I don't know, Jackson. I half-way expect the "scholars" of the 22nd century to say, "those organists of the late 20th and early 21st centuries didn't know diddly about playing Bach." Each age tends to think it knows more than those who came before it.

It has always puzzled me that seminars and chant workshops are taught using Solesmes editions. Why? The answer I get when I ask is along the lines of, "That's what everyone knows." Do they? If people who don't know chant to begin with are being taught, isn't it a good opportunity to teach them something else?

but their love of the music moved them to play it anyhow.
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This, I think, is an important part of what we do.

...measure of orthodoxy as if it could never change.

I know it only because at the time I was learning chant it was all that seemed to exist. I never taught it or performed it, though, because it became quite apparent to me rather quickly that it just didn't hold water, was inconsistent, required the invention of beats and highly subjective adjustments, groups of two and three didn't pan out, and further research learned me that it even relied on so-called rhythmic markings such as the 'vertical episema' which simply did not appear, ever, in the earliest chant manuscripts. As for the elusive and rather subjectively chosen ictus that didn't really seem to exist or make sense, I was delirious when I met Fr Columba, who told me it didn't exist at all and that he had never seen one. That he is a far, ridiculously far superior chant scholar than anyone who is pawning off the so-called Solesmes Method in the twenty-first century is beyond question. Indeed, it was Fr Columba who graciously provided me with the theoretical basis for text-governed chant as I had understood it for many years.

Yes, Matthew is right, the so-called SM is, yet, commonplace in that, probably, most chant singers (in the US, that is!) have been reared on it or were taught by its adherents. It's sort of a given that if one is chanting with certain people one just humours them, looks askance, and sings the quilisma wrongly. That, and much else. It's impossible to teach people who already know it all, but know it all wrong.

That is what happens when one gets stuck on once-valuable-but-now-eclipsed scholarship and behaves (an hundred years on, yet!) as if nothing had happened in chant research since their method was new. Granted, the scholarship of a hundred years ago represents a glorious advance over what was typical chant performance at that time. But, this same scholarship is now a hundred years old and is as outdated as what it supplanted.

Read Gregorian Semiology, Cardine, Saulnier, Kelly, et al., and don't forget Hiley. These and their scholarly kin are the last word in chant until our next generation learns even more. Too, not unworthy of serious note are the speculative interpretations of historic period chant by the likes of Marcel Perez and others.

I must add that these words are given in an academic spirit. As far as actual SM chant goes, I have heard some renditions which were self referentially beautiful and performed with, shall we say, 'methodical' artistry. If one really prefers the SM after carefully evaluating current scholarship, then Godspeed. SM chant has all the validity (that validity, and no more) of other historic relics such as renaissance Medicean chant, or baroque French plein-chant musical, Pustet, or any other period 'method'. It's good, actually, that we keep them all alive and perform them in appropriate circumstances. But erecting one of these period methods onto a pedestal as though it were and the last word for all time is absurd, dishonest, and intellectually irresponsible. None of them are.

(All this is not off topic because I heard the 2016 Easter Day mass at St Mary's Cathedral in Sydney on youtube this afternoon and the organist was very good - except that he accompanied the (incredibly ponderous) plain chant not just with the normal quiet 8' stops but with a plenum. No heads were turned, and I couldn't see whether anyone was showing the whites of his or her eyes. The organist was not the only one who was very good! The cathedral choir of men and boys were quite as good, magnificent, really, as any in Britain [or, for that matter, as a certain choir on Fifth Avenue of a certain city in the US] - and better than some.)

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MJO, what you described about organists applies equally to trombonists. Take a look at The International Trombone Association (www.trombone.net) Nothing really special about organists (besides being able to play organ.)

After much thought and reflection on this subject I must disagree with Adam. I think an organist who is alive would be much better at playing than someone who is dead.

You clearly are unaware of my preferences re: organ music.

You may (and what do you mean 'generally'?) -
in fact, I'd say that you deserve a [yellow box rescinded] for putting the likes of that on our forum. Shame!

My father, just one of a lot of people I know who said essentially the same thing, always quipped, "The best cats are the dead ones." I don't think he held that opinion of organists, though.

...the dead ones...

That's clever, but I'm not sure I don't know what it means.
Nor can I agree. A dead cat is rather a disgusting thing to see.
I love cats (a few degrees less than dogs), but much prefer them alive.

One thing is certain: being the best is exceptional and out of the ordinary.
Someone once told me that the only fish who go with the flow (meaning the river's current) are dead. This may or may not be true (I'm neither a piscene nor a flumenary scholar) but it sounds smart. It does seem to me, though, that in human affairs, those who 'go with the flow' never get anywhere worth getting to.

Jackson,

I'm glad to be confirmed in my opinion that the stuff didn't highlight the best living or dead organ players.

I was alarmed when someone proposed that I watch this stuff as an example of an excellent organist.

Do I get the yellow box rescinded if I put my suggestion in purple?

Many thanks, Chuck, for the Schweitzer recordings.
I've never heard him before, but have always reverenced his example of service.
I wonder how many of us here have his Bach editions - the big ones.
Mine, still bearing the price of $5 or so per volume (!) are quite ragged and tattered by now.
I make copies of everything I play so as to save my precious scores.

"."
"means you've self-edited"
"what you described"

Why not self-edit earlier
and spare some of the early readers the text,
and spare all of the late readers the dots (and yellow squares with dots)?

...(and yellow squares with dots)?

Actually, only one dot, not 'dots', will ever be experienced in a given comment.
Nor will one encounter both a yellow square and a dot together.
Only one of one or the other.

And, ha!, I might add that none other than Chonak said nothing but '!' as a comment somewhere here the other day. So, I'm not the only one. Plus, I've seen a few dots from time to time that weren't mine. (The nerve!)

I don't know, the anticipated audience may make a difference in programming. When I have played for AGO or other music groups, I have been a bit more careful in selecting music. A more "party" atmosphere where all are not musicians can have more pieces for fun.