Organ accompaniments

[johnquinn39]

Very often, I am asked to accompany 'guitar songs' on the organ. There are a very small number of really good arrangements around (for example Adrain Vernon Fish's version of 'Be still and know I am with you' and Craig Kingsbury's arrangement of 'Eagles wings').

However, many RC publications (from the US) seem to have a hybrid keyboard part that is not pianistic enough to work on the piano, and rather too pianistic to work on the organ.

Organ versions are sometimes supplied in Anglican hymbooks (many of which are very good), however, some arrangers seem to have completely missed the point, and have made arrangents, in my view, out of character with the melody.

I am gradually learning to play from the chord chart, but finding this difficult.

What is the copyright position with this?

Why do publishers supply keyboard parts that don't work?

What do other people do?

[Nick Baty]

However, many RC publications (from the US) seem to have a hybrid keyboard part that is not pianistic enough to work on the piano, and rather too pianistic to work on the organ.

Many of these are written for one or the other. I can't imagine Bernadette Farrell's My Soul if Yearning played on organ. But her Eucharistic Acclamations come with both organ and piano parts and I've sometimes used both together. Do you have a piano available? I find it's percussive nature excellent for accompanying.

I am gradually learning to play from the chord chart, but finding this difficult.

But do persevere because it makes you so much more flexible. And once you're thinking in chords it's much easier to transpose and to improvise. Learning to read figured bass can also be quite useful for this.

What is the copyright position with this?

As I understand it – and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong – you can write your own arrangements for use in your own community but can't pass them around.

Why do publishers supply keyboard parts that don't work?

It's mostly the crappy end of the market that does this. However, printed keyboard part with the addition of chord symbols does give you room to improvise. Even the chord symbols can be naff sometimes: rarely chromatic enough.

What do other people do?

I'm at the other end of the problem: I'm a lousy organist/pianist but a good accompanist. Even with blobs I tend to analyse chords as I go along and play by chord structure rather than actual blobs – problem is, my accompanying of Alleluia! Sing to Jesus does sound like a pub song.

[keitha]

Broadly, I agree with Nick. Some pieces just do not 'work' when played on the organ because they are clearly suited to a percussive rather than sustained style - for example some of Bernadette Farrell's works and some of the music of David Haas and the like. In the end I persuaded our parish priest to buy a good refurbished (acoustic) piano so that they could be performed decently, rather than my somewhat 'jammed' organ accompaniments. In passing, some of the accompaniments to these pieces have been simplified in hymnals and so I usually try to use the sheet music originals, which are often much better.

With those imprints that only provide third rate keyboard accompaniments, I tend to look at the guitar chords and improvise from them (but often those chords are limited, but they are the ones used by the guitarists who are often playing with me, who often do not have the ability to play anything more 'interesting'). Nick is quite right - learning to play from figured bass will do wonders for your ability to improvise accompaniments, if you have not already done so. There are plenty of tutor books on the market and there is a very good Dolmetsch on-line tutor available. I was taught using the Riemenschneider edition of the Bach chorales with figured basses as my practice material. once you have cracked that, it provides a great foundation for improvised accompaniments.

Sometimes, however, the Victor Meldrew in me asserts itself and I simply refuse to play stuff where I am not given a decent accompaniment!

[Nick Baty]

I was taught using the Riemenschneider edition of the Bach chorales with figured basses as my practice material.

Wow! That takes me back. Bought that in my first term at music college – and it was about a tenner which was a helluva lot back then. (Hm! Wonder who has since pinched it!!)

I learned the hard way. When I was 11 I was asked to play the organ for Benediction (20 March 1973 to be exact). We had The Parish Hymn Book which, some of you will remember, had one hymn per page and a melody line for the first verse. Nobody told me there was such a thing as an SATB edition so I learned the hard way, making it up as I went along. Must have played like that for a year before I clicked. I remember 20th Century Folk Hymnal coming along with all these (to the young me) strange symbols above the music. And I learned by trial and error.

And to this day I'll swear that's how I learned to accompany.

[nazard]

This is one of those knotty problems that I only occasionally cope with. I have been inspired by the way they occasionally accompany hymns which are not published in an organistic setting at Downside Abbey. I admit to sitting in the congregation paying more attention to the accompaniment than to anything else at times. I have tried to write such settings myself occasionally, but with even more occasional success.

Mayhew publish a book called "New Hymns and Worship Songs" which gives organistic accompaniments for a selection of recent material and some other odd bits, by their usual set of composers. I don't feel that all the arrangements work, but quite a lot of them do. Its a book worth having a look at.

