"Organist" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... before nightfall told me of a disastrous love-story in consequence of which, were it not for his mother, he would drown himself in the lake. He effaced himself before Paragot much as the bellows-blower does before the organist. His politeness to Blanquette would have put to the blush any young man at the Bon Marche or the Louvre. His name ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... surprise as Mr Rumbold walked from his stall to the pulpit for the sermon. Generally he gave out the number of the short anthem which accompanied this manoeuvre, but today he made no such announcement. A discreet curtain hid the organist from the congregation, and veiled his gymnastics with the stops and his antic dancing on the pedals, and now when Mr Rumbold moved from his stall, there came from the organ the short introduction to Bach's "Mein Glaubige Herz," which even Lucia had allowed to be nearly "equal" ...
— Queen Lucia • E. F. Benson
... Council House, but was doubtless considered at the time a very fine building, with its antique carvings and stained glass windows emblazoned with figures and armorial bearings of the Lords right Ferrers and others. As the Guild had an organist in its pay, it may be presumed that such an instrument was also there, and that alone goes far to prove the fraternity were tolerably well off, as organs in those times were costly and scarce. The old building, for more than a century after King Edward's ...
— Showell's Dictionary of Birmingham - A History And Guide Arranged Alphabetically • Thomas T. Harman and Walter Showell
... a young organist from Valdoste, called the Abbe Palais, a good musician and an agreeable companion, who performed very well on the harpsichord; I got acquainted with him, and we soon became inseparable. He had been brought up by an Italian ...
— The Confessions of J. J. Rousseau, Complete • Jean Jacques Rousseau
... first to stay with a married cousin who had a house at Easewood. His widowed father had recently given up the music and bicycle shop (with the post of organist at the parish church) that had sustained his home, and was living upon a small annuity as a guest with this cousin, and growing a little tiresome on account of some mysterious internal discomfort that the local practitioner diagnosed as imagination. He had aged with ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... (b. 1870), organist and composer, was born in England of Scottish origin. His compositions include songs, anthems, organ music, a Lenten Cantata, "The Message from the Cross." His setting of Katherine Lee Bates's patriotic hymn, "America, the Beautiful," has had nation-wide ...
— Scotland's Mark on America • George Fraser Black
... effect can be had, if an organ is played, by using the following. The organist should begin to play softly when the ...
— Masonic Monitor of the Degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellow Craft and Master Mason • George Thornburgh
... happiness, she had suddenly deserted him, leaving no clue as to where or why she had gone. His grief for her loss, weighed heavily upon his mind—he brooded incessantly upon it—and though his profession was that of a music master and organist, he grew so abstracted and inattentive to the claims of the few pupils he had, that they fell away from him one by one—and, after a bit, he lost his post as organist to the village church as well. This smote him deeply, for he was passionately fond of music, and was, moreover, ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... which his words produced on both mother and daughter, "imagine how disposed my mind would be to religious contemplation on entering the cathedral, when just at that moment, and precisely at the offertory at high mass, the organist played ...
— Dona Perfecta • B. Perez Galdos
... organist with vaguely-melodious hints foreshadows in his prelude the musical motifs which he means to vary and elaborate in his fugue, so Kielland lightly touched in these "novelettes" the themes which ...
— Tales of Two Countries • Alexander Kielland
... told me he was collecting for a regular church or chapel, and hoped soon to make a commencement of the building. Some years later he was able to do so. Our church choir at Copperas Hill, Liverpool, was then considered one of the best in the diocese. The choirmaster and organist, John Richardson, was a distinguished composer of Catholic church music, and held in such high esteem that, for any important celebration, he could always secure the services of the chief members of the musical ...
— The Life Story of an Old Rebel • John Denvir
... Committee was in the church and he had had much to do with its members in former days. The Select-men of the village were present, and he had made their acquaintance once, in an executive session. The deacons were all there and the pillars of the church and the choir and the organist—a spinster who had actively disapproved when he had put beans in the melodeon one Sunday. Yes, it was best to meet them in a body on a festive occasion like this, when the rigors of the village point of view were relaxed. It would relieve him of several dozen private visits of apology, ...
