50 (the magic number)

Part One: Fifty seconds.

Ears popping, rising ninety-five floors above overtired children, train schedules, bad bus directions and the guy on the street corner screaming about the end of the world. And at the end of it, the doors opened on this:

 

It was our tenth anniversary dinner, six months late, the first of two dates we set up in Chicago this weekend.

All morning at the planetarium, watching the top of the Hancock tower appear and disappear in swirling clouds, we wondered what we would be able to see when we went to dinner that night. But the sky retreated a bit, and we sat beside the soaring windows and chatted softly, minds and bodies slowly easing into the moment. It was almost seven before I remembered that I hadn’t left a menu list for Christian’s brother and sister-in-law, who were watching the kids back at the hotel.

The meal? Oh, of course, it was absolutely amazing. I didn’t expect anything else. But it was the respite, the chance to re-center and rediscover two made one, that made the experience what it was. And on toward sunset, the light around and below us shifted from smoldering gray to clear blue-white.

And although we went right back to the world of late buses and almost-missed trains, the quiet buzz remained, and carried me off into a deep sleep almost as soon as I hit the pillow.

Part B: Fifty minutes.

Date #2 was not so amenable to public transportation, so we drove downtown, leaving far too early for an 8p.m. concert because our hosts/babysitters didn’t know how bad construction traffic might be. Fifty minutes after we left the hotel, we pulled into a parking lot snugged up against the wall of the Symphony Center. With an hour and ten minutes left before the concert, we set off to visit Buckingham Fountain.
 

It was a relaxed, though windy and chilly, walk, and at the end of it we returned to Michigan Avenue…

 

…and made our way to our seats in the front row of the gallery, where we settled in for two hours of sheer musical bliss.

 

Any classical concert is a balm to my soul, but to watch one of the best orchestras in the world, on its home turf—that is a dream come true. Check it off the bucket list, and savor the moment for years to come.

What did you do for Mom’s Day?

Sweet Shot Day

tuesdays unwrapped at cats

Seven Clown Circus

Published in: on May 11, 2010 at 5:37 am  Comments (9)  
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The Unexpected Moment

Motherhood Moments

At 8:15 p.m., I was sitting in a hard metal folding chair in the parish hall. I didn’t feel good. Christian didn’t feel good. Nicholas didn’t feel good, and was past his bedtime. He was wiggling on my lap, desperate to nurse and go to sleep. The choir members were flipping through their hymnals. And Christian, as Christian does when he’s not focused, was noodling on the piano. Playing “One Bread, One Body” in ¾ time. “Okay, folks,” he said, “let’s do this.”

“Hon,” I said, “you’re playing it in three.”

“Oh.” He switched styles.

“You’re still playing in three,” I said…and then, I heard it. Not in three, but in compound meter; he had switched the underlying beat to triplets. “One Bread, One Body” in 6/8? I traded glances with one of our altos, a music teacher, and knew she had heard it too. Christian was onto something. What he was doing worked.

It’s amazing how the slightest change in something well-worn and familiar makes it seem like it’s still wet on the page. Ten voices raised to God…two percussive instruments providing form and shape to sung prayer…

I raised my sleepy baby up over my head and looked up at him, singing. He rewarded me with a big, adorable grin. And in that moment, I felt God within me, beside me…all around me.

And we, though many throughout the earth,
We are one body in this one Lord.

Published in: on January 14, 2010 at 6:17 am  Comments (3)  
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Listening…

Saturday afternoon, we arrived home to a relatively clean house, a stack of mail, and seven voice mails. The very first one was from Sr. Mary Ann, my grandfather’s sister and the woman who taught me to play checkers on that same vacation in 1980 that I shared pictures of a few days ago. She is an avid “reader” of this blog, and her Christmas message was heartfelt, and to the point: Kate, I hope you take time to find the quiet this year.

