I have a degree in music, but am no expert organist or singer. My degree is in music education; my training was to be a band director. I recently picked up the organ ( I had a few years of piano in my youth). I do have a repertoire of about 30 hymns, all played on manuals only. Nobody in the congregation has complained about having to sing the same hymns all the time. The more familiar they are, the more they sing. I really think it is the musicians that get tired of the same music over and over, not the congregation.

I did have the pastor request that I follow the OCP suggestions or otherwise choose music that matches the reading for the day. I told him I would like to, but my repertoire is limited, that the organ is not my principal instrument, that I have a day job and it takes me a long time to learn a new hymn, but I would do the best I can. I also mentioned that I saw some tension in the viewpoints that the congregation should sing all the hymns (full, conscious, active participation and all), but if we followed the OCP suggestions, few hymns would be repeated often enough for the congregation to sing them with any degree of confidence.

He then asked if we could have at least one hymn that matched the readings for the day. That was my chance to introduce him to the Simple English Propers. I pointed out that by doing these, we would be singing the most appropriate texts possible for the Mass. He had never heard of the propers. He told me that he would have to check with the Bishop. The Bishop confirmed that singing them would not only be appropriate, but praiseworthy. We have been doing them at Communion ever since.

I do have two volunteer cantors whom I work with. One plays a little piano and the other doesn't read music at all. Neither has had any formal vocal training. I myself have only recently started singing lessons. My plan is that once we get comfortable with the Communion propers (probably a year) we would start singing some of the others.

Hard to say in my case. As an organist I can manage (and have played in concert) repertoire at the level of Bach's Dorian Toccata and Fugue and Karg-Elert's Choral Fantasy on Ein Feste Burg. I've been regularly playing the organ in church contexts since the late 1970s (that fact will convey an idea of my age), though only after 2000 did I acquire a thorough pedal technique.

But unlike - I should imagine - most participants in this forum, I have no college degree in music, and no postgraduate degree in any field. So in formal terms I would count as exceptionally uneducated.

I'm probably around moderate. I can usually sight-read hymns (and sometimes sight-sing them, too) but I don't have a lot of repertoire for complicated instrumental organ music, although I try at times. I certainly am not at the level to do concerts or anything like that. I took organ lessons for some years, but aside from that (and piano) I've not had any education in music whatsoever. I've mainly learned while on the job, all of which I've had thanks to chance occurrence and/or lack of organists available.

I can play organ at a higher level, but there is one thing I have found from being a busy church musician. I don't have adequate practice time. The really good concert players spend hours in practice. That's something I have never been able to do. Consequently, I sometimes find myself playing whatever I was able to put together for a particular Sunday.

This would be me, though I do have a few decades on you 20-somethings . . . I do not play the organ, though my 16yo son does. Actually, he's a pianist who's learned to play the organ, manuals only, when our organist retired three years ago. I became "choir director" though I have zero training as a choral conductor (I learned everything I know from YouTube, thank you very much), modest musical training in piano and singing otherwise. But I do know something about liturgy and sacred music (I have degrees in theology, education, and biblical languages) so the combination of my son's excellent keyboard skills (he's a truly gifted sight-reader) and my limited musical background work for our smallish rural parish. I think that someone with real talent would be extremely frustrated with my job!

As for practice, we take care of that mostly at home (given that my family makes up 80% of the choir). My son did go up to the church to practice on the organ a couple hours per week for three months before he actually started playing for Masses. But now he can play anything in the OCP collection and has developed a large repertoire of sacred music for preludes, postludes, weddings and funerals. He will begin taking organ lessons this year at our local university to advance in organ skills.

Kathy

I personally am the dreaded...amateur... that everyone complains about.

I don't have a degree in music, (as a matter of record I don't have a degree in anything) and my formal training consists of several years of voice lessons and singing in choirs (sacred and secular) for the last 30 years, and piano lessons starting about 6 months ago. I have gone back to school to get a music degree, but with six children still at home...that is a very slow process.

Everything I know about church music I've learned from the following sources.

Reading the documents, reading books, reading this forum, attending the Colloquium last year, youtube videos, or pestering Darling, Dearest, and the incomparable CHGiffen with questions and pleas for help.

The organist for the Choir Mass is a college student and she's learning right alongside the rest of us. We all refer to ourselves as a learning choir. We chant the Propers from the SEP and are working very hard to learn more chant hymns and Latin. There are about 20 regular members when the school is in session and about 15 over the summer.

Thankfully, the Pastor is extremely encouraging and supportive, and we have the support of the music director as well.

I have no illusion that I would have this kind of opportunity to serve elsewhere, but I am grateful to have it.

If you think of the etymology of the word amateur, it is "lover of", in other words, someone pursuing a lifelong personal passion, intensely dedicated to self-improvement.

To paraphrase St. Augustine:

Facere musicam amantis est.

I think it's funny that while my husband is a professional musician and music educator and I've had private lessons but no degree, I'm the one who spends most of her spare time playing the piano and organ and digging through music websites and listening to YouTube videos. He can't wait to put away his instruments and read a book on anything but music (but I can't blame him since he spends all day teaching band to middle school kids).

I am also the dreaded amateur that everyone complains about. I am a self-taught pianist/organist. I learned to read music when I learned to play the saxophone in school. (Why couldn't I have picked a more useful instrument?)

My hymn playing is competent and focused on enabling singing. My service music is very basic (on the level of "The Organist" from Lorenz). I am considered a good singer and we also have a small group of singers (eight people) for the 8:00 AM Sunday mass that I play.

I love what I do and believe that I am valued by my church. It is discouraging sometimes to read opinions that seem to say that there isn't a place in the Catholic church for amateur (volunteer) musicians of low/moderate ability. All I can say is that I think that what I do is a positive contribution in my parish.

Thanks for the opportunity to introduce myself.

Jeff M
Altoona, PA

I am probably considered moderate. I am more of a pianist than an organist (play organ on manuals only), but have a degree in music and psychology. Most of my sacred music knowledge is self taught through this forum and the CMAA website. I am a general music teacher in 3 Catholic schools and direct the children's choirs at two of them.

As far as amateur musicians versus professional ones, I still haven't decided what constitutes a professional. I've known several church musicians who are very gifted, but do not have degrees, and have known those with degrees that shouldn't sit at the bench.

My sight-reading is getting increasingly better on both the piano and organ (again, manuals only), and I have written some music here and there. I also have a considerate amount of experience in playing for community musical theater groups and ballet schools.

I would say that I am the definition of beginner. That being said, I am not an organist whatsoever, let alone a parish music director in fact, and most of my limited abilities are self-taught. In fact, I have only had to play for a few Masses, all when the regular organist at the seminary I am at couldn't make it. Since I am the only other seminarian who can even being to play, let alone even being able to read music, nothing I play, when necessary, is complicated, and they are all mainly manuals only, or very minimal pedal if at all.

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Amen JulieColl.