are attending, it's probably for some of the same reasons that I don't attend (unless a friend is performing).
The future of opera? I won't even discuss it, because the level of singing is so low that I don't even respect the genre in the state that it's being currently perpetrated. (Recently I saw a video of a live Aïda from Verona, 1967, with an in-his-prime Bergonzi, Gencer, Cossotto, Colzani, and the list goes on. Excellect chorus. Excellent orchestra. Excellent direction by Capuana. And I remarked to my wife, "You could not even assemble a cast like this today. You could search the whole world and not even find this much talent and ability." And even if you did, you could never get from them a live, unspliced performance of this quality. Opera today is not even to be considered among serious music-making.)
There was an interesting article by Anne Midgette in yesterday's Washington Post about the topic of classical music in today's world:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/04/AR2009110404360.html
and many interesting blog responses, notably this one:
http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/2009/11/quotation_of_the_day_8.html
The future of "classical music," or of anything else, will depend on the leadership not of the country but of musicians. Undoubtedly you will consider this to be exaggerated and mathematically suspicious, but I will state that 99.999% of musicians follow instead of lead. Instrumentalists apply for jobs in symphony orchestras because "that's what's done." When orchestras fail and something else becomes popular, they will apply for that thing because "now this is what's done." To survive in music is very easy. Do what isn't done. Be one of that 0.001% who is strong enough to say, "I feel passion about this, this has beauty, this has cultural value, I'm doing this." People will follow.
And who follows more obediently that a music critic? Recently a critic in a major newspaper was trying to get across how famous Gustavo Dudamel is. He wrote, "Dudamel, in case you've been living in an organ loft, is [a famous conductor, etc.]."
Here is the letter I wrote in response:
Dear [name of newspaper],
I object to Mr. [Critic]'s statement that "[Gustavo] Dudamel, in case you've been living in an organ loft, is [a famous conductor]." Some of my best friends live in organ lofts.
Sincerely yours,
Leonardo Ciampa
Cambridge, MA
They printed it.
The fact, meanwhile -- and the conservatory administrators will be the last, I mean THE LAST, ones to figure it out -- is that the pipe organ is beginning its ascent to a comeback. The reasons are numerous, but here are the two major ones:
1. Churches are gradually forsaking their organs for guitars and drums, and other churches are closing altogether, but in the meantime, there has been a spate of new pipe organs going into concert halls (see http://www.chordstrike.com/2009/06/romancing-the-pipes-an-organ-primer.html ). Secular groups are buying the closed churches, or buying and relocating the organs they contained. Strangely enough, the organ is benefiting from the church attendance crisis. The organ is gradually shaking its perceived affiliation with the church. It is an independent musical instrument, like the oboe or the piano. Because of this, people who normally would never give money to something church-related are giving money to organs and organ recitals.
2. In a world where live, acoustic music played on live, acoustic instruments has never been rarer, people are getting tired of the constant synthetic sound -- the iPods and mp3's and wmv's and TVs and CD players and every other medium of sound replication. The engineering of a pipe organ, and the physics of how it resonates in its acoustical environment, has never been more interesting to an increasingly educated society. It "sounds better." Real sound sounds an awful lot better than a Youtube recording of real sound. And there is no sound more beautiful, more varied, or more interesting than the sound of a good organ played by a good organist in good acoustics.
These are merely beginnings of the Renaissance. Carnegie Hall still reigns. Juilliard still reigns. The Met still reigns. But they are all weakening, and if you don't believe me, take a peak at their annual reports.
Some corners of the classical music market certainly will fail. The major conservatories have already started their descent to failure, and the reason is a very simple financial one: tuition prices are moving in contrary motion to the salaries being earned by graduates, which means that the #1 fund-raising source of any school -- alumni -- is soon going to be no source at all. To put in layman's terms that even the administrators of a famous conservatory could understand: you can't teach someone to do a low-earning job and charge that person big money for the privilege.
Also on the road to failure are the major symphony orchestras. Again the reason is a simple one: people perceive that "classical music is boring," and as executed in the major concert halls, indeed it is. The last thing on Beethoven's mind -- the very, very last thing -- was a bunch of people wearing crisp tuxes, playing long programs, requiring the audience to sit for long stretches in total silence -- no one speaks to the audience, the audience speaks to no one. And, for this privilege, the ticket prices continue to climb. It defies all logic, and if fewer people are attending, it's probably for some of the same reasons that I don't attend (unless a friend is performing).
The future of opera? I won't even discuss it, because the level of singing is so low that I don't even respect the genre in the state that it's being currently perpetrated. (Recently I saw a video of a live Aïda from Verona, 1967, with an in-his-prime Bergonzi, Gencer, Cossotto, Colzani, and the list goes on. Excellect chorus. Excellent orchestra. Excellent direction by Capuana. And I remarked to my wife, "You could not even assemble a cast like this today. You could search the whole world and not even find this much talent and ability." And even if you did, you could never get from them a live, unspliced performance of this quality. Opera today is not even to be considered among serious music-making.)
