A Fine Thread
What appears below is from an email thread (exchange) that occurred following our May 11, 2008 Mother’s Day Service. An edited version of Patricia Baillif’s email from this thread was printed as “Warp and Weft” in the Dallas Unitarian Newsletter.
-----Original Message-----
From: David T. Norton
Sent: Sunday, May 11, 2008 1:35 PM
Subject: A Note of Thanks
Dear Don and fellow members of the Sanctuary Choir –
Since I have sung with the choir over the last 12 years, there have been only a few times that I was so busy with family, church, work, etc., that I had to miss so many rehearsals that I in turn missed an opportunity to sing on a Sunday morning. It always breaks my heart a little when it happens, but I must say that it is also always a little treat to hear how the choir actually sounds from down front.
This morning was an extra treat. The Brahms was beautiful. And you, quite literally, brought tears to my eyes with the 23rd Psalm.
Thank you so much for all of the hard work, and for how much you add to the worship at our church. I am so grateful (and so humbled) to sing with such a group and to have such beautiful music as part of our worship.
Dave.
PS – Happy Mother’s Day!
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Sent: Monday, May 12, 2008 10:31:10 AM
Subject: RE: A Note of Thanks
Dear All,
Because of continued committments at KLIF (they are taking their time filling the seat I am keeping warm), I too missed too many rehearsals to join in on Sunday. Very good work on the Liebeslieder! The fact that it was done on Mothers Day had special significance for me. My mother (a music ed major at Oberlin) made the first set of Liebeslieder Waltzes my introduction to Brahms at the age of two. (God knew what he was doing when he gave me my two parents. Dad's minor at Oberlin was church organ. He made sure I heard the Brahms Requiem next.) A very moving service. Thanks!
Steve Cumming
-----Original Message-----
From: Patricia Baillif
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 1:10 AM
To: steve cumming; David Norton
Cc: Laurel Hallman, Daniel Kanter, Donald Krehbiel; Stuart Owen
Subject: Re: A Note of Thanks
Dear Steve and David,
Maybe I shouldn't be thanking you for thanking the choir, but I wanted you to know how much I appreciated your responses to Sunday's music. It means a lot to me to hear fellow choristers be so generous in praise.
Truth be told, I had a hard time holding back my own tears on the 23rd Psalm. My saving grace was that I did not need to refer to my music for words or notes, and was able to focus on Don's face and hands. In our rehersal before the service Don commented that we do this song differently every time we sing it. I don't have his nuanced ear, but I can tell you that I experienced this song deeply and personally on Sunday in a way I have not in previous performances.
Privately, many of us had anxiety about the Liebeslieder, going in. I'm so glad you thought we did a good job.
Glory be to our mothers. And to our daughters. And to the holiest of holies.
On a different subject, sometimes in the choir we forget that not everyone knows our past. Steve, did you know that Margaret and Stuart Owen are graduates of Oberlin (I think they met there) and that Stuart is an organist? One of my favorite "little stories" told by the church from previous funrdaisers, or celebrations, or "who we are" presentations, was from Leslie Owen, Stuart and Margaret's daughter, telling of how she loved to sit in the dark church, listening to her father play the organ. The one he worked so hard to make happen and have installed in our chuch, which adds so much to our glorious music. I googled Seymour Blatt's name, to make sure I spelled it correctly, and came upon this, from Don's "Music Notes" column in the Dallas Unitarian November 27, 2005:
ELOISE BLATT MEMORIAL ORGAN
In August of 1989, when I was hired as a part-time employee to direct the Sanctuary Choir at First Unitarian Church, the Music department consisted of Music Director Jo Boatright, the Sanctuary Choir, a grand piano, and a very bad Hammond organ. This decrepit instrument was referred to as “the Toaster,” since it had more in common with a kitchen appliance (it was plugged into an outlet) than it did to a pipe organ.
