Music Newsletter Article 2/5/07 for Saint Philip's

                        Music at Saint Philip's

Lenten services commence with Ash Wednesday, on February 21rst. Holy Week will include Maundy Thursday, April 5th, and Good Friday, April 6th, each at 7PM. Last year, I found these latter two to be especially moving and enriching. This year, on Good Friday, our choir will sing Mozart's beautiful classic Ave Verum (in English). For Easter, the choir will bring us The Strife is O'er by Gibbs. We are pleased to have Anne Moszynski singing soprano with us. We're also enjoying drawing our recent anthems from a newly purchased book of fifty collected classics.

During April, we will hear Buxtehude's Prelude and Fugue in E Minor, which includes three beautiful fugues, the last of which is quite lively and joyous. On Friday, May 18th (after Lent), at 7:30 PM, in the church, I will present a harpsichord recital of works by Girolamo Frescobaldi, Louis Couperin, Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach, and Jean-Philippe Rameau. I hope that you will be able to join me.

Through a generous gift of Ed Abbe, a new stop has been commissioned for our pipe organ. This new stop will be a 2⅔ Twelfth for the Great division (lower keyboard). The 58 new pipes will fit into existing space that had been prepared decades ago for the possible eventual addition of such a stop. The stop knob and mechanical linkage already exist, and indeed the stop knob has been removed temporarily to be engraved with its name. We are hopeful that the construction, installation, voicing, and tuning will be completed during Lent, but there is no advantage in rushing the efforts of skilled craftsmen. When the stop does become available, at a Sunday worship service we will have a dedication and a special piece of music to celebrate and to illustrate our new sound. We will all be the immediate beneficiaries of this new stop, but these pipes will join a chorus that has already served for many generations.

                             Paul Utgoff
                             Music Director