Our year begins early with a social evening and Ottawa premiere of a newly discovered piece of J.S.Bach: Fantasia sopra il Corale Wo Gott der Herr nicht bei uns haelt. Tom Annand, Ottawa Centre Vice-President, will introduce the work and play the premiere at St Andrew's Church, Wednesday, September 17 at 7:30pm. After the premiere, Tom will moderate a discussion during which members and guests will offer their reactions to the work. A social time will follow to allow members to meet and reacquaint after summer holidays. Members are encouraged to bring and share programmes from concerts attended or played, new music or recordings acquired.

The chorale prelude turned up in Halle, Germany in the papers of Wilhelm Rust (d. 1892), one of the major editors of the Bach Gesellschaft Ausgabe. As important as Rust was, his work was not without controversy so participants will have an opportunity to judge for themselves as to the authenticity of the work. The eight-minute organ piece, dates from the early days of Bach's career; musicologists, Michael Pacholke and Stephan Blaut, who are doing research for a book on Bach's complete works, dated the piece to between 1705 and 1710, based on its stylistic features. It is the longest existing chorale fantasy by Bach and is based on the chorale Wo Gott der Herr nicht bei uns haelt (Where God the Lord does not stay by our side). The modern-day premiere was performed by Martin Haselböck, music director of Los Angeles' Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra, at the Halle Handel Festival, in Halle in June 2008.

Please use the office entrance, 82 Kent Street. Admission of $10 for non-members. Free to members.

The RCCO is pleased to announce that Dr. Mark Sirett will lead an anthem reading session and choral workshop at MacKay United Church. MacKay United Church is located at the corner of Dufferin and MacKay Streets in neighbourhood of New Edinburgh and is accessed off Sussex Drive or Beechwood Avenue. There is plenty of parking on MacKay and Dufferin and other nearby streets.

Dr. Sirett, is an organist and award-winning choral composer. His works have been performed choirs in Canada and more recently, around the world. Commissions have included works for the National Youth Choir of Canada, the Amabile Youth Singers, Ottawa Regional Youth Choir, La Jeunesse, Elora Festival Singers, and the Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. His published sacred and secular works are found in the catalogues of Boosey and Hawkes, ECS Publishing, Walton, Hinshaw, Alliance, Augsburg/Fortress, Warner/Chappell, and Canadian International. We are please that Dr. Sirett will feature his own compositions during the session and others by other contemporary composers.

The session is designed for both conductors and singers so encourage your conducting colleagues and singers to attend. Con Brio Music, of Ottawa will be working with Mark to prepare a package of music for use during the session. This will be an exciting event and a chance to expand our repertoires in time for the Christmas season.

Here is a partial list of music:

• The Marvellous Birth, R. Chilcott
• His Praises We'll Sing, A. Bulard
• One Gift, G. Rudolph
• Too Often, God Your Names I Used, C. Scott
• There's a Wideness in God's Mercy, M. Bevan
• Christ Hath a Garden, E. Daley
• Give Thanks to God, G. Hancock
• Only a Baby Came, Sleeth/Giardinere
• Sons and Daughters, M. Sirett
• The Oxen, M. Sirett
• Dormi Jesu, M. Sirett
• Waye Not His Cribb, M Sirett

A native of Kingston, Dr. Mark Sirett holds both masters and doctoral degrees in choral conducting and pedagogy from the University of Iowa and has taught at the University of Alberta, the University of Western Ontario and Queen's University. For six years he served as Organist/Music Director at St. George's Cathedral, Kingston. Under his direction the Cathedral Girl Choristers won first prize in the 1996 CBC Choral Competition for amateur choirs. In addition, Dr. Sirett directs Queen's Choral Ensemble.

Since founding the Cantabile Choirs in the fall of 1996, the choirs have received numerous distinctions at the regional and national level of the National Music Festival Finals, including the Mathieson, Cooke, and City of Lincoln Trophies, and recently a Gold Award at the Young Prague 2004 Music Competition. Dr. Sirett has won two international awards in conducting: the Jury Prize for Imaginative Programming and Artistry at the 2002 Cork International Choral Festival, and Outstanding Conductor Award at the 2004 Young Prague Festival. He has directed the Ontario Youth Choir and the Alberta Honours Children's Chorus. He has served as clinician with the Ontario Vocals Festival, the Royal Canadian College of Organists, and the Royal School of Church Music, and has adjudicated festivals in Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto, London, and Calgary.

On September 27, 2008 at 3:00pm the RCCO and the National Arts Centre are sponsoring a special event at the NAC titled: Explore the Flentrop Organ. Centre members will know that the Flentrop organs at the NAC are hidden treasures rarely heard or seen. The event is open to the public and will be geared to families with children aged 8 and up. The event is part of the Mozart and Brahms Festival which officially launches the NAC Orchestra Season. Tickets ($14 adults $8 children) are available through the NAC ticket office or Ticketmaster. Seating is limited to 75.

The event, on the stage at the NAC, is part recital and part demonstration, and will feature both the larger Flentrop (2 manual, 21 stop) organ and the smaller, single manual positiv organ. The RCCO will also make arrangements to transport Karen Holmes' portable continuo organ to the NAC such that participants can see and hear three different instruments in one setting. Tom Annand and other centre members will participate as organists and presenters.

The instruments, built by the famous Dutch organ builder Flentrop Orgelbouw, were given as gifts to Canada by the Dutch-Canadian community in appreciation of the role played by Canadian troops in the liberation of the Netherlands in 1945.

