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    Posts: 1
    Hi.

    I am about to start a new job as organist at a Methodist Church. 2 of the services I am playing will be in the fellowship hall where there is only a piano (these are meant to be small, more intimate services). I haven't played a lot of piano for church other than the occasional piano prelude/offertory. I'm wondering if any of you could tell me some good composers for sacred piano music. I find that so much of it sounds cheesy and too pop like. Do you know any composers whose music is not like that? Also, what are some good classical piano pieces for church? I especially need ideas for postludes. I can play advanced piano repertoire so feel free to suggest pieces of any difficulty level. Also, any tips for playing hymns on piano? Just playing the 4 part chorale texture just doesn't sound right. I appreciate any suggestions!!
  • This is difficult.
    There is no sacred liturgical piano repertory, so one would want to choose from literature that doesn't have too secular an air about it. It may be that some selections from Bach's WTC would make decent preludes, offertories, or even postludes. Ditto certain well considered movements from the partitas and suites, but much from the WTC would bear some resemblance to some sacred organ literature and have a certain ecclesiastical gravitas. I would avoid sonatas of the classical and romantic eras because, beautiful as they are, they have an unmistakable secular ethos. On the other hand, it may be that some well thought out slow movements from Mozart or Haydn sonatas could provide a meditative air during communion (if you have communion). Definitely avoid anything that has a 'concert' or overtly 'secular' air about it. It occurs to me that even some of Bartok's piano pieces might work well as postludes or preludes.

    Too, you might find that canzonas by Buxtehude, Frescobaldi, and others, though they are manuals-only organ music, could be well played on the piano. And, you could consider some of the manualiter settings from Bach's Clavier-Ubung III. These would be nice. Also, look into manuals-only chorale based literature by Walther, Pachelbel, and others, who have written very suitable chorale variations and partitas.

    There is much manuals-only organ music available, English voluntaries of the Tudor and Stuart eras, and other similar continental organ music that could work well on the piano in such circumstances.

    It's really no fun playing piano for church. I had to do it once for several months whilst the nave was being redone. How happy I was when we were back 'in church' and out of the parish hall!

    As for 'just playing the 4 part' version of the hymns. This can be awfully boring on the piano - but avoid the temptation to 'flesh it out' too much, lest you wander into an 'un-churchy' mode of playing. Vary the harmonies. Thicken the chordal texture and add passing notes and appogiaturas, etc. as in a chorale partita (so long as you add interest but don't throw the congregation off), but don't wander into that tasteless overtly flamboyant and gaudy pianistical manner that one has (regrettably) heard in some Protestant circles.

    You didn't say anything about your particular Methodists. There is, I think, quite a variety of 'styles' of worship in this denomination. Some are hardly different from Baptists or Pentecostals. Others, high church Methodists, think nothing of aping the Anglicans, even high Anglicans. One such congregation here in Houston has one of the finest choirs in the city and regularly offers an admirably done evensong right from the BCP. This is St Paul's, Houston's most magnificent Gothic pile, located just across from the Museum of Fine Arts.
  • Richard MixRichard Mix
    Posts: 2,767
    Can't go wrong with Bach, and don't forget the Art of the Fugue. I sympathize with MJO's reservations, but only to a point: Haydn's Last Words, the march opening Act 2 of ''Zauberflöte'', Beethoven's Op. 33 Nos. 4 & 6, Op. 119 No. 4 and Mendelssohn's Op. 19 No. 4, Op. 30 No. 3, Op. 102 No.6 are still in my old substitute-keyboardist survival kit, and I wouldn't call any of them more secular than a John Stanley voluntary.
    Thanked by 1M. Jackson Osborn
  • Fugues (many of them) by Johann Baptiste Peyer.
  • bhcordovabhcordova
    Posts: 1,152
    Open up the Methodist Hymnal. Play what's written.
  • music123
    Posts: 100
    For preludes, I would look for music by Carol Tornquist, especially hymn arrangements. Also Mark Hayes. Though some of his arrangements are a little more "pop" oriented, they are all well-thought out.
  • JL
    Posts: 171
    A glance at IMSLP turned up the following possibilities:

    Franz Liszt, "A la Chapelle Sixtine" (utilizes Allegri's Miserese and Mozart's Ave verum--perhaps a little on the overwrought romantic side for "small, intimate" services)
    Herve Roullet, "L'adoration des mages"
    Henri Ravina, "Adoremus" (described as "melodie religieuse pour piano ou orgue-melodium")
    variations on "Adeste fideles" by Edward Mack
    Oreste Ravanello, Antiche canzoni di Natale ("in stile facile")
    Liszt, "Ave Maria (Die Glocken von Rom)"
    Mel Bonis, "Carillon mystique"
    Louis Sawicki, 6 chants religieux de Noel (arrangements of Polish carols)
    Alexandre Croisez, "Chants de Noel"
    Walter Heurtley Braithwaite, Church service music (short interludes)
    Ferruccio Busoni, Ten chorale preludes (transcriptions of organ preludes by J.S. Bach)
    Johann Christoph Kuhnau, Choral-Vorspiele fur die Orgel und das Klavier
    Guy Ropartz, "Choral varie"
    Ernst Roters, "Choral Variations and Fugue for piano" (variations on WER NUR DEN LIEBEN GOTT)
    Charles Poisot, "Hymne des anges gardiens varie"
    Rob Peters, "Two improvisations on 'Ave maris stella'"
    Liszt, "In festo transfigurationis Domini nostri Jesu Christi"
    Edward James Loder, Musical devotions (give volume 3 a miss, but the other two are good)
    Jose Puig Alsubide, 12 Noels populaires des Pyrenees
    Julia Rive-King, "Old Hundred" (This looks like an excellent postlude!)
    Erno Dohnanyi, "Pastorale on a Hungarian Christmas Song"
    Liszt, Weihnachtsbaum (the "Adeste fideles" and "In dulci jubilo" movements are particularly lovely)

    It might also be worth tackling one or two of Messiaen's Vingt regards sur l'infant Jesus as well.

