New Haven Register (Sunday) (New Haven, CT)
Piping up
Organists organize fun ways to keep youngsters engaged with an ancient musical instrument
Most people don’t associate pipe organs with pizza.
But a local organization for pipe organists brings the two together as a way to educate young people about the unique musical instrument with roots dating back to the 3rd century B.C.
The Greater Bridgeport Chapter of the American Guild of Organists hosts Pedals, Pipes and Pizza gatherings to expose young piano players to pipe organs. More than 100 youngsters attended a recent event.
The AGO chapter’s annual “Pipescreams” concert uses a Halloween theme to attract large crowds. Pipe organists perform with university, church and children’s choirs, silent film clips are shown, and many performers and attendees dress in costumes.
“It’s a fun way to share the organ in an unconventional way and to get people thinking outside the box about what it can do,” says Frank Martignetti, who leads the local AGO as its dean.
Former chapter dean Meg Williams agrees. “There can be a stereotype that the pipe organ is a sad, slow-sounding instrument and that’s not the case at all,” she says.
The New Haven chapter of AGO, meanwhile, notes on Facebook that it’s a big week for organ lovers as it brings the first online AGO Organfest, happening from Monday-Friday, July 20-24, one hour of music five nights in a row for a festival born out of disappointment at the need to cancel the AGO National Convention in July. The 8 p.m. events will be archived for later use.
John Polo helped come with the idea for the Bridgeport chapter’s “Pipescreams,” partly so organists could play songs better known to the public such as Broadway and contemporary tunes and not just religious and classical ones.
“In one-and-a-half hours, you get all kinds of music,” says Polo, chapter administrator and webmaster. “It allows musicians to let their hair down. And a lot of people don’t want to hear just old songs from dead composers.”
The Pipescreams concept, now in its 19th year, has proved so popular that AGO chapters around the country now put on similar performances.
The pipe organ dates back to the ancient Greeks, who used water organs known as hydraulis to create music. Western European churches began using more modern pipe organs in the 9th and 10th centuries.
Most people associate pipe organs with religion, especially Christianity, and more than two dozen churches in the local AGO region have one.
A pipe organ produces sound by driving pressurized air through organ pipes selected on a keyboard. A musician uses both hands and feet to play the pipe organ, having to maneuver keyboards (called “manuals”), control knobs (”stops”) and pedalboards.
“It’s like playing the drums because all of your limbs have to move at the same time,” Martignetti says.
“You exercise your whole body,” explains Williams, associate pastor at First Congregational Church in Stratford, where she lives.
A pipe organ can imitate the sounds of many instruments. “You can express many different emotions,” says Williams.
When playing, says Polo, “You’re orchestrating an entire orchestra.”
Pipe organs are expensive. “You can spend up to $4 million, but it will last you 100 years,” says Martignetti of Fairfield, who chairs the University of Bridgeport’s music and performing arts department. He’s organist at a Manhattan church.
Electronic versions are much less expensive but can become outdated after a few decades due to sound quality advances.
Ilana Ofgang remembers the first time she played a pipe organ. “It blows your mind,” she says. “You can make the earth shake.”
She began playing the piano at 12 and three years later secured a job as a church organist despite having never played a pipe organ before.
“It’s a really fun, challenging and endlessly fascinating instrument,” says Ofgang of Bridgeport, music director at Trumbull Congregational Church.
Martignetti was immediately impressed when he heard his first pipe organ while in high school. “A keyboardist of any kind can’t look at a pipe organ and not be excited, with its power and diversity of tone,” he says.
Polo, formerly of Trumbull, was intrigued with the pipe organ as a youngster. “You kind of get mesmerized by it,” he says.
The national AGO dates back to 1896 and has 14,700 members. The local chapter began in 1948 and covers communities from Norwalk to Milford. Seven AGO chapters exist in
Connecticut, including in the Stamford-Danbury and New Haven regions.
The Greater Bridgeport AGO has about 50 members, ranging in age and background. “I really enjoy the variety of personalities and life experiences in the organization,” says Martignetti.
The group seeks to share the love of pipe organ music through education and performances, “bringing the pipe organ to new audiences,” Martignetti says.
It sponsors concerts, community and member workshops, social gatherings and other events. Past programs include a summer camp and choral festival. The chapter awards an annual $2,500 scholarship to a student studying organ performance.
Martignetti offers mixed views on the future of pipe organs. He says while “the narrative is one of decline,” with fewer fulltime church organist positions and fewer organ courses at colleges, churches in Greenwich and Westport recently installed new pipe organs and most new U.S. concert halls have them as well.
“The appeal of the instrument is growing but the skill set needed has shifted,” he says, explaining a pipe organist must be able to perform multiple musical styles and also have improvisation, directing, conducting and administrative expertise.
“It’s hard to find one person who can do all that,” says Martignetti.
One of Ofgang’s goals is to bring more gender, ethnic and age diversity to the AGO, perhaps by attracting musicians who don’t primarily specialize in traditional religious music.
Martignetti says making the pipe organ appear less pretentious is a good idea because it’s simply “a really great instrument for playing music.”
The New Haven chapter of AGO, meanwhile, notes on Facebook that it’s a big week for organ lovers as it brings the first online AGO Organfest, happening from Monday-Friday, July 20-24, one hour of music five nights in a row for a festival born out of disappointment at the need to cancel the AGO National Convention in July. The 8 p.m. events will be archived for later use.