There was an interesting article by Anne Midgette in yesterday's Washington Post about the topic of classical music in today's world:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/04/AR2009110404360.html
and many interesting blog responses, notably this one:
http://www.artsjournal.com/sandow/2009/11/quotation_of_the_day_8.html
The future of "classical music," or of anything else, will depend on the leadership not of the country but of musicians. Undoubtedly you will consider this to be exaggerated and mathematically suspicious, but I will state that 99.999% of musicians follow instead of lead. Instrumentalists apply for jobs in symphony orchestras because "that's what's done." When orchestras fail and something else becomes popular, they will apply for that thing because "now this is what's done." To survive in music is very easy. Do what isn't done. Be one of that 0.001% who is strong enough to say, "I feel passion about this, this has beauty, this has cultural value, I'm doing this." People will follow.
And who follows more obediently that a music critic? Recently a critic in a major newspaper was trying to get across how famous Gustavo Dudamel is. He wrote, "Dudamel, in case you've been living in an organ loft, is [a famous conductor, etc.]."
Here is the letter I wrote in response:
Dear [name of newspaper],
I object to Mr. [Critic]'s statement that "[Gustavo] Dudamel, in case you've been living in an organ loft, is [a famous conductor]." Some of my best friends live in organ lofts.
Sincerely yours,
Leonardo Ciampa
Cambridge, MA
They printed it.
The fact, meanwhile -- and the conservatory administrators will be the last, I mean THE LAST, ones to figure it out -- is that the pipe organ is beginning its ascent to a comeback. The reasons are numerous, but here are the two major ones:
1. Churches are gradually forsaking their organs for guitars and drums, and other churches are closing altogether, but in the meantime, there has been a spate of new pipe organs going into concert halls (see http://www.chordstrike.com/2009/06/romancing-the-pipes-an-organ-primer.html ). Secular groups are buying the closed churches, or buying and relocating the organs they contained. Strangely enough, the organ is benefiting from the church attendance crisis. The organ is gradually shaking its perceived affiliation with the church. It is an independent musical instrument, like the oboe or the piano. Because of this, people who normally would never give money to something church-related are giving money to organs and organ recitals.
2. In a world where live, acoustic music played on live, acoustic instruments has never been rarer, people are getting tired of the constant synthetic sound -- the iPods and mp3's and wmv's and TVs and CD players and every other medium of sound replication. The engineering of a pipe organ, and the physics of how it resonates in its acoustical environment, has never been more interesting to an increasingly educated society. It "sounds better." Real sound sounds an awful lot better than a Youtube recording of real sound. And there is no sound more beautiful, more varied, or more interesting than the sound of a good organ played by a good organist in good acoustics.
These are merely beginnings of the Renaissance. Carnegie Hall still reigns. Juilliard still reigns. The Met still reigns. But they are all weakening, and if you don't believe me, take a peak at their annual reports.
Sunday, November 1, 2009
The Effect of Paul Manz
Since Mr. Manz's death last Wednesday, I have listened, re-listened, and re-relistened to the three Pipedreams shows on Manz.
No two people are touched by the same thing in the same way. I knew a cleric who could hear Christian rock music of the lowest music and theological quality and say, "That touched my heart." Thus, these things are impossible to measure. That said, I have in these days been so touched -- in fact blessed -- by Mr. Manz's playing of his own music. It has "jumped out at me."
There are several qualities which make this man and his music remarkable and, well, touching.
A composer playing his own music. Without question, my greatest dilemma as a musician has been the inability to replicate how the composers played their own music. Even if, by some miracle, we could be certain of every articulation, rubato, and inflection of a composer, even by reproducing every one of these details, the personality, the "spirit" (and spirit is real) would never be right. Chopin is an extreme example. We know almost nothing about how he played. (Yes, I own Chopin: pianist and teacher, The Chopin Companion, and every other relevant book. So what? We still don't know what he sounded like. Or as Baron Munchhausen said, "Vass you dere, Sharlie?")
Then in 2001 I discovered the recordings of Ernesto Lecuona, playing his own music. From the "classical" point of view (I don't know what that means, but I said it anyway), the music is not on the level of Chopin, Liszt, or Debussy. But hearing Lecuona play it, it moved me on a profound level. It sounded ... well, right. Not just musically right -- spiritually right.
In 1989, in Newport, RI, I heard Charlie Callahan play the world-premiere of his Partita on "Slane." I remember seeing members of the audience in tears -- and they were musicians. Someday, a student of a student of a student of Callahan will exhume this piece and play it. And it won't be the same.
As a teenager, I played a lot of Neobaroque chorale-preludes, published by Concordia, of various composers of the Manz mold. Useful stuff for church, not all of it great. Today we know a lot more about how Baroque music was constructed. Improvisers like Bill Porter and Harald Vogel are not as rare as they once were. There are quite a few musicians today who can fashion Baroque-style music. We hear it, and in our snobbery we wonder, "How 'authentic' is it?" This week, hearing Manz play his music, the question instead was, "How right is it?"
In the context of church. The music of Manz seems even more right, because he wrote it for use on Sunday morning, during actual worship. Manz went one step further: instead of giving traditional organ recitals, he gave hymn festivals, playing hymn-based compositions and improvisations interspersed with hymns sung by all present.
I could not applaud this more loudly! We have dissected Bach's music from every angle and with every rationale. The composer whose music I most love to play is Bach. And the composer about whose music I feel the most subconscious is Bach. Every time I play a note, I imagine that I've broken ten rules. Maybe it was too legato or too staccato or, worse yet, it "wasn't in the style." What that "style" is, of course, no one knows, a fact that we've already established. It's a rather fluid thing; in ten years the "authentic style" will suddenly be something different.