    This is a good opportunity to expand your improvisation skills. If you can, devote some of your practice time at the piano to improvising on a hymntune or two, and you will work out a style that is a) suitably ecclesiastical and b) not boring.

    Also, I would recommend against Bach (or Scarlatti, or Sweelinck, etc.) on piano. It usually ends up sounding fake and a bit schmaltzy. Stick with music written for the instrument in front of you.
  • dhalkjdhalkj
    Posts: 61
    Augsburg Fortress published a 10 volume set of piano arrangements for every hymn (except Taize pieces) in ELW. There should be quite a lot of hymns in common.
    Thanked by 1Adam Wood
  • Spriggo
    Posts: 122
    John Carter has many different collections of hymntune-based pieces for piano that aren't too difficult.
  • Adam WoodAdam Wood
    Posts: 6,451
    Also, I would recommend against Bach ... on piano.


    Glen Gould would disagree with you. I would too, but his opinion is more valuable then mine.

    My recommendation is nothing more than an opinion, but it is my opinion:
    For a traditional-music-leaning Protestant church that has a piano instead of an organ, stick to Baroque and early Classical, including plenty of music written for harpsichord and clavier. Once you get to Romantic piano, the music becomes nearly intolerable for use in church.

    I think it is not for nothing that a lot of Baroque music was written as accompaniment to some other thing - whether dances or coronations or fireworks or rich people sitting around gossiping. This makes it well-suited (often) to the needs of liturgy and also especially preludes and postludes. The "stop what you are doing and listen to this important music from MY TORTURED SOUL" music of the Romantic period is (often) not a helpful accompaniment to the praying, preparation, and quiet socializing that happens before and after a service.
  • eft94530eft94530
    Posts: 1,577
    MY TORTURED SOUL

    Sigh.
    Another hymn from that Super Secret Hymnal
    that nobody will share with me.
    Thanked by 1CharlesW
  • JL, Adam, and Bach on the Piano.

    Well, Gould! Gould was a unique genius whose Bach on the piano won him wide acclaim, in which on some days I share, and other days I don't. I, for one, variously find his Bach a) fascinating, or b) a tiring and ill-tutored presumption, and even, at times, c) amusing. His Bach was a thing unto itself, highly idiosyncratic, and unquestionably more Gould than Bach. Some others sought or seek a more respectful relationship with Bach. Turek comes to mind, as does Sir Andras Schiff - there are many. Most of the great pianists count and have counted fluency in Bach as the foundation of their art.

    As self referential offerings many of these can rightly be said to be artistry of the highest order, some of which may even reveal facets of Bach that would not otherwise have been noticed. The key words here, though, are self referential - as opposed to 'Bach-referential'.

    I am reminded of a lecture I attended some years ago by a Dutch harpsichord scholar and builder. This was one of the most erudite evenings in my memory. At one point he brought up the harpsichord-piano conundrum and the oft proferred non sequitur that if Bach had had a piano he would have used it. He rounded this off with the patent observation that, 'yes, and if Caesar had had cruise missiles he would have used them'. All these rather ill-conceived assertions conveniently fail to take note of the fact that Caesar didn't, nor did Bach. He didn't. Bach's keyboard oevre would certainly have been different, very different, had he been writing for the piano. It might have resembled Carl Phillip Emmanuel's Prussian sonatas or some such (we will never know), but it would have had a pianistic structure and character. This much may be put forth with certitude, for Bach was far too great a musical mind to fail to write music that would exploit the character of the particular instrument for which he was writing. The WTC, the suites and partitas, the toccatas, the Italian concerto, the chromatic fantasie, and all the rest are and were conceived in Bach's mind as harpsichord music, They are not pianistic.

    All of us know that Bach played a piano on at least one occasion in the presence of Frederick the Great at Sans Souci. We also know that he wasn't particularly enamoured of it. If he had been pleased with it he no doubt would have written some very different music for it.

    'They are not pianistic', I said just above. This will not keep me and many of us from playing these works on the piano and delighting in making them sound self-referentially beautiful; but, with reference to Bach's conceptual mind and the sound world of his time a good many of us will not fail to appreciate that Bach on the piano can be beautiful, but it isn't really Bach - even though we may 'like it' it doesn't sound like Bach. With a tonal pallet fundamentally different from anything Bach would have conceived of it warps the textures and inevitably introduces expressive elements that Bach would have thought rather strange for the music that he wrote.
    Thanked by 1CHGiffen
  • melofluentmelofluent
    Posts: 4,160
    G.I. Gurdjieff: Sacred Hymns- Keith Jarrett, piano
    Thanked by 1noel jones, aago
  • Good composers of hymns on the piano - Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley, etc. Most old hymns sound good on a piano. Buy the piano accompaniment book for your Methodist Hymnal or learn to improvise off the guitar chords in the guitar accompaniment book. If such are not available, buy the piano accompaniment book to the hymnal Worship from GIA which should have 85% of the hymns you are interested in.
  • If you want something more contemporary, I think Shout to the Lord (Darlene Zschech), 10,000 Reasons (Matt Redman), In Christ Alone (Keith Getty and Stuart Townend), and Your Grace Is Enough (Matt Maher) have good hymn like character.
  • JesJes
    Posts: 574
    Check out Braithwaite stuff for communion. It's music for "after consecration"
  • JesJes
    Posts: 574
    On imslp