In other news, I did the church music thing again today. Not with the praise band, just me solo on the grand piano in the sanctuary. It was kinda wacky, because today was the First Sunday in Advent, which is a big deal, something worth playing up a bit in the service. Lighting the first Advent Candle in the wreath, the official start of the "Christmas season", etc. Except the choir director is out east visiting family for Thanksgiving, and the organist is also out of town visiting family, so no choir today. So they asked me to play the piano and basically provide all the music for the service. Obviously, there's no way I'm gonna turn down an opportunity like that. I say "again" because I did this once earlier in the year, but that was during the summer when attendance is traditionally on the low side. Today it was not.
All during Advent, the Introit is "Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence". Except that with no choir, it was down to me to provide the theme, so the Prelude was "Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence". I introduced the Dm theme straight, then wandered off into a theme-and-variations thing featuring Bbmaj7 for extra color and flavor. It was cool, maybe just this side of jazzy. Came back and finished straight, all in about 2.5 minutes. Then the opening hymn ("O Come, O Come, Emmanuel" of course). Call to Worship, Announcements, then Lighting of the Advent Candle, so music for that. Middle hymn was a Taize thing which naturally lends itself to a lot of improvisation, so I obliged. For the offertory, I did an original arrangement of "Do You Hear What I Hear?" Four verses, starts really simple ("Said the night wind to the little lamb..."), each verse builds, big and slamming by the end ("Said the king to the people everywhere..."). Got a spontaneous ovation, so that was cool. You don't always get that in church, but I guess they couldn't help themselves.
Doxology, again my own arrangement. Big and booming on the grand, ha ha. Closing hymn was "Come, Thou Long-Expected Jesus", another standard First Sunday in Advent hymn. After the Blessing and Dismissal, I kicked into "Deck the Halls" for the Postlude. Pounded for a few verses, then cut way back, just for some contrast, then finished up big and booming again. I intentionally went four verses so hopefully most people would have filed out, because if too many people are left when I finish, they might applaud again, and I was hoping to avoid that. Really, it's kinduv embarassing. But they did anyway. I mean, yeah, it feels good. It feels great. And people coming up to me afterwards telling me "Nice job!" and stuff, very cool. But it's weird. Any other music, I'd eat it up with reckless abandon. But this is church music. It's not about the accolades; it's not about the applause.
But a chance to serve, and provide four written pieces and four original arrangements, you can't beat that. I love playing that grand piano in the chancel, making it sing.
After lunch I took a short nap, then finished up the arrangements for some of the songs for the Christmas Pageant. They asked me if I could do another arrangement for the Youth Ensemble, so I arranged "Fum, Fum, Fum" for a wacky quartet with piano accompaniment. Clarinet Soprano, Violin Alto, French Horn Tenor, Bassoon Bass. Those are the instruments I had to work with, so I had to voice things accordingly. You might wonder why I didn't do Violin Soprano and Clarinet Alto, but it's a matter of proficiency. Our Clarinet player is much, much better than our Violinist. Also, the Clarinet is going to naturally be louder. The best musician in the group is the girl on Bassoon. She's amazing. I gave her the first half of verse two by herself, with just a little backgrounds from the others. Anyway, it worked out pretty well. Each of the instruments gets at least a little spotlight, just like last year's thing.
The other song is the one the little kids are singing, "Mary Rocked the Little Baby", which is a 50's-style rocker. Our pianist can't exactly jam, but he can play whatever I write, so I wrote up a boogie-woogie shuffle thing in 12/8. All he has to do is play what's written and it'll rock. Violin and flute for color. They double the melody mostly, per instructions from the director, but they get to break into some harmonies here and there. I let them have some fun, while still supporting the melody. I'm pretty happy with the arrangement there, too, even though I only ended up with an hour and a half to do it.
This is why, as much as I love Rock and Roll, I won't be heartbroken if the band implodes. At church, I get to do original piano arrangements of all kinds, and write and arrange crazy ensembles to give a bunch of kids each a chance to shine. That's a gas, a total gas. Music is the best.