But hearing Manz play his Neobaroque compositions, in the context of worship, I feel like I'm brought closer to the spirit of Bach. While the organ professors were out having fistfights over articulation, here in the Midwest, far from Boston, was a fervent Lutheran musician, improvising on Lutheran hymns during a Lutheran service. That is much closer to the Bach experience than some Bach recital by some top teacher on the trendy tracker of the time.
A good person making good music. Around 1991, I was at Duquesne University, playing what I think was the world-premiere of the Sonata for Clarinet and Piano by Elliott McKinley. It was some sort of new music festival organized by David Stock. One day, Bill Bolcom did a composition masterclass, during which the discussion somehow meandered to "good" music written by "not necessarily good" human beings. Bolcom mentioned Wagner and admitted that he wasn't sure how to reconcile the fact that great music was written by ... well, Wagner. I admired Bolcom's candor about it; he was brave enough to say, "I don't know the answer to that one."
It is a question that I've thought often of in the almost 20 years since.
There's no question that great people sometimes write bad pieces, and bad people sometimes write great pieces. And frankly, we can't always judge how "good" or "bad" a historical figure was. Some claimed that Verdi, Brahms, and other composers "believed in nothing." Chances are, they very much believed in a Higher Power but did not believe in the church hierarchy. Put differently, God's laws and church laws are not necessarily synonymous. The latter they were happy to break -- and historically the clergy themselves have been only too willing to break both categories of laws. ("Do as we say, not as we do," proclaims their conduct.)
However, what I do know is that when you have a great person writing a great piece of music, it transcends all earthly stratospheres. The greatest music of Perosi is greater than the greatest music of Wagner or some other reprobate. We have, for instance, a recording of Perosi conducting his "Giudizio Universale." This is a musical/spiritual level that Wagner never reached.
And so there is "a certain something" about the music of Paul Manz. It comes across that there is a great human being making this music. There is a simplicity -- a quality that is not childish but childlike. Manz, in his music, seemed to be behaving the way Christ admonished us to behave.
Here are the Pipedreams shows. Experience them for yourself:
http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2001/0114/
Long live the memory of Paul Manz.
No two people are touched by the same thing in the same way. I knew a cleric who could hear Christian rock music of the lowest music and theological quality and say, "That touched my heart." Thus, these things are impossible to measure. That said, I have in these days been so touched -- in fact blessed -- by Mr. Manz's playing of his own music. It has "jumped out at me."
There are several qualities which make this man and his music remarkable and, well, touching.
A composer playing his own music. Without question, my greatest dilemma as a musician has been the inability to replicate how the composers played their own music. Even if, by some miracle, we could be certain of every articulation, rubato, and inflection of a composer, even by reproducing every one of these details, the personality, the "spirit" (and spirit is real) would never be right. Chopin is an extreme example. We know almost nothing about how he played. (Yes, I own Chopin: pianist and teacher, The Chopin Companion, and every other relevant book. So what? We still don't know what he sounded like. Or as Baron Munchhausen said, "Vass you dere, Sharlie?")
Then in 2001 I discovered the recordings of Ernesto Lecuona, playing his own music. From the "classical" point of view (I don't know what that means, but I said it anyway), the music is not on the level of Chopin, Liszt, or Debussy. But hearing Lecuona play it, it moved me on a profound level. It sounded ... well, right. Not just musically right -- spiritually right.
In 1989, in Newport, RI, I heard Charlie Callahan play the world-premiere of his Partita on "Slane." I remember seeing members of the audience in tears -- and they were musicians. Someday, a student of a student of a student of Callahan will exhume this piece and play it. And it won't be the same.
As a teenager, I played a lot of Neobaroque chorale-preludes, published by Concordia, of various composers of the Manz mold. Useful stuff for church, not all of it great. Today we know a lot more about how Baroque music was constructed. Improvisers like Bill Porter and Harald Vogel are not as rare as they once were. There are quite a few musicians today who can fashion Baroque-style music. We hear it, and in our snobbery we wonder, "How 'authentic' is it?" This week, hearing Manz play his music, the question instead was, "How right is it?"
In the context of church. The music of Manz seems even more right, because he wrote it for use on Sunday morning, during actual worship. Manz went one step further: instead of giving traditional organ recitals, he gave hymn festivals, playing hymn-based compositions and improvisations interspersed with hymns sung by all present.
I could not applaud this more loudly! We have dissected Bach's music from every angle and with every rationale. The composer whose music I most love to play is Bach. And the composer about whose music I feel the most subconscious is Bach. Every time I play a note, I imagine that I've broken ten rules. Maybe it was too legato or too staccato or, worse yet, it "wasn't in the style." What that "style" is, of course, no one knows, a fact that we've already established. It's a rather fluid thing; in ten years the "authentic style" will suddenly be something different.
But hearing Manz play his Neobaroque compositions, in the context of worship, I feel like I'm brought closer to the spirit of Bach. While the organ professors were out having fistfights over articulation, here in the Midwest, far from Boston, was a fervent Lutheran musician, improvising on Lutheran hymns during a Lutheran service. That is much closer to the Bach experience than some Bach recital by some top teacher on the trendy tracker of the time.
