Knowing that 3 December 2023 was the First Sunday of Advent and knowing the hymns sung for that Liturgy, I checked in with Saint Thomas Church to see if any descants were used and how the organ was played.

No, Jeremy did not use the arrangement of “O Come, O Come…” as used back in 2011 and after that. I noticed that he did programme yet another of his own compositions. Did the congregation notice? Only if they pay any attention to who the Choirmaster is. And do most even know — or care? — who the Choirmaster is? I doubt it. The same for the Organists.

I’d feel embarrassed to promote myself as much as Jeremy promotes his own compositions. I did notice what I usually notice and that is that many in the Nave left right after Communion. I call them the “eat and run” fake-Christians. At the beginning of the Mass, the Nave was fuller than usual, and I’m not sure why. I never knew that the First Sunday of Advent was any more special than any other Sunday, excluding Christmas and Easter. Of course the fake Christians always show up for Christmas and Easter in their apparent attempt to try to deceive The Holy Trinity, but I suspect “he” is not fooled by these transparent people who leave after receiving Communion and don’t stay for the entire Mass, including the Organ Voluntary. Tacky.

I’ve written many times about how the hymn playing and organ playing has changed at Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue since the installation of their new pipe organ. I have no idea why that’s the case. I was under the impression that the new organ was intended to sound very much like the old/previous organ. Well, the way the new organ is played these days, that’s not the case. They even carried over parts of the old organ into the new organ if you know what I mean by that. Yet as my friend says about the hymn playing, “It sounds like the organist is playing a Casio keyboard the way he plays the organ, except for maybe the last verse.” Yeah, the hymn playing is nothing like it used to be.

Despite having well-trained organists, the hymn playing is as “dry as dust” and “by the book.” There’s nothing “grand and glorious” or High Church about the hymn playing. Subdued, lame and monotonous best describes the hymn playing these days, with few exceptions. And it’s now rare to hear a descant. They hired Mr Anti-Descant. Who knew there was someone out there like that? Unless I missed it, I never hear High Church interludes between verses or elaborate High Church introductions for the hymns. Using the full resources of the organ is also rare these days. All of which makes hymns much more interesting, creative and non-monotonous. Or as I was told by the parishoners at the Anglican parish where I served as Organist/Choirmaster when I did all of the above, “The music was so joyful this morning. Thank you.” I appreciated the comment, and I agree: Monotonous and “by the book” is not joyful. It’s boring. Instead, the congregation can be thinking: How many more verses of this hymn do we have?

So I found some personal clips I saved years ago (back in 2011) of these Advent hymns from Saint Thomas Church, and I played them for my friend. The hymns were played completely differently back then than they were here in 2023. He said, “They didn’t even sound like hymns back then. They were musical and very listenable.” He can’t stand the hymn playing now at Saint Thomas. He says, “All the hymns sound the same.” I don’t remember who the organist was back then; it may have been Jeremy Bruns or Kevin Kwan or maybe John Scott was playing these hymns. The clips of them are below. The organ led the congregation back then — as I was trained to do at the Conservatory — and because of that the congregation was a singing congregation to the point of sounding rehearsed. These days, the organ does more of an accompanying style than leading the (dragging) congregation.

As you can hear in the clips below, the organ led the congregation in the hymns which caused the congregation to really sing the hymns almost as if they (the congregation) are rehearsed. These days, the congregation is like many other parish and cathedral churches: they are — what I call — a stand and mumble congregation and all one really hears is the Choir of Men and Boys singing the hymns and not a roaring/singing congregation as heard in the clips below.

For the First Sunday of Advent 2023, two of the hymns used to be played like this when Organist Jeremy Bruns was there:

For Advent 2023, neither sounded like this. The organ playing was lame by comparison.

The first clip is from 2011 of “O Come, O Come Emmanuel.” The second clip is also from 2011 of “Lo, He Comes With Clouds Ascending.”

My friend asked me why there’s such a drastic difference between the hymn playing in 2011 and 2023. I have no idea.

He asked me: Maybe the organists were told to “tone it down” by the clergy. Well, I doubt it and why would the clergy tell them to do that? I never had anyone — any priest — tell me how to play the hymns or anything else. I only had some priests tell me the service music they wanted to use for the Mass, which I didn’t care for musically and that’s where we butted heads because they had no musical training for selecting service music, and I probably told them that ultimately when I resigned. Yes, the Rector and other priests were my “boss” but I didn’t try to tell them how to do their job because I didn’t have that training. Just as they didn’t have my training, but that didn’t seem to matter to them. I liked the service music used at the cathedral church and that’s what I wanted to use.

What I’d like to know is if the priests at Saint Thomas notice the difference in hymn playing or have they even thought anything about it? In the clip below, “O Come, O Come…” the organ is nicely dominant and the boys are singing a descant but the organist doesn’t “tone it down” for the descant. He makes the boys work at trying to overpower the organ. The organ playing for the hymns are glorious in the 2011 samples.

My friend suggested I write a comment on their videos (Saint Thomas) making them aware of how the music has changed — for the worse — since then. My friend said, “It’s as if they just don’t care anymore the way the hymns are played now.” Well, frankly, I think they couldn’t care less what I think or anyone who holds my views. My friend wondered: “Have the priests even noticed that it’s rare that the boys sing descants anymore?” I don’t know. The irony in that is that descants should only be sung by the finest boys or soprano sections in perfect intonation. The trebles at Saint Thomas are stellar, trained in the Choir School. So knowing that many choral ensembles can’t do descants or do justice to descants, here you have a Choir where the trebles are superb and the Choirmaster/Director of Music has shelved (most) descants from the past from the days before he took over. Insanity. He hasn’t shelved anything else. He’s using anthems and service music from the past. So it’s not a case of “out with the old and in with the new under me.” Sigh. Insanity.

The first clip is “O Come, O Come” followed by the Organ Voluntary. And notice they were not afraid to hold chords for a long time (fermata) back then. The second clip is “Lo, He Comes With Clouds Ascending.”