— The Romance of a Christmas Card • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... The organist must always be at the rehearsal, as one of the most important details is marking the time of the wedding march. Witnesses of most weddings can scarcely imagine that a wedding march is a march ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... The organist while he plays thinks of his family, and considers how wearied he is; the bellows-blower thinks, as he fills the pipes, of the half-pint which will dry his sweat; the tenors and basses are careful of their effects, and admire themselves in ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... brotherly love. But they would have none of either. Each steward approached him privately and tendered his resignation, giving reasons that reflected upon the character of some other steward. Then the organist tendered her resignation because the Sunday-school superintendent had reflected upon her playing, and she retaliated by reflecting upon his unmarried morals. When the superintendent heard of her complaint and withdrawal he at once sent in his resignation, because he did ...
— A Circuit Rider's Wife • Corra Harris
... conductor knows that the chord in the orchestra must be played "after the voice," as the technical phrase has it. But not every pianist or organist is familiar with this usage, and the effect would be very disagreeable if given as written. ...
— Style in Singing • W. E. Haslam
... fuller than it had been since the funeral services of the last pastor. At each squeak of the door, every head was quickly turned; and when, in the middle of the first hymn, the three ex-miners filed decorously in, the staring organist held one chord of "Windham" so long that the breath of the ...
— Romance of California Life • John Habberton
... word; he surmounted all difficulties, removed all objections. In vain Benda declared the organ in the chapel was out of tune, the performance impossible; the marquis hastened to the organist and obliged him to put it in order that night. In vain the singers protested against singing this difficult music before the king without preparation; D'Argens commanded them in the name of the king to have a ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach
... part of the ceremony is fixed by the church in which it occurs. The groom must call on the rector or clergyman, see the organist, and make what arrangements the bride pleases, but, we repeat, all expenses, excepting the fee to the clergyman, are borne ...
— Manners and Social Usages • Mrs. John M. E. W. Sherwood
... to her mind that Miss Mapp gave a shilling to the offertory instead of her usual sixpence, to be devoted to the organist and choir fund. The Padre, it is true, had changed the hour of services to suit the heresy of the majority, and this for a moment made her hand falter. But the hope, after this convincing sermon, that next year morning service would be at the hour falsely called twelve decided her not to withdraw ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... in for music with an earnestness worthy of maturer years; a change of teachers was largely responsible for this. I began now to take lessons of the organist of the church which I attended with my mother; he was a good teacher and quite a thorough musician. He was so skillful in his instruction and filled me with such enthusiasm that my progress—these are his words—was ...
— The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man • James Weldon Johnson
... details about his dear relative's last moments. Incidentally he gave me to understand that Kurtz had been essentially a great musician. 'There was the making of an immense success,' said the man, who was an organist, I believe, with lank grey hair flowing over a greasy coat-collar. I had no reason to doubt his statement; and to this day I am unable to say what was Kurtz's profession, whether he ever had any—which was the greatest of his talents. I had taken ...
— Heart of Darkness • Joseph Conrad
... did not hear. She was watching the rather fussy movements of Lord Reggie, who was darting about, sorting out the copies of his anthem which the village organist had laboriously written out that day. His face was pale, and his eyes shone ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens
... The organist's face and figure commanded attention. Tall and spare, with the scholar's stoop, a long narrow head broadening at the brow, a mass of iron-grey hair,—a thin, eager face lit by almost colourless eyes, which looked as though the blue ...
— A German Pompadour - Being the Extraordinary History of Wilhelmine van Graevenitz, - Landhofmeisterin of Wirtemberg • Marie Hay
... J.W. ELLIOTT, Organist and Choirmaster of St. Mark's, Hamilton Terrace, London. With some Practical Counsels taken by permission from "Notes on the Church ...
