Musical Styles -- Hope?

[MusicMan]

It was our Catholic church’s turn to host our community’s Ecumenical Thanksgiving service last night. Usually the Contemporary Choir handles the service music and hymns for such events. They weren’t available, so Father asked me to play for the service.

In going through the hymns from the last time we hosted, he and I discovered two things: 1.) I didn’t know any of these songs they sang and 2.) He really didn’t like the idea of doing them, and if I didn’t know them, odds were that the congregation wouldn’t either.

We picked out three traditional Thanksgiving-type hymns.

While I received a lot of compliments on the music following the service, what got me were the Assembly of God Pastors gushing at me about the use of “traditional hymns that we all know and can sing,” and how nice it was to hear the organ again in the Catholic church. Granted, we haven’t had an organ in years, and all I did was use the organ settings on the digital keyboard, but still, compliments from the AG Pastors about traditional hymns and nice to hear organ again!

Even better, the 75 people who gathered last night sang louder than I’ve ever heard at one of these events.

Now, I’m not bashing contemporary music, but we’ve had a lot of discussion about traditional music and organ music vanishing. There’s hope, ladies and gentlemen.

 

[puzzleannie]

oddly enough having participated in such events almost annually for years, you are more likely to find that traditional hymns appeal most widely in the most diverse Christian gathering, and your audience will appreciate finding common ground. My cousin, who is a non-demon minister, is the only one I know who has ever made the organ in our parish really rock. She came to visit once, and at the pastor’s invitation blasted How Great thou Art and a Bach piece and really blew the dust out of those pipes.