It got me thinking about my expectations: what I need, and what I only think I need. Last night, for instance, Julianna was sitting beside me at the piano as I talked to a voice student, whining for me to play music; so I began hitting random chords…and discovered something beautiful that I wanted to write down. So do I really need quiet to hear the music–or do I just need to go sit down and start playing?

I’ve all but given up on quiet for the moment. I have hopes for four weeks from now, when Julianna starts school…but they are hopes tempered by reality. It’s reality that there isn’t enough time for everything; every day I have to choose between quiet time and work time; exercise and writing; scrapbooking and house cleaning.  That is the reality of life with three small children, and that is my blessing. After all, it wasn’t so long ago that I begged God every night for three years, in tears and raw suffering, to give us one child.

And therein, I believe, lies my answer. I may want to listen to God in the stillness, in the quiet—but in this season of my life, God speaks to me through my children: through Alex, playing dress-up doll with his sister; through Julianna’s sweet hugs and infectious giggles; through Nicholas’s sparkling eyes and Mamama’s. My task is to learn to listen in a new way.

***

Every Wednesday, we Walk with Him, posting a spiritual practice that draws us nearer to His heart. Join Ann at Holy Experience.

Published in: on January 6, 2010 at 8:22 am  Comments (10)  
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7 Quick Takes Friday–the Christmas Carol edition

1. The local “Christmas station” plays a sometimes-delightful, often appalling mix of cheesy ’80s pop stars (think Hall & Oates “Jingle Bell Rock”), some great Mannheim Steamroller, and several versions of Feliz Navidad and Chestnuts Roasting—but virtually ZERO religious content. This got me thinking about the kids at school. When we would plan our Christmas Mass, and I’d ask them to pick songs, they kept having trouble coming up with sacred songs. Their brains defaulted to “Jingle Bells” and “Santa Claus is Coming To Town.” Why is that, I ask myself? Last year I taught Alex “Away in a Manger,” but this year he’s all about “Rudolph” (see #2) and “Jingle Bells.” Upon further reflection, I came to the conclusion that these songs are easy to learn because they don’t require deep thought to understand, and they’re short. The truly great sacred carols are dense in theology, and the language requires plumbing the depths (see #7).

2. Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Alex has been learning this for his school concert, and after singing the intro a dozen times for him, it suddenly occurred to me: You know (fill in the blank x 8…) –But DO YOU KNOW the most FAMOUS reindeer of all?????

(Uh…as a matter of fact, no, I knew the eight nobody ever heard of except in a little poem, but I never heard of the famous one, the one that has his own TV special!)

3. Joy to the World. (Liturgy geek alert!) Look through the words to this hymn. What do you NOT see included? Hint: Angels, babies, shepherds, or Magi. This is actually a hymn for the feast of Christ the King. I think this is why it is my favorite Christmas carol of all time. And if it wasn’t so fundamentally tied to Christmas, it would be a spectacular hymn for ten or twelve different Sundays throughout the liturgical year.

4. White Christmas. Every child knows it’s supposed to be snowy at Christmas. But living in Missouri, I have, at length and at last, bowed to the inevitable: white Christmases are few and far between. It’s just not in the climate where I live. In fact, it’s been two years since we had a white anything here. You know that big blizzard that buried the entire middle of the country this week? We got…a dusting. About enough to look like a weak frost. Why is that Christmas and snow have become synonymous? After more reflection, I realized it is because the traditions of American Christmas came from New England, and in New England, y’all do get snow at Christmas. And every other part of the winter.

5. Last year I arranged “I Heard the Bells” for our contemporary group. This was my introduction to the name Johnny Marks. Chances are, you haven’t heard the name either—but it turns out that this Jewish man, who earned a Bronze Star in World War II, wrote a ton of those easy carols that kids learn. He wrote practically the whole score for Rudolph, including Rudolph, A Holly Jolly Christmas, and Silver and Gold, plus Run Rudolph Run, one setting of I Heard the Bells and Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.

6. Did you know that there are at least three different tunes for Away in a Manger, and that in the UK, they use a different tune for It Came Upon a Midnight Clear? (This I discovered in looking for choral links for #7.)