— Astronomy of To-day - A Popular Introduction in Non-Technical Language • Cecil G. Dolmage
... the work that I can not do will yet be done. I once sat before my organ improvising a thought that was in my heart, trying to give expression to it, and I could not. I knew what I wanted, and I knew it was in my heart, but how to give it expression I did not know. A celebrated organist came up the stairs and stood beside me. I looked around to him. 'Can't you take this tune,' I said, 'just where I leave it, and finish it for me as I have it in my heart to do? I can't give it utterance. Don't you ...
— Four Girls at Chautauqua • Pansy
... branch of my responsibilities than upon all the rest of my work. You see we can not afford to pay any of the singers, and indeed my people—some of them, at least—think fifty dollars is a great sum for poor little Miss Knapp, the organist. The rest are volunteers, or rather, I should say, have been pressed into the service. We are supposed to have two sopranos and two altos; but in effect it happens sometimes that neither of a pair will appear, each expecting the other to be on duty. The tenor, Mr. Hubber, ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... church of Normalm, which is all that is left of the once famous cloister of St. Clara, and still bears the saint's name. The sermon was finished, and the strong full tones of the organ, called out by the skillful hands of an excellent organist, hovered like the voices of unseen angel choirs in the high vaults of the church, floated down to the listeners, and ...
— Library of the World's Best Literature, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 1 • Charles Dudley Warner
... By-and-by the organist commenced playing, and a flood of music, grander and more solemn than he had ever heard, filled the whole edifice. He listened with rapt attention and suspended breath till the last note died away, and then sank back upon the richly cushioned seat ...
— Paul Prescott's Charge • Horatio Alger
... Johann Ambrosius Bach, organist of Eisenach, was the descendant of a long race of musicians of the name who had followed music not merely as a means of livelihood, but with the earnest desire of furthering its artistic aims. For close upon two hundred years ...
— Story-Lives of Great Musicians • Francis Jameson Rowbotham
... middle of the floor an immense Christmas tree was enthroned and brightly lighted. All the servant-folk came in, and Bjoernson spoke, beautifully and warmly, as he well knows how to do. 'Now you shall play a hymn, Grieg,' he said, and although I did not quite like the notion of doing organist's work, I naturally complied without a murmur. It was one of Grundtvig's hymns in 32—thirty-two verses. I resigned myself to my fate with stoicism. At the beginning I kept myself awake, but the endless repetitions had a soporific effect. Little by little I became as stupid as a medium. When ...
— Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson • William Morton Payne
... one of Talmage's sermons to us, and we have sung Gospel songs galore, in both Swedish and English, with myself as organist. When this is tired of, the smaller instruments are taken out, and Ricka has the greatest difficulty in preventing Alma from amusing the assembled company with her mandolin solo, "Johnny Get Your Hair Cut," ...
— A Woman who went to Alaska • May Kellogg Sullivan
... Spenslow came in. Frances was organist, but today, instead of walking up to the platform, she slipped demurely into her father's pew at one side of the pulpit. Eben Craig, who was the Putney singing master and felt himself responsible for the choir, fidgeted uneasily. He tried to catch Frances's eye, ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1902 to 1903 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... of the better-known writer Katherine Mansfield (whose real name was Kathleen Mansfield Beauchamp). Born in Australia, Elizabeth was educated in England. She was reputed to be a fine organist and musician. At a young age, she captured the heart of a German Count, was persuaded to marry him, and went to live in Germany. Over the next years she bore five daughters. After her husband's death and ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... his twelfth year he happened to overhear two men, in a music store, conversing about a church in the upper part of the city, where the organist was to leave in a few weeks. ...
— Choice Readings for the Home Circle • Anonymous
... head rapidly and repeatedly). No, thank you, General. All my life long people have wanted to make a man of me. When I was a boy, our good priest wanted to make a man of me by teaching me to read and write. Then the organist at Melegnano wanted to make a man of me by teaching me to read music. The recruiting sergeant would have made a man of me if I had been a few inches taller. But it always meant making me work; and I am too lazy ...
