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Moravian Music Foundation

Moravian Music Foundation

Preserving, Sharing, and Celebrating Moravian Musical Culture

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Notes from Nola: All the Ducks in a Row?

Mary Lou Kapp Peeples at the 1798 Tannenberg organ, Single Brothers’ House

Recording Moravian Organ Music

The Moravian Music Foundation preserves, shares, and celebrates Moravian musical culture.

“All the ducks in a row” – that sounds too often like wishful thinking, but for the Moravian Music Foundation, it really happened, the week of January 14-18, 2019, when everything worked just like it should have to record more music than we need for the forthcoming CD of Moravian organ music!

A lot of work went into this ahead of time. The project was three or four years in the “dream” stage, and in early 2018, things began to come together. Organist Mary Lou Kapp Peeples (with, I’m sure, the consultation and counsel of her composer husband Wade Peeples) reviewed dozens upon dozens of compositions, to begin to narrow down to the selections on this CD.

“But wait,” you say, “Nola, you’ve been telling us for years there isn’t much Moravian organ music. Where did all this come from?” And you’re right – if you’re thinking early Moravian. There’s very little pre-20th-century organ solo music written by Moravians (at least that we now know). There are the preludes by Christian Latrobe, Francis Florentine Hagen’s arrangements and transcriptions, and in the early 20th century, E. I. Erbe’s preludes. These are all good pieces, but hardly enough to justify a whole CD.

But in the latter quarter of the 20th century and the early years of this century, Moravian composers have been busy! With careful work, and that indefinable factor called “inspiration”, many composers are writing wonderful pieces based on Moravian chorale tunes old and new. And even since we recorded in January, we’ve become aware of many more pieces … dare I sniff out a second CD coming in a couple of years?

So. What “ducks” had to line up for this recording, this year?

There is, of course, the usual cast of characters – performer (Mary Lou Kapp Peeples); producer (Gwyn Michel); recording engineer (Wade Peeples); liner-notes author and general “project manager (yours truly). And then we throw in another cast of characters – the instruments themselves! Mary Lou had the ambitious thought to make this an exploration, not only of Moravian music, but of Moravian organs, and so the recording takes place not at one location, but at five. That meant five organs had to be tuned and checked over; five locations had to be reserved; air-handling units in five locations needed to be turned off or minimized; all the recording equipment to be hauled in and out of Frank’s truck (not 5, but 6 times, as we had 2 sessions at Home Church!). Everybody had to stay healthy, and (in January, no less!), the weather needed to stay cooperative. OK, I’ve lost count of the “ducks” that needed to be in a line. The organs featured were: 1798 Tannenberg, Single Brothers House; 1800 Tannenberg, Old Salem Visitors Center; 1830 Henry Erben, Single Sisters House; 1926 Hook and Hastings, Calvary Moravian Church; 1959 Aeolian-Skinner, Home Moravian Church.

So you have an idea of the week, here’s the schedule, starting on Sunday, January 13:

Sunday            Gwyn flew in from Bethlehem (NC folks, you’ll remember there was a LOT of ice here that weekend! Gwyn was able to arrive safely, but her drive in from the airport was strange, in that there were very few lights along I-40 and Silas Creek Parkway all the way into Winston-Salem!)

Monday          We did not plan to start recording until late in the day, in case Gwyn’s Sunday flights were delayed or cancelled. As it turns out, she did arrive on time. We began at 5:00 p.m. in Gray Auditorium of the Old Salem Visitors’ Center, with the 1800 Tannenberg organ, and recorded until about 10 that evening.

Tuesday          All day at Home Moravian Church

Wednesday     5:30 p.m. at the Sisters House, Salem College, to record on the 1830 Erben organ

Thursday        evening at the Single Brothers House, on the 1797 Tannenberg

Friday              Morning at Home Moravian Church

                        Afternoon at Calvary Moravian Church on the 1926 Hook & Hastings organ.

But wait! (my turn to say that) … That’s not ALL we recorded that week! You’ll note that we had sessions on Wednesday and Thursday evening, so on Wednesday and Thursday days, we worked with violinist Warwick Lister and pianist Barbara Lister-Sink to record the three-movement Sonata for Violin and Piano by Charles G. Vardell.  This lush, mid-20th-century work will be part of a forthcoming recording project, to include many of Vardell’s piano solos. This was a great opportunity to do this, as Frank and Gwyn were “booked” for the week; Warwick was free to visit here from his home in Florence, Italy; and Warwick and Barbara had had rehearsal time the summer before to prepare the piece.