A good person making good music. Around 1991, I was at Duquesne University, playing what I think was the world-premiere of the Sonata for Clarinet and Piano by Elliott McKinley. It was some sort of new music festival organized by David Stock. One day, Bill Bolcom did a composition masterclass, during which the discussion somehow meandered to "good" music written by "not necessarily good" human beings. Bolcom mentioned Wagner and admitted that he wasn't sure how to reconcile the fact that great music was written by ... well, Wagner. I admired Bolcom's candor about it; he was brave enough to say, "I don't know the answer to that one."
It is a question that I've thought often of in the almost 20 years since.
There's no question that great people sometimes write bad pieces, and bad people sometimes write great pieces. And frankly, we can't always judge how "good" or "bad" a historical figure was. Some claimed that Verdi, Brahms, and other composers "believed in nothing." Chances are, they very much believed in a Higher Power but did not believe in the church hierarchy. Put differently, God's laws and church laws are not necessarily synonymous. The latter they were happy to break -- and historically the clergy themselves have been only too willing to break both categories of laws. ("Do as we say, not as we do," proclaims their conduct.)
However, what I do know is that when you have a great person writing a great piece of music, it transcends all earthly stratospheres. The greatest music of Perosi is greater than the greatest music of Wagner or some other reprobate. We have, for instance, a recording of Perosi conducting his "Giudizio Universale." This is a musical/spiritual level that Wagner never reached.
And so there is "a certain something" about the music of Paul Manz. It comes across that there is a great human being making this music. There is a simplicity -- a quality that is not childish but childlike. Manz, in his music, seemed to be behaving the way Christ admonished us to behave.
Here are the Pipedreams shows. Experience them for yourself:
http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2001/0114/
Long live the memory of Paul Manz.
RIP Paul Manz
In Memoriam Paul Manz
by Scott M. Hyslop
by Scott M. Hyslop
Paul Otto Manz, internationally celebrated organist, dean of American church musicians, and composer of the internationally acclaimed motet “E’en So, Lord Jesus, Quickly Come” has died in St. Paul, Minnesota at the age of ninety years.
Manz’s life and career were filled with the honors and accolades that many performing musicians strive for yet seldom attain. With a lengthy list of performances at venues like The Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., with the National Symphony; Symphony Center in Chicago, with the Chicago Symphony; and Orchestra Hall in Minneapolis, with the Minnesota Orchestra, Manz was able to perform the canon of major works for organ and orchestra – a feat that few organists can claim. His charisma at the console made him a favorite of conductors like Leonard Slatkin, Charles Dutoit, and Henry Charles Smith.
While his career as a soloist took him around the world to splendid cathedrals and thrilling concert halls, his charisma as a musician and a servant of the church found its fullest expression in the action of leading people in congregational song. Through his work as an organist and composer, Manz reinvented the classic organ chorale of Buxtehude and Bach, giving it a new voice which spoke clearly and unapologetically with a fresh American accent. His work in this genre led him to play thousands of hymn festivals around the world – playing that excited and invigorated countless organists, church musicians and lay people who came to hear him play. Manz’s work in congregational song and liturgy can be viewed as the spark that eventually became a bonfire in which the standards for service playing and church music in this country were recast.
Even with an enviable career as a concert organist, Manz’s heart was deeply rooted in his work as a parish church musician. “Love the people you have been called to serve” was the surprising answer Manz gave when asked what one piece of advice he would offer to an individual starting out in the field of church music today. This seemingly simple response belies a depth of experience, wisdom, and faith which was formed and molded in the crucible of service to God’s people of the church over the course of a life well lived.
The only child of Otto Manz and Hulda (nee Jeske) Manz, German-Russian immigrants who had come to America to make a better life for their family, Paul Otto Manz was born on May 10, 1919, in Cleveland Ohio. At age five, Manz began piano lessons. Two years later, upon the advice of his first piano teacher, Emily Dinda, Manz began studying piano and organ with Henry J. Markworth at Trinity Lutheran Church in Cleveland, Ohio. In order to study with Markworth, Manz had to agree to take two lessons at the piano for every lesson at the organ. Upon completion of the eighth grade, Manz entered Concordia High School in River Forest, Illinois, eventually matriculating into their teacher training program.
While a student at Concordia, Manz also began private organ studies at the American Conservatory in Chicago with the eminent American organist Edwin Eigenschenk, a student of Bonnet and Vierne. Manz would go on to further study with the eminent Bach scholar Albert Riemenschneider at Baldwin Wallace College in Berea, Ohio, and Edwin Arthur Kraft at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland. Formal studies at the graduate level were pursued by Manz at the University of Minnesota, where he was a student of Arthur B. Jennings, and in 1952 he received his Master’s degree in organ performance from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois.
In 1956 Manz received a Fulbright grant for study with Flor Peeters at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Antwerp, Belgium. An extension of the Fulbright provided Manz with the opportunity to work with Helmut Walcha at the Dreikönigskirche in Frankfurt, Germany. Manz would subsequently return to Belgium for three more summers to study with Peeters. The bond between Peeters and Manz grew so close over the ensuing years that the Belgian government invited Manz to be the official United States representative in state ceremonies honoring Flor Peeters on his 80th birthday and his 60th year as titular organist of the Cathedral of Saint Rombaut in Mechelen, Belgium. At that time, Flor Peeters referred to his former student as "my spiritual son."
