Pet Peeves

[Scott R Nelson]

Peeve: When someone plays the piano at church and pounds out the song as loudly as they can.

This is especially annoying in Junior Primary where we're trying to get the little kids to sing, but there is no way we can hear anything over the loud piano.

Related peeve: Same thing on the organ, even though that one has a volume control. Just because you can play it loud, doesn't mean you need to play it loud.

[Clark Addison]

Peeve: When someone plays the piano at church and pounds out the song as loudly as they can.

This is especially annoying in Junior Primary where we're trying to get the little kids to sing, but there is no way we can hear anything over the loud piano.

Related peeve: Same thing on the organ, even though that one has a volume control. Just because you can play it loud, doesn't mean you need to play it loud.

In Sacrament Meeting, obviously there is such a thing as too loud, but if an organist plays with confidence and volume, you are going to get more people singing, and fewer people mumble-singing. I'd rather have that than someone who plays like they are in the temple waiting room and no one sings above a whisper.

[BigFatMeanie]

The organ has volume control but also registration (how many pipes are enabled). For hymn singing, the volume is typically pumped up to max and the registration of the organ is changed to make things louder or softer. But getting the right registration depends on many variables, not all of which are known beforehand including:

- The size of the building
- The size of the congregation
- The nature of the song itself
- How well the congregation knows the song
- The mood of the congregation, which can be affected by many random things.

So, sometimes the volume/registration is set for what the organists thinks is the right level but then an unknown variable causes that to not be the right level. Unfortunately, it can be quite hard for beginning organists to adjust either volume or registration on the fly or between verses. It's not like a piano where you can change your touch and strike the keys differently (softer) to produce a change in volume.

For example, say the organist has finished playing the prelude and has the opening hymn registration all set. Then Bishop gets up and makes some announcements before the opening hymn and announces that a well-known ward member has died that week. Good luck on getting the registration and potentially even the volume adjusted for the opening hymn. The congregation will likely barely muster any noise at all, even on a well-known hymn and it will sound like the organ is way too loud even though it may have already been under-registered for the song.

[BigPiney]

Since we are complaining about music at church...

One of the organists in my ward plays the music so damn slow that every song feels like a funeral dirge. We sang O My Father yesterday and it was dragging on and on. It was almost painful. It has gotten so bad that my kids get out the metronome app on their phone to see how much slower than the recommend bpm it is being played. Each song yesterday was at least 10 bpm slower than the low end of the range suggested. Now if this was because the organist was only comfortable going at that speed and was doing their best I wouldn't complain at all. When my son has had to play in sacrament, just a couple of times, he may have been slower than he had hoped, but he was our only option that week and we were grateful he was there doing it. The organist yesterday is a piano teacher and plays very well, but stylistically feels that we should sing all the hymns slower so that we can think about the words as we sing. It is terrible and kills any energy that may have been there.

[hostile]

Since we are complaining about music at church...

One of the organists in my ward plays the music so damn slow that every song feels like a funeral dirge. We sang O My Father yesterday and it was dragging on and on. It was almost painful. It has gotten so bad that my kids get out the metronome app on their phone to see how much slower than the recommend bpm it is being played. Each song yesterday was at least 10 bpm slower than the low end of the range suggested. Now if this was because the organist was only comfortable going at that speed and was doing their best I wouldn't complain at all. When my son has had to play in sacrament, just a couple of times, he may have been slower than he had hoped, but he was our only option that week and we were grateful he was there doing it. The organist yesterday is a piano teacher and plays very well, but stylistically feels that we should sing all the hymns slower so that we can think about the words as we sing. It is terrible and kills any energy that may have been there.

Shouldn’t the conductor establish the tempo?

[Katy Lied]

Growing up, our ward had no pianist, but there was a 15 year old girl taking lessons who volunteered to play. In the beginning, she only knew one song, Dear to the Heart of the Shepherd and she played it very very slow. We sang that song every Sunday for a month until she learned another song. There is no song as funereal as that one at a slow pace.

[Eddie]

I sat with the Bishop for funeral he was presiding over once. While he was in doing the family prayer, the older lady who was going to be conducting the music showed me the songs really quickly, then told me that since it was a funeral they would play them a little more slowly to match the somber mood.

I just said "sounds good", thinking - you're leading, do it how you want.

Big mistake. HUGE. After that first hymn I think there were a number of us in the congregation who were ready to join the deceased in the coffin. SO SLOW. I think the opening hymn took us 10 minutes to sing.

[BigFatMeanie]

Shouldn’t the conductor establish the tempo?

Yes, but there are many organists who can't play uptempo even if the conductor wanted them to. There are also many conductors out there who like to go really slow. Even though the conductor is in charge of the tempo in theory, the organist can often establish a tempo when playing the intro. But there are still conductors who will deliberately slow it down. I really hate these types of conductors.

Yesterday we sang Come Unto Jesus. This is a very easy song to play so I can play it as fast as anyone wants. I played the intro at a good pace. Then the conductor started leading the song. The time signature is 6/8 and she started to beat out the 6/8 pattern, which is ridiculous when playing at tempo. She should have beat it as 2/2. So she decides to slow it way down for her to be able to beat out 6/8. It was horridly slow. I tried to ignore her and play it faster but then she's up there waving her arms so furiously in the 6/8 pattern that she looks like a flapping bird. I finally gave up and just went with the slow dirge.

