Several Christmases ago, the Vicar of St Stephen’s twisted my arm, and I found myself offering to play the organ for the Patronal Day.
My keyboard skills were rusty Grade 8 Piano and I hadn’t played anything properly since a teenager. Playing the organ pedals was obviously out of the question, but I did manage to bluff my way through the service. Of course the Vicar wasn’t going to let it go at that and I found myself on the rota.
And that was it – I was hooked on the instrument, the weight of history behind it; loved the repertoire, the combination of excitement and trepidation at being asked to perform on an unfamiliar instrument, the sheer mechanical geekiness of it all.
I thought some lessons might be a good idea, and how right I was – the patient tutors of the Royal College of Organists have tactfully converted my piano playing habits into a proper organ technique, and it all got a lot harder before it has actually started to get better.
This blog began as a record of personal progress, in the hope it might be useful to others doing a similar thing. But thanks to my generous contributors it’s gone from blog to global magazine. And it’s probably the reason I was brought in to help create the Royal College of Organists‘ virtual learning campus in 2015, and put in charge of their own blog, StopPress.
As of 2019 I’m Head of Publications for the RCO, which now includes Editorship of RCO News, the Royal College of Organists’ print magazine, along with managing their online content hub iRCO.
In 2017 I was appointed Director of Music at St Mary’s in Frittenden, a village in the Weald of Kent, which proves my organ teachers must have done a fairly decent job. I now have a choir to look after, and a parish organ which is rather a cut above the usual. My Frittenden Diaries chronicle the attempt to live up to my new responsibilities.
Don’t hesitate to get in touch – always good to hear from fellow organists, and non-organists, alike.
Morwenna
THE LADY ORGANIST BULLETIN
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