In 1943, Manz married Ruth Mueller, a union which was blessed with four children: David, who died at birth; Michael, who died unexpectedly in 2006; John, and Peter. Following the deaths of Ruth’s brother, Herbert Mueller, in 1961 and his wife Helene, in 1964, the Manzes took in their four orphaned children, Mary, Anne, Sara, and John, increasing their family number to nine. Through all of life’s vicissitudes Ruth was Paul’s partner in every sense of the word, and he has been quoted as saying, “Without her I would probably be playing piano in a bar somewhere. Ruth has been the cantus firmus in our home and for our children, whom I treasure, while I practiced, taught, played and wrote.” Through the course of their 65 years of marriage, Paul and Ruth shared an exceptionally close relationship until her death in July of 2008. Her influence on his work and career cannot be underestimated.
Upon graduation from Concordia in 1941, Manz filled positions as teacher, principal and musician with several parishes in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin and St. Paul, Minnesota. In 1946, Manz received a call to Mt. Olive Lutheran Church in Minneapolis, where he served as full-time director of Christian education and music, an affiliation that would last for 37 years. Over the course of his service at Mt. Olive, Manz’s job description would change several times as the congregation made every effort to nurture and share his gifts with the church-at-large. A man of many sought-after talents, Manz served on the faculties at the University of Minnesota and Macalester College in St. Paul before he accepted a call in 1957 to serve as professor and chair of the Division of Fine Arts at Concordia College in St. Paul. Rather than lose him, Mt. Olive arranged for Paul’s duties to be pared down, allowing him to share his gifts at both institutions.
Manz would serve for many happy years at Concordia. Noteworthy among his numerous accomplishments during his tenure was his establishment of a sound program of music studies with a well-trained and distinguished faculty. His ultimate achievement at Concordia was the fulfillment of the dream that the Fine Arts Division of the school would have its own facility replete with rehearsal rooms, classroom space, and an auditorium complete with a concert pipe organ – designed by Manz, as well as well-designed studios for the art department. Shortly after the realization of this dream, Manz would find himself caught in the whirlwind and cruel chaos that enveloped the Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod at that time. His own convictions, coupled with deeply personal connections to the fray, left Manz with little choice but to resign his position at Concordia. He returned to full-time parish service, this time as Cantor at Mt. Olive with a specific mandate from the parish to use his many gifts in the service of the church catholic.
In 1983, after 37 years of service at Mt. Olive, Paul and Ruth Manz pulled up stakes and began a new chapter of ministry in Chicago, where Manz received a double call to serve as Christ Seminex Professor of Church Music and Artist in Residence at the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago, and as Cantor at the Evangelical Lutheran Church of St. Luke. Manz retired from LSTC in September of 1992, but this retirement was merely a change of direction that provided an opportunity for friends and colleagues to encourage him to share his wealth of knowledge through workshops and master classes throughout the country. The dream was formalized with the creation of the Paul Manz Institute of Church Music based at the Church of St. Luke in Chicago. The Institute enabled him to continue to give lavishly and selflessly to others in the church, drawing from his own wealth of education and experience.
After a lifetime of faithful service as a church musician, in 1999 Paul Manz retired from the Paul Manz Institute of Church Music and St. Luke Church at age 80. The Manzes moved back to Minneapolis to be closer to family and friends.
Although it was Manz’s intent to keep performing from his base in Minneapolis, his life would soon take another direction. In May of 2000, while in North Carolina preparing to dedicate a new organ at an Episcopal Church in Hendersonville, Manz was stricken with sepsis. While Manz’s life was spared, his hearing was greatly compromised. After months of difficult recuperation it became apparent that he would not be able to play again.
The esteem and respect with which Paul Manz was regarded is seen in the numerous honorary doctorates, and honors he received over the course of his career. Northwestern University, his alma mater, presented him with the prestigious "Alumni Merit Award"; Trinity Lutheran Seminary of Columbus, Ohio bestowed the "Joseph Sittler Award for Theological Leadership”; The Lutheran School of Theology, Chicago presented him with the distinguished "Confessor of Christ Award"; The Chicago Bible Society presented him with the "Gutenberg Award"; and the Lutheran Institute of Washington, DC honored him with the first "Wittenberg Arts Award".
Paul Manz’s organ and choral works are internationally known and are used extensively in worship services, recitals, and teaching, and by church and college choirs. His motet “E’en So, Lord Jesus, Quickly Come”, having sold over one million copies, is regarded as a classic and has been performed and recorded in the United States and abroad. Manz’s life and work is the subject of a doctoral dissertation, published in 2007 by MorningStar Music Publishers in St. Louis, Missouri as The Journey Was Chosen: The Life and Work of Paul Manz.
Composer, recitalist, teacher, minister of the Word, clinician, author, organ consultant, faithful servant -- all facets of Paul Manz’s life shone as sure and faithful reflections of the hope, joy and peace which God has promised to us.
Paul is survived by his children, daughter-in-law Patricia Manz (Michael, deceased) of Spokane, John Manz (Ellen Anderson Manz) of Saint Paul, Mary Mueller Bode (Joel, deceased) of Saint Paul, Peter Manz (Stephanie Cram) of Portland, Anne Mueller Klinge (David) of Saint Louis, Sarah Mueller Forsberg (Dale) of Minneapolis, and John Mueller of Spokane. Twelve grandchildren: Erik Manz (Kimberly), David Manz (Caitlin) Rachael M. Manz, Rachel C. Manz, Rebekah Manz, Sarah Bode Selden (Dave), Katherine Edmonds, Erin Klinge Eftink (David), Jessica Klinge Hemmann (Scott), Laura Klinge, Peter Forsberg, Anna Forsberg, and five great grandchildren; many treasured friends, colleagues, former students, and legions of people in the pews. Through the example of his life, through the legacy of his family, and ultimately through the legacy of music that he graced us with to stir our souls, to excite our imaginations, and to enable our prayer and proclamation, we hear Paul Manz say,
Thank you for the grace of singing with me across the years in good times and in bad, when our words have stuck in our throats and when our eyes have overflowed with joy. It has ever been a Song of Grace: ‘Love to the loveless shown that we might lovely be.’ I have just been the organist. Thank you for letting me play.