I really, really hate conductors that slow down the hymns.

[Copelius]

Yes, but there are many organists who can't play uptempo even if the conductor wanted them to. There are also many conductors out there who like to go really slow. Even though the conductor is in charge of the tempo in theory, the organist can often establish a tempo when playing the intro. But there are still conductors who will deliberately slow it down. I really hate these types of conductors.

Yesterday we sang Come Unto Jesus. This is a very easy song to play so I can play it as fast as anyone wants. I played the intro at a good pace. Then the conductor started leading the song. The time signature is 6/8 and she started to beat out the 6/8 pattern, which is ridiculous when playing at tempo. She should have beat it as 2/2. So she decides to slow it way down for her to be able to beat out 6/8. It was horridly slow. I tried to ignore her and play it faster but then she's up there waving her arms so furiously in the 6/8 pattern that she looks like a flapping bird. I finally gave up and just went with the slow dirge.

I really, really hate conductors that slow down the hymns.

Reminds me of the last Sunday my wife played before one of our kids were born. I was sitting up front by the organ to keep our oldest, 2 at the time, close enough to mom so that he wouldn't try to escape and run up to join her. We were singing one of the hymns that my wife and I refer to as cowboy poetry. (You know the ones that sound more natural with a country twang in your voice as you sing them.) Anyhow, I started the twang as I am wont to do. My wife, who is annoyed by the twang, at the same time had a late pregnancy urge to pee. To combat both of those stimuli she decided to speed up the hymn. The conductor liked the original tempo and made a very big deal about her ictus. I wish I could remember the exact hymn so people could truly appreciate it, but try singing something like Scatter Sunshine at around 130. Won't be any twang in your voice.

[BigPiney]

Shouldn’t the conductor establish the tempo?

Yes, but the conductor is just a figurehead in this case. Actually it is whichever one on the YW is there on time to conduct. The organist would not follow anyway.

[BigFatMeanie]

Reminds me of the last Sunday my wife played before one of our kids were born. I was sitting up front by the organ to keep our oldest, 2 at the time, close enough to mom so that he wouldn't try to escape and run up to join her. We were singing one of the hymns that my wife and I refer to as cowboy poetry. (You know the ones that sound more natural with a country twang in your voice as you sing them.) Anyhow, I started the twang as I am wont to do. My wife, who is annoyed by the twang, at the same time had a late pregnancy urge to pee. To combat both of those stimuli she decided to speed up the hymn. The conductor liked the original tempo and made a very big deal about her ictus. I wish I could remember the exact hymn so people could truly appreciate it, but try singing something like Scatter Sunshine at around 130. Won't be any twang in your voice.

Before Thee, Lord, I Bow My Head is the canonical cowboy hymn. It just begs to be sung with a twang.

[Copelius]

Before Thee, Lord, I Bow My Head is the canonical cowboy hymn. It just begs to be sung with a twang.

Wasn't that but I agree. My dad, who grew up in Willard, is the ward music chairman and picks all the songs. Needless to say, my wife pretty constantly is making threats to him and his health. She doesn't play in this ward, so she has to sit next to me on my active years and enjoy the twang. And the organist abets by playing every song at least 10 bpm less than the lowest suggested. I use the app to BP.

[creekster]

We lived in a ward for around 25+ years in which we had one organist. Her father had been a professor of music and had a doctorate in Organ Pedagogy. She had a music degree in music performance and was a very talented and well-trained organist (and I mean organist, not pianist who sits at an organ keyboard and pretends). She always played fairly loudly to make people sing more loudly (and it worked) and she was masterul in changing the registers and voices on the organ to make the pieces more interesting. She also played on the faster side of any given hymn's recommended tempo and it always helped to keep it interesting. In addition, her organ technique was superb and, as you might guess, she used the pedals properly. Her efforts were assisted by the fact that our building had one of the better pipe organs you will ever find in an LDS ward house (which her father had insisted on, as I understand it, back in the day when buildings were somewhat individualized and each congregation could decide how much to pay for certain aspects of construction).

A couple of years ago or so we moved into another ward. We have a rotation of four organists. Two of them are decent with one of those two being an actual organist who always plays at tempo. The third is a pianist but has a good sense of tempo and dynamics. The fourth, bless her heart, is well-intentioned and loves to play and is a wonderful person but listening to her is like listening to a metaphorical butchering of whatever song she is playing. I can barely stand listening to her and have to fight an urge to leave or to shout out something like "oh for crying out loud, the tempo is too slow and shouldn't be variable from measure to measure depending on difficulty in the left hand!" I so miss our old ward's organist.

[BigPiney]

Wasn't that but I agree. My dad, who grew up in Willard, is the ward music chairman and picks all the songs. Needless to say, my wife pretty constantly is making threats to him and his health. She doesn't play in this ward, so she has to sit next to me on my active years and enjoy the twang. And the organist abets by playing every song at least 10 bpm less than the lowest suggested. I use the app to BP.

:thumbsup:

[happyone]

Since we are complaining about music at church...

One of the organists in my ward plays the music so damn slow that every song feels like a funeral dirge...

I can relate to this. We have a new organist that play everything so slow....