The Dutch-Canadian Committee 1945-70 mounted a fundraising campaign under the title of "Operation Thank You Canada" and, on March 17, 1970, on the 25th anniversary of the liberation of Holland, presented the two organs to the National Arts Centre "to round out the musical life of the Centre". The National Arts Centre, which had opened just nine months prior to this, had hoped to install an organ for use in its Opera (now Southam Hall), but had run out of funds before it could do so. Thus, the generous gesture of Canadians of Dutch origin was especially welcome.

At the time of the presentation only the small positiv instrument was turned over to the National Arts Centre, as a token for the larger one which was yet to come. This took three years to build. It was finally voiced in September 1973 and inaugurated at a special recital on October 7, 1973 by the well-known Dutch master organist Albert de Klerk.

Tom Annand will offer a Messiaen masterclass and pre-concert lecture on the organ works of Olivier Messiaen prior to his Pro Organo concert (In Honour of Messiaen's 100th Birthday) on Friday November 28, 2008.

Many will recall from Rachel's masterclass last year that she introduced two distinct ways to improvise: theme based improvisation and free form improvising. This masterclass will focus on the former and will use the music of Christmas as starting points. Organists are traditionally most busy at Christmas time with many services and musical events to manage - so perhaps this masterclass will be an opportunity for you to develop or refine your improvisation skills and perhaps put them to use at some point in the Christmas season.

An evening of festive French Christmas music for organ and brass quartet, and audience carol singing.
Free-will Admission

Karen Holmes is the RCCO Travelling Clinician this year and as such will be travelling to various centres across the country to offer a series of masterclasses to members and students alike. Hymn playing is a central skill for most church musicians and yet there is always more to know about how best to lead choirs and congregations in song.

Anyone who wishes some feedback or pointers on playing hymns is invited to play. Karen will talk about the hymn-playing requirements on RCCO exams, so you might consider playing one of the hymns on the examination syllabus. They are listed on the RCCO national website, and if you wish, you can ask Sharon Adamson to e-mail copies to you. Or use your own hymnbook. One of the easiest hymns in the RCCO requirements at the moment is Stuttgart, on the Service Playing list. The CRCCO list includes Slane and Austria, and the ARCCO list includes Regent Square and Lasst uns erfreuen. (There are more!) Or, if you prefer, you can play a hymn of your own choice, but in that case it would be useful if you brought some photocopies for people to sing from. Anyone who does not want to play is welcome to come for the “hymn-sing”; it will be useful to have a congregation to accompany! RCCO examinations require candidates to play an introduction and three verses. For the CRCCO exam., you must play the tune as a right-hand solo in one verse. For the ARCCO exam., you must play a reharmonization for the final verse, and a four-bar “improvisation” either as an interlude between verses, or as an extension of the last verse. (The interlude and the reharmonization can be prepared in advance.) Topics for discussion will include what to play for an introduction, what to do for registration, how to respect the text, how to practise hymns, and so on. Not everyone plays hymns the same way, or even agrees on how they should be played. Examiners are flexible about some points, but it will be clear that others are not acceptable.

This class will be of particular interest to students, reluctant organists, and church musicians who might primarily use piano. We are also hoping that many regular members might attend as well to create a real choir to make the whole event as practical as possible. This is also a chance for all members to promote the work of the college and to personally offer the class to organists and church musicians that are not presently members of the College but who might benefit from or welcome this opportunity to hone their hymn playing skills. Our membership convenor Don Marjerrison has lists of churches and musicians who are not presently connected to the college. Please feel free to contact him and offer to make a few calls to promote the event.

Do come and hear our students play. There is no admission charge, however donations for the student Scholarship Fund will be accepted.

Rochester is about a 4 hour drive from Ottawa which is comfortable for a two day event in the late spring when the weather is predictably better than earlier in the year. So…New York here we come! This event that will feature visits to at least three new instruments that have been installed in the city in addition to other notable instruments associated with the Eastman School of Music. A highlight will be opportunity to hear and play the new two-manual, thirty-three-stop organ named after David Craighead and Russell Saunders, two venerable professors of organ at the Eastman School of Music. The result of a six-year interdisciplinary research project between the Göteborg Organ Art Center (GOArt) and the Eastman School of Music on the processes of eighteenth-century organ building, the organ is a scientific reconstruction of an organ from 1776 built by Adam Gottlob Casparini for the Holy Ghost Church in Vilnius, Lithuania, and represents a Baltic-North European building style from the height of Enlightenment-era Europe. Other organs include the circa 1770 Italian organ at the Memorial Art Gallery, the Brombaugh at St Michael’s Church and the Fisk at Downtown United Presbyterian Church among others.

Details are still being worked out but stay tuned to Pipelines and the web site for more information. We are also hoping to turn this event into a joint event with the Kingston and Montreal Centres.

The AGM will be held this year at St. Paul's Presbyterian Church, with dessert and coffee at 7:00 p.m. and meeting at 7:30 p.m. This year we will be honouring our Centre member, Karen Holmes, with the presentation of the Member of the Year Award. Considering that this is the 20th anniversary of Pro Organo, Karen Holmes will be honoured for her long service not only to Pro Organo, but to so many Centre initiatives as well as the national RCCO. The June Pipelines will have more information about Karen.

George Old will have a display of organ and choral music there prior to the meeting. The slate of nominees for the Centre Executive for the 2009-2010 year will be sent out to the membership later in May.