July’s issue contained an account of how an organ performance of Messiah in Evesham was halted when ‘Charlie’ reached his quota of pumps on the bellows. This prompted a resident of Dymock to relate how; as a lad, he and a chum were taught to pump the organ by a local, we shall call ‘Tom.’
Pumping bellows was hard work and the two lads often broke into a sweat. They were however always encouraged by Tom who used to sip a hip flask which he said contained holy water. The youngsters laboured cheerfully especially when Tom let them run the bellows down so that the organ sounded out of puff. When this happened, they would count twelve, by which time the Vicar of the day would predictably run around from the chancel to tear them off a strip.
My friend’s reminiscences reminded me that the relationship between clerical incumbents and local musicians has not always been easy. In fact, every church musician of my acquaintance has a story illustrating some antipathy between the clergy and the musician.
I have personal memories of a fine organist who, during his later years, was choirmaster at a Gloucester Church. Although an amateur with a keen ear, he had studied music at college and was good enough to play recitals and accompany a number of prominent West Country choral societies. A retirement led to the appointment of a new vicar who felt that young people would be attracted to church if the services took a different form. Unfortunately, this also meant that his musical ambitions were not synchronised with those of ‘Morgan the Organ.’ Morgan was not happy with modern songs and guitar music played in minor keys over only a one-octave range. Instead, he liked the harmonies of Bach and Handel and the challenging, but confident, tones of the hymns of Watts and Wesley.
Over about a year tensions built up until finally, the Vicar announced his chosen hymn only to hear the choir and congregation singing another. The result was that he sacked the choirmaster/organist, and disbanded the choir.
A month’s notice was agreed during which the Choirmaster’s choice of music was observed. At the beginning of the final service in the month the Vicar, unwisely, announced that, “In future the services would be in a more modern, more relevant, more exciting, more interesting,” and crucially, “In a more harmonious format.”
This latter point was taken as a calculated insult to the musical abilities of the choirmaster and choir, and some muttering in the choir stalls ensued. As nothing further happened, the service got underway.
However the organist had the last laugh because, at the commencement of each verse of the final hymn, the skill of Morgan was displayed as he moved effortlessly up a key. By verse four the Vicar, who played guitar and rather fancied himself as a singer, found his vocal chords frighteningly tight and during verse five did himself an injury. As far as I know that was the end of his vocal career and also of the church choir.
I suppose all this goes to show that the power of music to generate emotion must not be underestimated.
View from the Pew 