7. I used to get annoyed by the archaic language in Christmas carols. At what other time of year would we consent to sing the word “hark”? Especially with an exclamation point after it? You’d get laughed at! But a month post 9/11, I was working on the music schedule for the Christmas season at church, and I actually read the words to “It Came Upon A Midnight Clear,” and I dissolved into tears. Go read them. Listen to them. And see if it doesn’t strike to the heart of life on Earth…then, now, and forevermore.

Published in: on December 11, 2009 at 11:04 am  Comments (3)  
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Big Bad Voodoo Daddy (Thursday Motherhood Moment)

Motherhood Moments

Precious moments. We’ve all had them—those moments that make your heart catch every time you remember them. No matter how often you revisit them, they never get stale or lose their power. Tender or funny, poignant or inspiring, they fortify us against toddler tantrums and pubescent (and pre-school) power struggles.

Leave a comment sharing your moment—or, if you’re feeling ambitious enough to write a whole post (or want to link from your own blog), email me and I’ll use your story as the moment of the day.

***

As recently as two years ago, we would never have attempted any such thing…but yesterday, our Advent calendar told us to pack up the family and go see Big Bad Voodoo Daddy.

I spent the whole day trying to get all the necessities done to get us there. There wasn’t enough time for me to think, What happens if the kids self-destruct?…until we were sitting in the balcony of Jesse Auditorium at 7:05p.m., no sign of the band, and the natives started getting restless. Alex trying to tickle parts of my anatomy that he didn’t have any business touching. Nicholas arching his back and fussing. You know. Piddly stuff like that.

I was just beginning to worry when the lights went out and the music began. It was loud. It was exciting. Nicholas froze. Alex sat up straight. And Julianna did a “Yay for the band!” yell and clapped her hands. Christian and I traded smiles and a kiss in the back row of the auditorium.

Advent Calendar: 2. Boring, stressful December: 0.

It’s been a long time since I enjoyed a concert that much. You expect a touring band to be tight, to execute flawlessly, to look relaxed on stage. You might even expect them to appear to have fun. But these guys took all of those expectations and kicked up the intensity by several exponents. I could have watched Dirk Shumaker on bass and Josh Levy on piano all night. Their fingers were so fluid, so relaxed, and the joy of playing music for a living just radiated off of them. I get tired of playing the same two hundred songs for Mass. I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to keep up your enthusiasm for playing the same set 5-7 times a week, months on end. To say it was fabulous is a huge understatement. By the end of the evening, ridiculous as it sounds, I felt like I knew these guys—like they were guys I would have hung out with, played music with, in college and grad school.

The kids loved it, too. Julianna was hysterical. For once, she got enough music to satisfy her; it was virtually nonstop for an hour and 45 minutes. She yelled, she clapped, she danced in Daddy’s arms; it was Heaven for her. Alex had the binoculars and amused himself watching the horn players, the drummer, Scotty up front, the lighting guys behind us—and singing “Frosty the Snowman” with the band.

Mesmerized as I was, I didn’t notice when Nicholas’s body relaxed back against my chest, but four songs into the set, I realized he hadn’t moved a muscle since the guys took the stage. “Christian,” I hissed. “Is he asleep?”

Christian glanced over and shook his head, grinning. And a few minutes later, Nicholas joined Julianna in “dancing.”

Nicholas and Julianna’s first concert. We’ll never be able to match it again.

Published in: on December 3, 2009 at 2:25 pm  Comments (3)  
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Nice Surprises

For today’s Seven Quick Takes, I’m going to take a slightly different tack…hope you’ll bear with me!

Every so often, something I think will be just one more commitment unexpectedly turns out to be a blessing.

Such was the case with the Religious Ed Institute I attended today. It involved two sixty-mile round trips with a really awful night in between, an extremely overtired baby (who, nonetheless, managed to flirt with every single person in the building)—and thus, a Mommy with an attitude that was less than open to blessings.

