[Magdalen] New music director at our cathedral...some here may know of him...

[Scott Knitter]

On Fri, Jun 12, 2015 at 10:03 AM, Jay Weigel <jay.weigel at gmail.com> wrote:
> I know St. Stephen's, and have mixed memories of it....their Sunday evening
> Celtic service was wonderful. Their outreach, not so much. Wouldn't know
> Brandon Dumas from Adam's off ox, as my friend Carol used to say. But I
> hope you at Ascension and he have a wonderful life together

Sorry...Brandon will be at St. James' Cathedral; we're getting Jeffrey
Smith. I like Jeffrey's intro, posted to Facebook:

A Profound Bow - from Jeffrey Smith
https://www.facebook.com/notes/church-of-the-ascension-chicago/a-profound-bow-from-jeffrey-smith/831915643522630

My genuflections are a bit wobbly of late, due to a long sojourn among
Episcopalians where such acts raise a wary eyebrow. So I'm happy to
join you at Ascension, where Creaky Knees declare the Glory of God and
a Straight Back sheweth forth his handiwork. In our trudging on, day
to day, such unfashionable gestures are rare; it's hard to make and
keep habits which so clearly acknowledge something other than our
self.

The boys of Eton College haven't worn top hats for generations, yet a
vestigial hat doff persists: students tap the top of their head with
forefinger when encountering school masters at college or in town.
It's a curious, but effective, way of honoring another's presence.

Obeisance, the word, like obeisance the mind-set are today as outmoded
as top hats. But habits of posture, like habits of devotion do indeed
matter. And so I'm heartened to work in a parish in which sacramental
reverence becomes habitual; where the Daily Office carries on, however
calmly or not. This discipline very much enters the bloodstream of a
parish's music program. Church music should be---at very least, an act
of profound acknowledgement.

We are what we repeatedly do.
Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.

- Aristotle

Most musicians--the good ones, anyway---perform with careful
acknowledgement of the composer's intent: Let's have the right notes,
please, and at the right time. Let's obey the composer's dynamics,
too. But to make music is so much more!  We liturgical musicians have
no less performance anxiety than our concert colleagues, but we orbit
a different planet, it often seems. Is it that we aspire towards a
more profound bow? In his family Bible, that greatest of church
masters J.S. Bach annotates an Epistle passage thus: "Wherever
musicians come together with the right spirit of dedication and
devotion there is grace available to them."

What a privilege it is for me to lead your superb congregational
singing, to mold the choral offerings, and to envision your future
musical growth. I happily acknowledge the long tradition of musical
excellence here, and look forward to adding whatever I can---in the
spirit of genuflection---to enrich and enliven our worship.

Jeffrey Smith
Interim Organist and Choirmaster



-- 
Scott R. Knitter
Edgewater, Chicago, Illinois USA