[Southern Comfort]

I was taught using the Riemenschneider edition of the Bach chorales with figured basses as my practice material. once you have cracked that, it provides a great foundation for improvised accompaniments.

I know it's OT, but I used Riemenschneider for early transposition practice. Once you have played all the chorales in the book (can't remember how many there are ─ 379?) up a semitone, then up a tone, then up a minor third, then down a semitone, then down a tone, and then down a minor third, you're pretty much set for life. Since I have absolute pitch, this was a great way of overcoming playing something in a different key from the one in which you hear it in your head as you read it.

My next hill to climb was figured bass in C clefs, transposed as well.

[keitha]

Well, let's all hear it for Albert Riemenschneider and his Bach Chorales!

- and it's still available!

[mcb]

Yep, I'm another Riemenschneider survivor. In my case it was for learning the 'grammar' of harmony. It's nearly thirty years since I last looked at him, though, and I'm not sure too much of it stuck in the first place.

[dmu3tem]

Returning to the basic question: transferring hymns designed for one type of instrument to another.

First, the issue has innumerable variants. Here are some of the more basic ones:

(1) Piano to Pipe Organ
(2) Pipe Organ to Piano
(3) Digital/electronic organ/piano to either of the above
(4) Conversion of a keyboard part to other instruments (a) to Guitars (b) to orchestral instruments
(5) Combining other instruments with any of (1), (2), (3)
(6) Combining any of the above

From a purely musical point of view my response is always to write/arrange the score as characteristically as possible for the given combination I have before me. This is a good exercise for any musician (even those who do not consider themselves to be composers) to do. This is because (a) It really enables you to 'get inside' the piece (b) It extends your knowledge of the capabilities of the instruments/musicians you are arranging for. The direct benefits for all are (a) You write something that enables everyone (congregation included) to put their best foot forward (b) You produce something that is locally distinctive that people can take pride in ('Noone does it quite like us) (c) You have the opportunity to give the piece a completely different 'personality' to suit a given occasion or group of people.

Note that, when arranging for one or more melody instruments and a keyboard (of any type), by giving the melody instrument the melody this enables (indeed it often virtually compells you) to write a different sort of accompaniment to the one provided. If the melody instrument just duplicates the melody in the keyboard part you lose the benefits derived from thinking in terms of instrumental 'colour'. Moreover, by having a separate accompaniment, this means the keyboard can do more rhythmically.

If you are arranging for purely orhestral instruments (i.e. no Guitars or other Rhythm instruments) you will often be compelled to strip out the existing accompaniment and compose a completely new one. Otherwise you may find you can write properly for the characteristics of the instruments you are using. This particularly applies to Clarinets.

Remember that if you produce a new instrumental arrangement you may have to alter the vocal parts. For example, if you alter the harmony and part writing in a four part hymn, you will need to adjust these for any SATB choir singing this in parts as well.

Copyright is tricky if you wish to keep to the strict letter of the law. I know that in practice all keyboard players at some point or other 'adjust' the music to suit their circumstances. In my case it is often because I do not have the requisite technique to play the original properly. At the simplest level this may simply involve transposition (as discussed above), but it can also result in changes to the underlying chordal,contrapuntal and rhythmic patterns. You see the effects of this when comparing different versions of the same hymn in various hymnals (e.g. Slane (Be Thou My Vision) I know two different versions: Celebration Hymnal vs Laudate).

If you decide to stick to the letter of copyright law note the following areas where you have flexibility:

(a) Many old hymn tunes (and their accompaniments) are out of copyright because their composers died before 2008.
(b) Many other hymn tunes were 'collected' or 'adapted' from 'folk' or popular sources. They are therefore 'fair game' for arrangement. The only thing that is copyright is the actual arrangement the collector has provided. You are free to write/arrange a quite different one. I do not know what the position is if you simply transcribe the accompaniment 'lines' provided by the collector for other instruments; probably the collector might have copyright protection. However, personally I find this sort of 'arrangement' usually produces rather unsatisfactory or at best pedstrian results.
(c) In either of the above scenarios, you have to produce your own 'artwork' (even if this you are only producing manuscript copies. This enables you to get round the copyright on the artwork of a given printed edition of something and mass produce your own arrangement using your own 'artwork'.
(d) I know that in the academic field you are allowed to make a single copy 'for research purposes' of a given article (or at least a section of one). In most musical arrangements likewise you are making only a single copy for you yourself - or your fellow musicians/instrumentalists to use. Whether academic practice applies to this as well I do not know. Perhaps someone else can enlighten us (Citing the relevant authority).

Thomas Muir