So now we’re up to 8 recording sessions, 6 locations, 5 days, 3 performers, 1 producer, 1 engineer, 1 project manager, organ technicians, facilities managers, staff of Old Salem, Salem College, Home Church, Calvary Moravian …

And it all worked. And when you hear the recording (coming this fall!), you’ll know, as we already do, that it was worth it. Can’t wait to share this wonderful music so beautifully played!

Next time: What does the “Psalm of Joy” teach us?

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WINSTON-SALEM OFFICE at the ARCHIE K. DAVIS CENTER

457 South Church St.
Winston-Salem, NC 27101

Phone: (336) 725-0651
Email: info@moravianmusic.org

BETHLEHEM OFFICE at the MORAVIAN ARCHIVES

41 West Locust St
Bethlehem, PA 18018

Phone: (610) 866-3340

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Other resources at MMF:

  • Reference library: the Peter Memorial Library in Winston-Salem
  • Irving Lowens Collection of early American tunebooks and songbooks, in Winston-Salem
  • An extensive international collection of hymnals (mostly Moravian) in many languages, dating to the 16th century, in Winston-Salem

 
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ArchivGrid

ArchiveGrid                         LINK

This is a collection of over 7,000,000 archival descriptions, including documents, personal papers, family histories, and other archival materials held in about 1,500 archival institutions. ArchiveGrid helps researchers looking for primary source materials, but who may not know exactly where to go to find them. MMF’s finding aids can be discovered through ArchiveGrid. For an example, go to https://researchworks.oclc.org/archivegrid/help/; type in the search box (upper right) “Bethlehem congregation” and the first thing you will find is MMF’s finding aid for the Bethlehem Congregation Collection, and also related collections and suggested search terms (Lancaster, Dover, Lititz, etc.), linked to those finding aids on the MMF website.

Finding Aids

Individual Finding Aids       LINK

Guide: Arranged by Collection          LINK

The archival holdings of MMF are divided into collections. (some in Bethlehem, some in Winston-Salem)

The finding aid for each collection is a “30,000-foot view” of the collection in its context. Each finding aid contains information about the size of the collection, how it was created, history of the community or key individuals involved in the collection, and a description of the contents.

A guide to the MMF collections is available at MoravianMusic.org:

For the individual finding aids, see https://moravianmusic.org/category/finding-aids/
Then, click on any of the titles and read about that collection. When this work is completed, there will be a finding aid for every collection we hold.

RISM

RISM: Répertoire International des Sources Musicales    LINK

RISM, or International Inventory of Musical Sources, is an international, non-profit organization that aims to comprehensively document extant musical sources worldwide: manuscripts, printed music editions, writings on music theory, and libretti that are found in libraries, archives, churches, schools, and private collections.

The RISM Catalog of Musical Sources contains over 1.2 million records and can be searched at no cost. Early western music from 1600 through to the early 19th century is included.    https://rism.info/de/search.html

RISM was founded in Paris in 1952 and is the largest and only global organization that documents written musical sources. RISM records what exists and where it can be found. RISM is where scholars go when they are looking for music manuscripts or early prints around the world. RISM entries include the musical incipits – the first phrase or so of music – to enable identification of a specific piece of music (which setting of “Sing to the Lord a New Song” is this?).

GemeinKat

GemeinKat is the MMF digital catalog on WorldCat.org    LINK

“GemeinKat” is the name given to MMF’s project to upload new and enhanced digital records to the OCLC and RISM databases. We have used the name “GemeinKat” as our umbrella term for the entire project, involving Backstage Library Works, OCLC, WorldCat, and RISM and the work of cataloging; also, the creation of the digital records and the creation of finding aids.

GemeinKat is available to the public, on the internet, at moravianmusic.on.worldcat.org and is a WorldCat Discovery catalog, developed by OCLC, a nonprofit organization that provides services to thousands of libraries worldwide. Through WorldCat, users have the potential to access more than 1.8 billion items in libraries around the world.

GemeinKat itself is: the bibliographic records for each manuscript, book, or printed music item found in MMF holdings.
These archival holdings are grouped by collections and physically reside in either the Bethlehem or Winston-Salem archive (sometimes in both).
For a description, see the MMF website: https://moravianmusic.org/gemeinkat-catalog/.