(Mr. Hyslop is the author of The Journey Was Chosen: The Life and Work of Paul Manz. To purchase this book: http://www.ohscatalog.org/jowaschliand.html )
Sunday, September 27, 2009
MIT Chapel Concerts
(updated on October 1, 2009)Friends,
I'm happy to announce a new series of noontime organ recitals in the MIT Chapel. I am coordinating the series, which is under the aegis of the MIT Office of Religious Life.
The fall series will comprise five consecutive Thursdays, Oct. 22 to Nov. 19, inclusive. The concerts will be from 12 to 12:30 p.m. I will play the first two concerts (Oct. 22 & 29); the organists for the other three concerts will be Joshua Lawton (Nov. 5), Paul Cienniwa (Nov. 12), and Lee Ridgway (Nov. 19).
The Chapel organ, built by the Holtkamp Organ Company in 1955 (their Op. 1674), is an exquisite example of the organ building of that era. It remains unaltered and, thus, is one of the most important historic organs of that period of American organ building. The instrument is wed felicitously with the acoustics and architecture of Saarinen's renowned chapel.
The Chapel organ dates from Holtkamp's finest period: the tenure of Walter Holtkamp, Sr. (1894-1962), who was president from 1951 till his death in 1962. Many important installations date from this period, including the organ at Crouse College (Syracuse University), as well as our own Kresge Auditorium.For more information on different ways that you might support these concerts, click here.
To hear this beautiful organ in a worship setting, there is a non-denominational prayer service held every Tuesday morning from 8:30 to 8:50 (preludes at 8:25). I am the organist for this short but meaningful service.
Photos by Leonardo Ciampa (29 September 2009).
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Mark Twain V
All publishers are Columbuses. The successful author is their America. The reflection that they -- like Columbus -- didn't discover what they expected to discover, and didn't discover what they started out to discover, doesn't trouble them. All they remember is that they discovered America; they forgot that they started out to discover some patch or corner of India.
*
[Henry H. Rogers said:] "Business has its laws and customs and they are justified; but a literary man's reputation is his life; he can afford to be money poor but he cannot afford to be character poor; you must earn the cent per cent and pay it."
*
Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one and is this: we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities which we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists of just that. Our heroes are the men who do things which we recognize with regret and sometimes with a secret shame that we cannot do. We find not much in ourselves to admire, we are always privately wanting to be like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself there would be no heroes.
*
Oxford is healing a secret old sore of mine which has been causing me sharp anguish once a year for many, many years. ... In these past thirty-five or forty years I have seen our universities distribute nine or ten thousand honorary degrees and overlook me every time. ... This neglect would have killed a less robust person than I am, but it has not killed me; it has only shortened my life and weakened my constitution; but I shall get my strength back now. ... Now then, having purged myself of this thirty-five years' accumulation of bile and injured pride, I will drop the matter and smooth my feathers down and talk about something else.
*
[Henry H. Rogers said:] "Business has its laws and customs and they are justified; but a literary man's reputation is his life; he can afford to be money poor but he cannot afford to be character poor; you must earn the cent per cent and pay it."
*
Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one and is this: we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities which we ourselves lack. Hero worship consists of just that. Our heroes are the men who do things which we recognize with regret and sometimes with a secret shame that we cannot do. We find not much in ourselves to admire, we are always privately wanting to be like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself there would be no heroes.
*
Oxford is healing a secret old sore of mine which has been causing me sharp anguish once a year for many, many years. ... In these past thirty-five or forty years I have seen our universities distribute nine or ten thousand honorary degrees and overlook me every time. ... This neglect would have killed a less robust person than I am, but it has not killed me; it has only shortened my life and weakened my constitution; but I shall get my strength back now. ... Now then, having purged myself of this thirty-five years' accumulation of bile and injured pride, I will drop the matter and smooth my feathers down and talk about something else.
Monday, September 7, 2009
The Italian (& Hungarian) sides of Joe Maneri
Friends,
I know many of you have been waiting for a (to use one of Joe's favorite adjectives) heavy-duty post from me. Certainly the man whom I said was both "one of the greatest musicians of our time" and "like a father to me" was someone about whom I would have something to say.
Well, I still can't bring myself to write it.
A book could, and should, and will, will written about him. Several, I'm sure. But to reduce him to one blog post? It would be easier to arrange a ten-minute piano work entitled, "Highlights from Beethoven's Last Five Piano Sonatas."
I did, however, find a journal entry that I wrote several months back. It is not even the tip of the iceberg -- it is a snowflake on top of the tip of the iceberg. Still, I think begins to hint at the immensity of my feelings:
3 April 2009
Today was the day that I learned that Joe had a heart attack two weeks ago, and now has congestive heart failure. So it's only natural that I wanted to get some thoughts on paper.