Surprise #1: Bobby Fisher. I’ve heard him talk at pastoral music conventions, but I didn’t know until I played flute with him on guitar today, how amazing a guy he is. Such a positive attitude, such a gentle soul. And when they asked us to turn to the person next to us and share how we praise God, he said simply, “Through music.” And I realized how sterile my own contribution has become.

Surprise #2—I am Martha! I juggle all my various interests and commitments, and get everything done (well, except the housework), but at the cost of taking anything slow and quiet—and slow and quiet is the source of whatever holiness I achieve. I’ve accepted that chaos is the rule of my life for the next few years, and in so doing, I’ve ceased to try to find quiet. I say all the right things to my choir, and hopefully I’m able to facilitate worship for them and for the community—but I never pay attention myself, because there are so many layers of thought running the Indy 500 in my head. In short—I am Martha. And although this is a rather depressing realization, I’m grateful for it, because you can’t fix a problem of balance until you’re aware of it.

Surprise #3— Nicholas, who decided that today was the day to learn to army crawl. He did it halfheartedly, one tug, last week, but this morning when I got tired of holding such a squirmer, I put him on the floor as I stood in the back of church beside a priest friend of mine (wearing clericals and open-toe sandals, if that tells you anything about the weather). A minute later, Fr. Dave jumped about three feet sideways and then collapsed laughing, and I glanced down to see Nicholas staring at Fr. Dave’s toes with the injured expression of someone who has been denied a great treat. I put him back on the other side of me and took my shoe off, so he could go after my toes instead, but that boy promptly crawled his way around my foot and went for Dave’s instead. Cuteness.

Surprise #4—Inspiration. After that rotten night, I intended to retreat to the van and nap during one of Nicholas’s sleep periods, and walk in the park for the other. Well, I made it to the park by skipping the second keynote, but the rest of the time, I was participating. I attended a session on craft projects that can be used in religious instruction. And oh, what a treasure trove that turned out to be!

Surprise #5—Peace of Mind. I fell into conversation with a teacher at our school about something that has been weighing on my mind all week, and by the time I was finished talking to her, I had some much-needed clarity—as well as a great practical suggestion for avoiding the problem from recurring.

Surprise #6—Hope. Two other teachers stopped to ask about my quest to get special education in the local Catholic school—an effort that hasn’t borne much fruit. These two teachers suggested a whole different approach: inclusion. In retrospect, I should have thought of it before. The whole point of inclusion is not to have to have a special ed teacher. It gave me hope that we might yet manage to get Julianna in Catholic school…depending on all the factors that we won’t know for another couple of years.

Surprise #7—Glory. When I crossed the street from the Cathedral and took Nicholas on a walk in the park, I discovered a warm, breezy, sunny November day, and a beautiful walking path. While Nicholas slept, I sat and wrote most of this post, and when he woke, we went on walking, until I just had to leave behind the certainty of concrete and delve into piles of oak leaves up to my ankles, my feet sinking into the unseen softness of mole tunnels, while tiny gray squirrels darted across my path.

I had a whole different post for Seven Quick takes, but it can wait for next week…

Published in: on November 13, 2009 at 9:56 pm  Comments (2)  
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The Image and the Hope

 

image and hope cover

This summer, GIA released  The Image and the Hope, a CD of flute pieces from the GIA catalogue, including two pieces  (“Morning Mist” and “Falling Snow”) from my collection, “Times and Seasons.” Dominic Trumfio is a wonderful flutist, and he and Kelly Dobbs-Mickus did a great job with this CD. It’s a beautiful recording, from top to bottom. It’s gratifying–and humbling–to have my music included.

When I set out to write pieces for flute and piano, it was because Christian’s piano students were always playing pop songs and Disney and Broadway, and I knew there wasn’t a comparable repertoire for flute. I wanted to give my students something to play that was in a little more of a popular style, to counterbalance the endless mind-numbing exercises that fill up the beginner and intermediate flute books. Eventually it went beyond that. The pieces aren’t really “popular,” they’re just pretty. They make nice preludes and post-Communion pieces at church, and they’re good for weddings, too. But using them ourselves is one thing; hearing someone else play them–even hearing from people who have played from the collection–is quite a thrill. It reassures me that all the balancing I do to make time to write is actually worthwhile.

