J David Hart

Thursday, August 1, 2013

I enjoy "trolling" church websites. It amazes me, though, that very few (if any) have a way to access music. Beyond this, very few sites have even so much as a congregational hymn being played/sung as the site opens. It's a very poor excuse to say things such as, "It's against copyright laws". If the hymn was written and composed prior to 1923, you're probably safe. I am not giving legal advice.

If in doubt, there are wonderful sites that deal with all these legalities.

Do what I do: improvise your own hymn arrangements!

Saturday, July 6, 2013

Money and the Church Musician

For years it has troubled me that there is very little rhyme nor reason how Organists and Choirmasters (yes--I still think that's a proper title) are compensated. I remember so well when Russell Wichmann told me as a teenager, "Don't always worry about being paid for everything you do!" If I were 55 instead of 15 or 16, I would have replied, "Who should worry about it?"

While the American Guild of Organists is a wonderful entity (otherwise I would not have worked so hard to become a Fellow of that organization), its Charter is one of education rather than representation or negotiation. In a recent salary recommendation, the Guild's top annual compensation recommendation for the highest educated musician working 40+ hours per week is a mere $105,000. Most church musicians, though, are considered to be "part-time", and one source sets the average compensation at $3,600 per year (not month). Frankly, $3,600 per month is very poor pay for a highly-skilled musician!

Two points: I can easily name over 100 churches that should be paying well over this amount (but choose not to), and I can think of a plethora of highly skilled women and men who deserve this kind of money. Members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic receive $148,720 per year, including rehearsals and performances. The contract specifies three health option: Kaiser, Health Net PPO and Health Net HMO, with contributions from both musicians and the orchestra company.

Any thoughts? I'll keep talking about this issue.

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Widely recognized for his “passionate and brilliant” style, International Concert Organist J. David Hart, a Fellow of the American Guild of Organists, has served as Company Artist for Johannus Orgelbouw of the Netherlands since 2000. He is US Artist Representative for Hey-Orgelbau in Germany. He has concertized extensively throughout the United States and abroad, including solo performances and engagements at major churches, universities and institutions including New York’s Riverside Church and the U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis. He made his Carnegie Hall debut in 1989. He has been a featured performer with distinguished American symphony orchestras and professional ensembles under conductors Michael Tilson Thomas, Robert Page (declaring that “even as a student [Hart] was awesome!”), Lorin Maazel, Istvan Jaray, Sir Andrew Davis, James Paul, Keith Lockhart and Zdenek Macal. Hart’s solo performances with these esteemed conductors include Janáček’s Glagolitic Mass, Saint-Saëns’ Organ Symphony No. 3 in C minor and several Handel’s Organ Concerti. Mr. Hart was also organist for the American premiere of Sir Michael Tippett’s The Mask of Time.

A former National Treasurer and Regional Councillor of the American Guild of Organists, he is a Fellow of that organization and received the highest score nationally in the Associateship exam. Mr. Hart earned both Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from Carnegie Mellon University and later was appointed a member of its eminent music faculty where he served until 1990. He also presided as College Organist and Organ Instructor for the Laboratory School of Music at Chatham College from 1984 to 1991. His organ teachers include Donald Wilkins, Robert Anderson and Frederick Swann, who observes that Hart “is an exceptional performer.” Robert Croan, writer for Opera News, refers to Hart’s “technical virtuosity on the organ and other keyboard instruments. Most significant, perhaps, is his consummate musical comprehension, years of experience and a total dedication to the art of music.”

Hailed as a skilled improvisateur, Mr. Hart has played concerts, led workshops and taught master-classes for conventions and chapters of the American Guild of Organists, the Presbyterian Association of Musicians and other denominational organizations.

For 19 years, Mr. Hart served the well-known Shadyside Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, first as Assistant Organist under the tutelage of his mentor, Russell G. Wichmann. He later assumed the duties of Organist and Director of Music in 1987 where he led one of the nation’s distinguished music programs. Mr. Hart has also served as Artist-in-Residence at St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church, Highland Park, Pittsburgh.

As conductor, Mr. Hart has led full orchestral performances of such choral masterpieces as Bach’s Mass in B minor, Mozart’s Requiem and Solemn Vespers, Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum, Haydn’s Missa in Angustiis and Rossini’s Stabat Mater. A frequent transcriptionist of oratorios, he has performed many of these large works on the organ, including Brahms’ Requiem, Mendelssohn’s Elijah and St. Paul, Handel’s Messiah and Maurice Duruflé’s Requiem.

In March, 2005, he was one of five international artists to perform on a DVD recorded in Feike Asma Hall, Johannus Orgelbouw, b.v., Holland. He also recorded a CD of the company’s Monarke Series in 2001. He has eleven other CD's to his credit as well as two DVD's, including a series entitled The 21st Century Church Musician. His setting of Adoro te devote is published by Cantica Nova Publications and his two volumes of Six Hymn Improvisations were published in June, 2005. In 2007, Mr. Hart began an association with the renowned German pipe organ builder, Hey Orgelbau where he serves as its US Artist Representative. He has released a new CD entitled European and American Church Sounds Embrace on the organ at Mellrichstadt, Germany.