WorldCat.org: to search the catalog, go to https://moravianmusic.on.worldcat.org/discovery. You can search by composer, title, collection, or any number of other keywords; just go try!

OCLC (Online Computer Library Center): the collective of organization(s) that built the online database called WorldCat. It is now owned by Backstage Library Works.

Timeline of the Transition

The current plan (subject to change and adjustments, of course) is shared here, and will be updated.

How it works; who hires whom?

A. The MMF Board of Trustees hires the Executive Director. 
B. The Executive Director hires the Asst. Director and other MMF staff.

The Plan

1. Nola and Gwyn will retire, effective the end of August, 2022.

2. The Board is currently searching and accepting applications for Executive Director.

3. A new Executive Director will be named by summer and will be in place by mid-July, 2022.
The new Director would then be able to experience Festival and spend up to 6 weeks with the current Director.

4. An interim Asst. Director will be hired by summer and will overlap with the current Asst. Director.
This position will be 2-days a week to finish out the 2022 calendar year, while the new Director considers applicants for Asst. Director.

5. Assistant Director opening will be posted in the fall of 2022.

6. A new Asst. Director will be hired by the new ED and should be in place to start as of Jan. 1, 2023.

We are open for business!

…however, we prefer you make an appointment to visit the WINSTON-SALEM office in-person, and follow the guidelines, below.

336-725-0651

We request visitors follow these requirements:

  • Researchers must call or email to make an appointment. Walk-in researchers will not be admitted.
  • There will be a limit of 3 persons in the research room at a time (including MMF and Archives researchers).
  • Masks required for ALL.
  • Researchers are required to bring their own writing materials (pencils & paper).

 

For shopping, when convenient, please order items on the MMF website. We can leave them at the door for pick-up or ship to you.

For anthem and lending library requests, research inquiries, and other inquiries,
you are welcome to send an email to info@moravianmusic.org or sales@moravianmusic.org
or, for research, dave@moravianmusic.org
or directly to any of the staff, using this pattern: [first name]@moravianmusic.org

We Are Open for Business!

…however, you must make an appointment to visit the BETHLEHEM office in-person. Masks, distancing, and limits of occupancy are mandated.  

610-866-3340

For shopping, when convenient, please order items on the MMF website. We can leave them at the door for pick-up or ship to you.

For anthem and lending library requests, research inquiries, and other inquiries,
you are welcome to send an email to info@moravianmusic.org or sales@moravianmusic.org or
directly to any of the staff, using this pattern: [first name]@moravianmusic.org

A recent inquiry to MMF - Subject: Copyright/Streaming

 

Dear MMF,

I have a question about copyright and streaming. We have CCLI license and streaming license at my church, but it does not cover many pieces for organ. Would the ASCAP license provide that protection for us to stream and include copyrighted organ music? I’ve read their website, and it seems like it would.  https://www.ascap.com/music-users/types/church-or-ministry

Thanks!

____________________________________________________

Dear Worship Leader,

We have been instructing folks to follow CCLI and OneLicense guidelines, which, as you discovered, unfortunately, rarely cover instrumental/keyboard music.

Yes, it appears as though ASCAP offers a “WorshipCast” streaming license, which is set up in much the same manner as CCLI and OneLicense licenses – i.e., the fee structure is based on worship attendance:

https://apps.christiancopyrightsolutions.com/purchase-license.aspx?svc=wc

A quick click brought up this fee structure:
1 – 199 (in attendance): $284.00
200 – 499 (in attendance): $424.00 (obviously it goes up from here)

Some further good news – the WorshipCast license offered above is controlled by Christian Copyright Solutions (a division of CCLI, and it appears as though purchase of this license would allow you to broadcast both ASCAP and BMI titles, opening up even more possibilities.

I don’t think, however, that this license includes SESAC titles; thus, if you wished to perform anything under the SESAC umbrella (Dan Gawthrop, for instance), you would need to approach that entity directly for a license:

https://www.sesac.com/#!/

Thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Blessings to you in your music ministry!

Gwyneth Michel, Assistant Director, Moravian Music Foundation      – – (with edits by Erik S.)

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Archie K Davis Center

Construction began on the building in the fall of 1999, and the facility was completed and occupied in July 2001. In September 2001, the building was dedicated as the Archie K. Davis Center. More about the man, the building, and a quick, visual tour of our beautiful home.

The Archie K. Davis Center