Five months after my arrival, long-time church member Seymour Blatt gave a generous financial gift to the church to acquire a new organ in memory of his late wife, Eloise. Though Seymour’s gift would have covered the cost of a fine electronic instrument, there were members of the Music Committee who thought a pipe organ would better suit this church and its expanding music program. Dr. Stuart Owen, chair of the Music Committee and avid organ enthusiast, researched the possibilities, located a pipe organ for sale which fit into our balcony, and, with the help of the Music Committee, called all the members of our church to try to raise the additional $140,000 needed to purchase the organ.
There were doubters, but the campaign succeeded. Just five short months after the initial gift, all monies were raised and contracts signed – a very rare occurrence for the purchase of a pipe organ.
Put in context, this was a magnificent achievement for our church. Our church budget at the time was a little over $300,000. The acquisition of this pipe organ was a historic moment for our church. The general sense of “genteel poverty”
was replaced by a sense of abundance. The project’s success sparked a “can-do” attitude which has carried us through many later projects, including the 1999 renovation.
Through the generosity of Seymour Blatt, the dedication and perseverance of Stuart Owen, and the concerted effort of the entire congregation, we have an instrument which can serve us well into our next century.
Although it is a cliche today, the purchase of our organ truly produced a paradigm shift in the way our members viewed their financial committments to our church. People began to put their money where their mouths were and the overall level of giving bounded upwards. I remember when, as chair of the Finance Committee, I was astonished at a $400,00 budget. Today we are closing in on raising $9 million, on top of our operating budget.
I know this isn't exactly on point with producing strike-me-to-my-soul music, but like the butterfly crushed off the path, all my stories tie together.
We are a great church because people before us have had great vision for the future. Al Johnson chaired the pledge drive where he introduced us to the phrase "paradigm shift" in the early '90s. Al was a Chief Financial Officer of Kimberly-Clark and brought an extrordinary talent for vision and focus, and he booted us out of our placid "genteel poverty" that Don referenced in 2005.
Laurel is the weaver, not I, so she has the language I don't to more aptly wrap up my story, but throughout our church's history there have been strong warp threads that have enabled the weft. In current parlance we call our warp threads mini-congregations: Women's Alliance, Sanctuary Choir, LGUU, YRUU, RE. Strong threads that are firmly rooted in our past, carry us through our present and deliver us our future. The wefts are the tides of support and vision and programs and music which sweep back and forth, creating, giving, building on what has come before us. Like rings of a tree, some years build at a greater rate than others, but always we add on. Music, and our choir music, is one of the ways we add to the thick layers of our years.
Steve and David, thank you again for your kind words. Having taken two days to write my response, I realize that you have gotten a sermon rather than a simple thank you.
We have been greatly blessed. It is up to us to pay it forward.
Love to all,
Patricia S. Baillif
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From: steve cumming
To: Patricia Baillif, David Norton
Cc: Laurel Hallman, Daniel Kanter, Donald Krehbiel; Stuart Owen
Sent: Wednesday, May 14, 2008 10:15:53 AM
Subject: RE: A Note of Thanks
Hi Patricia (and Stuart,and everyone),
Glad you brought it up. Those to whom music is not the major ingredient to life as it is to us will still acknowledge that our services would be much less without it. And if the subject of another addition to the organ comes up (as it does over the years at many churches) I'd like to be of assistance any way I can.
Yes, I heard about the Oberlin connection when Stuart e-mailed me about it. My parents met in the Oberlin Choral Union. I still have a radio transcription from 1947 of the combined choruses in a broadcast originating from Cleveland's NBC affiliate, WTAM-AM.
Gee, the memories are flowing back now.... listening to Dad rehearse the first and third organ chorales by Franck in the early 1950s while Mom kept me and my brothers occupied in the pews at church. Dad performed Piece Heroique as the postlude four years ago on his 80th birthday. (Sniff!) And I had wondered for many years why the first movement of the Mozart first flute concerto has always sounded so familiar. Mom told me several years ago that she rehearsed it endlessly while I was invitro. There's a lesson there. It's never to early to listen. Glory be to our mothers. Indeed!
Steve
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