Published in: on August 10, 2009 at 8:11 am  Leave a Comment  
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“I Hate Church”

The other day I was listening to my WLP showcase CD in the car (I promise, this is not as geeky as it sounds; I was trying to decide if our choir could handle one of the pieces for Christmas Eve) when Alex suddenly piped up from the back seat, “Hey, Mommy, this is the song we sang when we walked at church.”

It was Steve Janco’s “Draw Near,” and we did indeed sing it while “walking”—to Communion. I got the teensiest little shiver at this glimpse into my son’s head—a glimpse that reveals that despite the number of times we hear “I hate church!”, something he has experienced there actually made a connection. And that gives me hope.

Hope is something I need. Church is tough for kids—for adults, for that matter—and doubly so because it’s 100% aimed at adults. Our parish offers children’s liturgy, but not every week. The rationale is that we don’t want to create separate communities within the community. If the kids never attend church with the Big People, they will grow up disconnected from the larger community. Besides, the problem is larger than liturgy that goes over children’s heads.

What is the problem? In short, the problem is that familiarity breeds contempt…and virtually everyone, even a liturgy geek, takes for granted what we do every week. Taken for granted, liturgy becomes something we do by rote, with our minds & hearts elsewhere. In place of ritual, we have repetition; in place of prayer, glib recitation that skips off the lips without ever penetrating the ear, much less the heart.

That’s the problem. The solution is twofold: good liturgy and an invested assembly.

Unfortunately, that’s easier said than done. Good liturgy requires a long-term view. You need priests who are committed to the process; you need skilled lay people with a gift for oratory and hospitality and reverence; you need money for trained musicians…and trained musicians frequently have no pastoral skills or sensitivity. (That may sound harsh, but I am a trained musician. Trust me, we’re a self-centered lot.) You need staff members and a music ministry and assembly members who have been catechized to participate, who don’t put the blinders on when we go outside their preferred musical style. You need people who are willing and able to read the documents thoughtfully, without imposing their own biases. The documents leave a lot of latitude, but some people run roughshod over them, as if latitude equals no rules at all. Others ignore what latitude is granted, on the misguided premise that everything about the Church was better a hundred, or two hundred, or a thousand years ago, and everything would revert to Ye Goode Olde Days if we just put things back the way they used to be.

I’m talking about Catholic worship specifically, but remove the documents and substitute pastors for priests, and the rest of it applies across the denominational board. I’ve been thinking about this a lot, and with great frustration, because my son “hates” church. I try not to attach too much importance to this, because he’s four. But I’m a liturgist at heart. I dream of having my whole family leading music together. Alex on drums. Christian on piano. Me singing and playing flute. Nicholas and Julianna singing, playing guitar, whatever it is they end up being good at.

So when I hear, “Church is BORING,” it hurts me…because Alex is right. It is boring. And it isn’t supposed to be. How do we bridge the gap between repetition and ritual? Between childhood and mature understanding? How do I keep “I hate church” from becoming a mantra that he rides right out of the Church?

Published in: on July 23, 2009 at 2:25 pm  Comments (4)  
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Inspiration, Insomnia

I had forgotten.

The creative process is a consuming one in any form. I tend to get my brain wound up, and then, even if my entire being is crying out for rest, I can’t get to sleep. It can happen after critique group, it can happen when I have a new article assignment or an idea for a blog post—even after scrapbooking. But nothing fuels my insomnia quite like writing music.

Writing music winds my soul into a tightly-coiled spring. I get music stuck in my head anyway—for days and days on end. When I’m working on something new, it’s weeks and weeks. Words and melodies rocket in circles in my head, preventing me from dropping off to sleep. They percolate so persistently in the background that even after I do fall asleep, they crouch in readiness, waiting for a change in sleep state—and then the music starts up again, like an alarm clock. I wake up, and the problem I haven’t yet solved sets my blood instantly to boiling again.

