Bells and Percussion in Church
Apart from accompanying coloratura and lyric sopranos in German lieder, I experienced my most dramatic encounter with Gustav Mahler while singing tenor (in the chorus) for the August 1971 Vienna Concert Hall performance of his 8th Symphony [the “Symphony of a Thousand”], the climax of that year’s two week Summer European Choral Symposium. My main recollection was that the tenor section stood adjacent to the tympani and cymbals. My placement was even more precarious …next to the gong! To this day, I still can remember percussion cues! Another of my Mahler encounters in Vienna that Summer of 1971 occurred back stage of the concert hall. It remains one the more embarrassing American/Austrian incidents of my stay. It seems that one of our thoughtful American basses (who will remain nameless) approached one of the Vienna Boy Choir members and feebly attempted to compliment the boy’s English. I believe the dialog went something like this:
American Doofus: “My, you speak English good!”
Austrian Child Prodigy: “Thank you, sir. I always try to speak well.”
[Sadly, I don’t believe I am exaggerating!]
All of this causes me to remember my study of Orff pedagogic methods for children. Coupled with a study of the Hungarian composer, educator, Zoltan Kodaly (part of the 1971 Vienna Choral Symposium), I always sought to create percussion and tonal centers for kindergartners during weekly classes. Even without owning those expensive percussion instruments, I could always come up with some kind of improvisatory center. Soon after arriving at my first full-time church position, I borrowed some plastic xylophone bars from the pre-school wing of the church. After connecting I, IV, and V chords with rubber bands, identified with long color-coded ribbon streamers, I supplied an assortment of handmade mallets. With this kind of fool-proof system, the children were able to make a pleasing sound while demonstrating unbelievable rhythm. As Orff’s friend Hans Fenger commented, “even a little kid can jam” with this system. To quote Orff: “Since the beginning of time, children have not liked to study. They would much rather play, and if you have their interests at heart, you will let them learn while they play; they will find that what they have mastered is child's play." For the next three decades, I applied this Orff "child's play" approach to the composing (arranging) of over 300 hymns for solo handbell ringing. It's all about freedom!
In worship, it's also about freedom, but I prefer the ethereal, the mystical, the mysterioso in the sacred use of bells and percussion. When I conducted Lenten noonday services at church, I would sometimes chant the entrance hymn in procession, using handbells.
This is an example of my singing "Thou Hidden Love of God" to the tune "Vater Unser" while playing open 5ths with handbells. Church solo handbell ringer, Janice Schlosser, played the low bells at random with my tolling of bells an octave higher. The original hymn text by Gerhard Tersteegen appeared in "Geistliches Blumen-Gartlein, 1729, under the title "The longing of the soul quietly to maintain the sacred drawings of the love of God." I am singing a translation by John Wesley in 1736 from the eight-stanza version in the Herrnhut Gesangbuch, 1735, that Wesley sang and translated from in Savannah, Georgia.
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