I'm sure I will write something about Joe. And I'm sure it will be viewed by some as a student's adulation for his teacher, something not "impartial."
Well, I will tell you this:
If you went to the home of the greatest Italian chef who ever lived, and you tasted the greatest ravioli ever created by the hand of mankind, and if your reaction was, "Those ravioli are pretty good," that is not impartiality. That is inaccuracy.
If I use superlatives to describe Joe, it shows that he must be very great. If he were not very great, why would I want to write about him? And why would I write with superlatives if he were "normal"?
For to state that "Joe Maneri was within the range of normal" would be an inaccuracy. He was well beyond the range of normal. The only honest thing is to describe a great man with great terms. If through my writing the subject emerges as someone "great," that is not my fault. I am merely reporting a fact.
Joe and I spent many hours -- who knows how many? -- listening to and talking about Italian opera and song. Though Joe had a thoroughly German training with Josef Schmid (1890-1969), his heart and his upbringing were equally thoroughly Italian. At the time it was the furthest thing from my mind that I was "influencing him" in any way. I was simply sharing, and anyone who knew him knew that he was a limitlessly generous man who had a gift for drawing the loves and passions out of those around him. It was natural for his students and friends to share what was in their hearts.
Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana was an opera known and loved by countless Sicilians of Joe's parents' generation. Though many musicians and musicologists persist in thinking of this work as being "crude" and, in the worst sense of the word, "pesanty," Joe found much sophistication in it. I can still hear Joe singing the cello theme that opens Scene II -- that heart-breaking F# minor melody. There is a spot where Mascagni uses an F major 6/4 chord, with the cellos playing an open C. Quite a distant chord in F# minor. Joe told me, "When I first played that chord, I cried."
I had trouble holding back the tears when, following Joe's funeral, I was at the Maneri home, seated at the Knabe piano that used to be his mother's, with the old yellowed score of Cavalleria on the rack. I couldn't bring myself to play Scene II, but I played the Prelude. There are no words for the sadness I felt. I think I was sad in particular because I realized, at that moment, how sophisticated that music really is. Joe was right all along, yet the world was years from realizing it. The story of his life.
I often brought CDs of Caruso and Gigli, singing Verdi, Puccini, and of course Mascagni, but also Tosti. Many times did I play Tosti for Joe on one or another of the various pianos in the Maneri residence. On one of these occasions, Joe said to me, "You know, I have to tell you, I think that Paolo Tosti is really my favorite composer."
Joe once paid me a compliment that, at the time, I didn't think I deserved in the slightest way. Today, I think there may have been some truth in it. He said, "You've influenced my teaching. Before my teaching was too German. But because of you, I put more of the Italian in there."
Another composer whom Joe loved in a way that few people realized was Franz Liszt.
Liszt was a lot like Joe. Liszt had a comprehensive knowledge and understanding of all other music and musicians of his time. Liszt encouraged the musicians around him and treated them with the utmost generosity. Liszt pushed tonality ten or twenty years before the rest of the musical world as a whole started pushing it. Liszt plunged depths of spirituality and profundity, yet his detractors insisted he was "posing." All of that could be said about Dr. Maneri.
Once, I had a beautiful print made of Liszt seated at the piano (see image) and had it professionally framed. I don't remember the occasion; Joe's birthday, maybe? Anyhow, when he saw it, he went wild! He looked at it as if to know everything that Liszt was thinking at the time of the photo. It would be a little cliché to say that "it was like Joe knew him." What it was was: Joe really related to him. And he got very excited every time we talked about him.
Once, in class, Joe unexpectedly asked me to go to the piano and sightread (!) several of Liszt's late, mysterious piano works (Nuages Gris and one or two others). These works profoundly moved and fascinated Joe. After all, they were, in the best sense of the phrase, "ahead of their time."
I knew Joe since I was eight or nine years old, before he became my teacher. In September of 1989, during Orientation Week at the conservatory, many of the teachers gave a please-take-my-class demonstration. I could write a small book just about the demonstration that Joe gave that day! But I will mention only one thing which relates to the discussion about "ahead of one's time."
One very misunderstood aspect of Joe was his total humility, which to many seemed to be total arrogance. It wasn't. For instance, once in class Joe said (verbatim), "I'm so amazing it's scary, and I say that with the deepest humility." There wasn't a shred of arrogance in that statement. Joe gave every nanogram of credit, for every great thing inside him, to the Lord. If you knew him, you understood the simplicity and honesty of such statements.
Anyhow, here we were in September of '89 during Orientation Week. Joe's telling us the story of something that happened only a week before. He was cleaning out his swimming pool, and he combined chlorine with something else, and he couldn't breathe, and Sonja had to rush him to the hospital, and it took five hours for them to get him to breathe normally again. Joe then said -- and he couldn't say it without laughing -- "Had I died, ha ha ha, had I ha ha ha died, it would have set the world back 50 years."
That, too, was a humble statement. Joe was merely stating the truth.
I know many of you have been waiting for a (to use one of Joe's favorite adjectives) heavy-duty post from me. Certainly the man whom I said was both "one of the greatest musicians of our time" and "like a father to me" was someone about whom I would have something to say.
Well, I still can't bring myself to write it.
A book could, and should, and will, will written about him. Several, I'm sure. But to reduce him to one blog post? It would be easier to arrange a ten-minute piano work entitled, "Highlights from Beethoven's Last Five Piano Sonatas."
