The organist librarian

We sang "There's a wideness in God's mercy" Maurice Bevan's tune fits the words perfectly. I played Thiman Postlude on Harwood's Thornbury and my own tribute to Newman part of the Prelude and Angel's farewell from Gerontius. I have lost two friends recently Eileen McDade and Philip Chandler RIP. Each has their own angel to bring them safely home. Folake did not come - we had gifts for her as she had said she was leaving! Reader starts reading then tries again with another bit of letter to Timothy. Jerry points to correct reading so she says "third time lucky!" love it! A really lovely evensong at St John's. Liz was the only soprano and sang Dyson beautifully.  Richard is excellent and encourages relaxed singing. We also sang Pitoni Cantate domino and O thou who camest from above. Psalm 148 to Anglican chant, It was all so enjoyable! Louise and the boys have arrived.

Up early for Van Gogh and Britain at the Tate. Some lovely paintings they are all about himself and discoveries like Christopher Wood. Members special opening 8 to 10 Saturdays a wonderful idea! Some rooms I had to myself! The queue outside Tate Britain at 10 horrendous. So glad I was there at 8. Abandoned Cadogan square garden idea as wet. To St John East Dulwich for Andrew Chadney's recital. Some out of tune stops. Buxtehude and Percy Fletcher. Nice chat to John Webber. Bridge adagio too slow and no flow. Sitting in the hospice with John East and listening to radio 3, I spoke to John about that superb passage at the beginning of part 2 of Gerontius illustrating the sleep of the soul. "I went to sleep and now I am awake. It is the voices who say the Profiscere hither the echoes come. Go forth upon thy journey Christian soul." As Alan Rees said "This is a loving God welcoming us home". Who can imagine the music in heaven? John Bell said all the strange harmonie...

I warmed to the  new Mander organ at St Mary Merton Park after a while. Lunch at Elys. Fine organ at St Mary's Wimbledon village. Rather a lot of walking. The Mass at Anerley for feast of St Simon and St Jude was for Canon Gerald Coates RIP long a member of Society of St Gregory and a wonderful man. His funeral is Nov 9 at noon Arundel cathedral..  Why do some organ teachers tell students not to wear shoes? It is so dangerous and Peter Hurford is adamant that shoes improve your pedalling.  Daniel Cook from Durham cathedral played superbly at Bloomsbury Baptist - Parry, Byrd, Elgar Prelude and Angel's farewell from Gerontius (one of my favourites) and Bairstow. I was sorry to miss the Howells and Willan. Piccolo Lasso from Dublin sang beautifully at the cathedral Bodley Mass and Welsey Love one another. fr Michael was chatting about Hereford and Fr Michael Quaqoe is back from Ghana. Furious that it appeared that the cassocks I had taken off the rack for replacement had be...

<iframe width="560" height="315" src=" http://www.youtube.com/embed/ax4I-A6RHDM " frameborder="0" allowfullscreen>iframe> Here is Bede Griffiths on the subject of creation and transfiguration. The Archbishop of Canterbury asked yesterday "What will we do in heaven?" The answer is "Enjoy God" and hell would be no longer wanting to enjoy God. The art of dying is something we all need to learn every day and my Mum and Dad certainly taught that. I asked a question about The Dream of Gerontius and pointed out that many of our hymns about heaven are 19th century e.g. Jerusalem the golden lovely as it is is a Victorian version of an older hymn. "Glorious things of thee are spoken" is a great hymn as is "Blessed city" but we need more. People use spirituals but Bishop George Rowell said maybe he would write a new hymn to fill the gap! The last verse of "One in royal" expresses comfort for those...

There was a good congregation for the service. We had a quintet and we sang Psalm 121 to Barry Rose's chant, Thou knowest Lord and Nunc Dimittis to Tonus peregrinus - the latter 2 unaccompanied as the keyboard is so naff! I played Vierne Epitaphe, 2 Brahms choral preludes and angel's farewell from Gerontius at the end. The hymns were Praise my soul, Lord of all hopefulness, Love divine and Immortal invisible and we used "O Lord hear my prayer". There was time for me to light 4 candles for the grandparents and all the names were read out. Arnold's 5th symphony on way home and William Mathias on The Choir with Stephen Cleobury.

To Coulsdon and 4 in the choir. We sang "Day by day" by Martin How and "God be in my head". "Praise to the holiest" and I played Angel's farewell from "Dream of Gerontius" to mark Newman's beatification. Waited in car for Liz and listened to a programme about Miss World 1970 and Just a minute. Dennis had sorted his books out so we took those he is keeping up to Glyn Close and they saw Martin next door. We ate in the garden in sunshine probably our last chance this year for that! Mark Elder conducted a prom of the Last night 1910 which featured a new work based on the slow movement of a cello concerto by Vaughan Williams written for Casals called "Dark pastoral" and Elgar Pomp and Circumstance No. 4. Songs of praise was from South Africa. Ulster orchestra prom in tribute to Sir Henry included Bliss and Bax and Rachmaninoff. I was watching on Iplayer the last in the series on British writers and the broadband went but later saw th...