Even the obsession of prose writing, which is a pretty consuming fire in its own right, seems mild by comparison. I’ve been blessed to find writing gigs on topics I really care about, so those projects can keep me up at night, too. But for the most part, I’ve learned to overcome that obstacle to rest. Not so with music.

Caught as I have been in a long musical dry spell, I had forgotten all this. I’ve been puzzling about it this week, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it happens to me because the function is different. Magazines are read and discarded; a blog post is read but not usually revisited. Even a novel doesn’t usually warrant a second reading, unless it’s Austen or Tolkein or Rowling. But music—at least, music for worship—is meant to be experienced again and again, working its way down to the very core of those who sing it—until it takes on a life of its own—until it no longer belongs to me, but to the people of God.

It’s a humbling, overwhelming thing, to feel called to write this music. And hard. At least, words are hard for me. The music itself is pure joy. Even in music school I was a freak. I never minded theory, and after I started writing I became a theory nut. Fresh, unexpected chord progressions, voice leading, part writing—I glory in that stuff. I’ll stick my fingers in and dig in to it like Julianna does to her applesauce.

In the week since returning from NPM convention energized and inspired, with all the creative floodgates open, I’ve had a lot of trouble sleeping. Combined with Julianna waking up whining for water and Nicholas wanting to eat in the middle of the night, I am one tired mama. But even so, I’m grateful. Dry spells are good for puncturing my pride when it gets over-inflated. They remind me that inSpiration is a gift, not a right, and that the music isn’t mine. It comes from outside me, flows through me, and is given in turn to others, in the hope of making the world a better place.

Published in: on July 19, 2009 at 12:37 pm  Leave a Comment  
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Reflections on Text and Style

July 7, 2009: I began the day with “O God Beyond All Praising” and ended it with “Rockin’ the Runway,” which is essentially Contemporary Christian/Praise & Worship. In the middle I worked on my own hymn text, so while I stood at the concert tonight singing, I was also analyzing the texts.

Many of these songwriters—unlike me—are quite prolific. I envy them that; I love writing songs, but I wrestle constantly with text. For communal worship, I don’t want to speak in the first person, nor do I want to use the wagging finger “you.” And these days I insist on the syllables matching from verse to verse. I try to console my frustration by focusing on Stravinsky’s philosophy: the greater the limitation, the greater the art.

But the songwriters I heard tonight follow a totally different set of rules, and their music works for worship, too. The rules for CCM are a lot more relaxed, more tied to the spoken language. There’s something visceral about this music, the beat and the riffs and the way the words live so close to the heart, like the prayers you breathe and feel, but can’t find the words to say. These writers say them for us. Hymn texts are very elevated; they raise our sights—P&W grabs us right where we are. Detractors of either style of music could use this paragraph as ammunition, but the simple fact is that both styles are powerful, and prayerful, and I love them both—and everything in between.

For hundreds of years, the music of the Church was art music—medieval motets, the incredibly dense textures of the Renaissance, the long, drawn-out, (unusable) high Masses of the masters, and so on. Composers used popular tunes—drinking songs, even—as the basis for their sacred music, but not in their original form; they were always altered to suit the liturgy.

In the post-Vatican II world, popular styles have again been lifted from the culture and adapted for sacred use. In my lifetime we have traveled from the much-derided folk style through the music of the Jesuits, to the Haas/Haugen era, and beyond. The “new” music is P&W and Contemporary Christian. That all this has happened and continues to happen in less than 35 years illustrates just how rapidly the changes are occurring. Unstoppable, by the way, and thank God for that. There’s room for all musical styles in worship.

But I’m writing this at 12:27 a.m. and I am totally shot…must get Nicholas to go to sleep…must sleep… sleep…sleep…

Published in: on July 13, 2009 at 7:09 am  Leave a Comment  
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