I did, however, find a journal entry that I wrote several months back. It is not even the tip of the iceberg -- it is a snowflake on top of the tip of the iceberg. Still, I think begins to hint at the immensity of my feelings:
3 April 2009
Today was the day that I learned that Joe had a heart attack two weeks ago, and now has congestive heart failure. So it's only natural that I wanted to get some thoughts on paper.
I'm sure I will write something about Joe. And I'm sure it will be viewed by some as a student's adulation for his teacher, something not "impartial."
Well, I will tell you this:
If you went to the home of the greatest Italian chef who ever lived, and you tasted the greatest ravioli ever created by the hand of mankind, and if your reaction was, "Those ravioli are pretty good," that is not impartiality. That is inaccuracy.
If I use superlatives to describe Joe, it shows that he must be very great. If he were not very great, why would I want to write about him? And why would I write with superlatives if he were "normal"?
For to state that "Joe Maneri was within the range of normal" would be an inaccuracy. He was well beyond the range of normal. The only honest thing is to describe a great man with great terms. If through my writing the subject emerges as someone "great," that is not my fault. I am merely reporting a fact.
Joe and I spent many hours -- who knows how many? -- listening to and talking about Italian opera and song. Though Joe had a thoroughly German training with Josef Schmid (1890-1969), his heart and his upbringing were equally thoroughly Italian. At the time it was the furthest thing from my mind that I was "influencing him" in any way. I was simply sharing, and anyone who knew him knew that he was a limitlessly generous man who had a gift for drawing the loves and passions out of those around him. It was natural for his students and friends to share what was in their hearts.
Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana was an opera known and loved by countless Sicilians of Joe's parents' generation. Though many musicians and musicologists persist in thinking of this work as being "crude" and, in the worst sense of the word, "pesanty," Joe found much sophistication in it. I can still hear Joe singing the cello theme that opens Scene II -- that heart-breaking F# minor melody. There is a spot where Mascagni uses an F major 6/4 chord, with the cellos playing an open C. Quite a distant chord in F# minor. Joe told me, "When I first played that chord, I cried."
I had trouble holding back the tears when, following Joe's funeral, I was at the Maneri home, seated at the Knabe piano that used to be his mother's, with the old yellowed score of Cavalleria on the rack. I couldn't bring myself to play Scene II, but I played the Prelude. There are no words for the sadness I felt. I think I was sad in particular because I realized, at that moment, how sophisticated that music really is. Joe was right all along, yet the world was years from realizing it. The story of his life.
I often brought CDs of Caruso and Gigli, singing Verdi, Puccini, and of course Mascagni, but also Tosti. Many times did I play Tosti for Joe on one or another of the various pianos in the Maneri residence. On one of these occasions, Joe said to me, "You know, I have to tell you, I think that Paolo Tosti is really my favorite composer."
Joe once paid me a compliment that, at the time, I didn't think I deserved in the slightest way. Today, I think there may have been some truth in it. He said, "You've influenced my teaching. Before my teaching was too German. But because of you, I put more of the Italian in there."
Another composer whom Joe loved in a way that few people realized was Franz Liszt.
Liszt was a lot like Joe. Liszt had a comprehensive knowledge and understanding of all other music and musicians of his time. Liszt encouraged the musicians around him and treated them with the utmost generosity. Liszt pushed tonality ten or twenty years before the rest of the musical world as a whole started pushing it. Liszt plunged depths of spirituality and profundity, yet his detractors insisted he was "posing." All of that could be said about Dr. Maneri.
Once, I had a beautiful print made of Liszt seated at the piano (see image) and had it professionally framed. I don't remember the occasion; Joe's birthday, maybe? Anyhow, when he saw it, he went wild! He looked at it as if to know everything that Liszt was thinking at the time of the photo. It would be a little cliché to say that "it was like Joe knew him." What it was was: Joe really related to him. And he got very excited every time we talked about him.Once, in class, Joe unexpectedly asked me to go to the piano and sightread (!) several of Liszt's late, mysterious piano works (Nuages Gris and one or two others). These works profoundly moved and fascinated Joe. After all, they were, in the best sense of the phrase, "ahead of their time."
I knew Joe since I was eight or nine years old, before he became my teacher. In September of 1989, during Orientation Week at the conservatory, many of the teachers gave a please-take-my-class demonstration. I could write a small book just about the demonstration that Joe gave that day! But I will mention only one thing which relates to the discussion about "ahead of one's time."
One very misunderstood aspect of Joe was his total humility, which to many seemed to be total arrogance. It wasn't. For instance, once in class Joe said (verbatim), "I'm so amazing it's scary, and I say that with the deepest humility." There wasn't a shred of arrogance in that statement. Joe gave every nanogram of credit, for every great thing inside him, to the Lord. If you knew him, you understood the simplicity and honesty of such statements.
Anyhow, here we were in September of '89 during Orientation Week. Joe's telling us the story of something that happened only a week before. He was cleaning out his swimming pool, and he combined chlorine with something else, and he couldn't breathe, and Sonja had to rush him to the hospital, and it took five hours for them to get him to breathe normally again. Joe then said -- and he couldn't say it without laughing -- "Had I died, ha ha ha, had I ha ha ha died, it would have set the world back 50 years."
That, too, was a humble statement. Joe was merely stating the truth.
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