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hi

ekpees

New member
i want to know the technigue used e.g. an organist play a hymn, in the second stanza of the hymn he will play the melody of the hymn with his right hand while runing the bass note with his left hand. iwant to learn the technique thanks
 

Thomas Dressler

New member
Well, to do this takes a little practice, and it is very helpful to have some pedal technique. When you're playing with both hands on the same manual, you can take the alto and tenor in whichever hand is most convenient. But when you're soloing the melody on another manual, it is often difficult to reach the three lower voices with the left hand alone. So you need to practice playing the bass line on the pedal, the inner voices with the left hand, and the melody with the right hand on another manual. Sometimes it is still difficult to reach the alto and tenor with the same hand and then you need to change them a little bit to make sure you can get all the notes somehow, because it will not sound so good if, for instance, you leave the third out of a chord.

Also, keep in mind that there are lots of ways to vary the verses on hymns. You can take both hands to another manual, change registration, change the harmonization, sometimes play just the melody on the pedals alone on full organ. . .It's best to study what the words are saying in each verse and then try to make the organ somehow reflect what the words are saying.
 
When I play at the church, I do various things to change every verse. The first time I play at the Hauptwerk with Principal Chorus and I use also the Pedal. The second verse is played with the soprano part at a solo stop, then alto and tenor are played varied at another department and the Pedal are used also. If other verses exist then I prefer to be back at the Hauptwerk. If more than three verses are, then I prefer to play the middle verses in softer sound, with or without pedals and then tha final one with the Principal Chorus of the main department.
This is also another good idea to vary the sound of the organ when you play hymns. You can have a lot of combinations in such a kind of playing.
 
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