— The Man of Destiny • George Bernard Shaw
... in the seminary, even before he sang his first mass. His thirst for learning was insatiable, and it seemed as though the library really belonged to him. Some evenings he would go into the Cathedral to pursue his musical studies, and talk with the Chapel-master and the organist, and at other times in the hall of sacred oratory he would astound the professors and the Alumni by the fervour and conviction with which he ...
— The Shadow of the Cathedral • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... huge disappointment, her services as mouth organist were not to be requisitioned this time. Captain Hallett, taking charge of the gathering, ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... I then find, to my astonishment, that I have been, and still am, taking a strong kind of invisible snuff, up my nose, into my eyes, and down my throat. I wink, sneeze, and cough. The clerk sneezes; the clergyman winks; the unseen organist sneezes and coughs (and probably winks); all our little party wink, sneeze, and cough. The snuff seems to be made of the decay of matting, wood, cloth, stone, iron, earth, and something else. Is the something else, the decay of dead citizens ...
— The Uncommercial Traveller • Charles Dickens
... had fumbled at the keys of the organ in the dark; he had spread his fingers amply and pressed down; behold, back from the cathedral lofts echoed a rising music of surpassing beauty. Like the organist, he sank back again in the shadow and wondered at the phrase of melody. Surely he had not created it? Then what? God, perhaps. For her lips parted to a smile that was suggested rather than seen, a ...
— Trailin'! • Max Brand
... celebrated for over fifty years for the beauty and exquisite finish of its musical Services. As 1915 gave place to 1916, one by one the professional choir-men got called up for military service, and finally came the turn of the organist and choirmaster himself, he being just inside the limit of age. The organist, besides being a splendid musician, happened to be a skilled mechanic, so he was not sent abroad, but was given a commission, and sent ...
— Here, There And Everywhere • Lord Frederic Hamilton
... my father he was sitting buried in a low arm-chair with his eyes closed. His dry, emaciated face, with a shade of dark blue where it was shaved (he looked like an old Catholic organist), expressed meekness and resignation. Without responding to my greeting or ...
— The Chorus Girl and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... "pierce" the obscurity of such "stuff" as this. One extract more and we have done. A gold medal in the department of Hermeneutical Science to the ingenious individual, who, after any length of study, can succeed in unriddling this tremendous passage from "Master Hugues of Saxe-Gotha," the organist:— ...
— Early Reviews of English Poets • John Louis Haney
... the musical life centered about the Court. Beethoven studied the organ under the court organist, Van den Eeden, an old friend of his grandfather's. Van den Eeden was succeeded shortly after by Christian Neefe, and Beethoven, then eleven years of age, was transferred to him. Neefe had an important bearing on Beethoven's life. He was in his best years, thirty-three, ...
— Beethoven • George Alexander Fischer
... very unequal in character, and some is very poor indeed. The windows at the west, especially one in memory of Mr. Wm. Chater, a late organist, may be regarded as exceptions. There are still, fortunately, many which are not filled ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Churches of Coventry - A Short History of the City and Its Medieval Remains • Frederic W. Woodhouse
... some that think we ought to have an organist. Mrs. Bingley volunteers to play until we're able to hire some one, but she isn't much of a player. She says she can't play any music unless it's written in ONE flat. She says it's the only key she knows. She says two flats make ...
— Princess Polly's Playmates • Amy Brooks
... one of the greatest of services by assisting it to praise Beauty on many lips in naked Light. I wish to consecrate my work on it to that end. Today I have been influenced by Frederick Tennyson, Traherne, and Patmore. In agony lies the highest music. The key is struck by circumstance, Time's organist, and the stars tremble with music. For the full thundering silence of Absolute Beauty a Divine Agony was necessary, so that all Heaven and its choirs and Hell trembled in the majesty of this stricken ...
— The Forgotten Threshold • Arthur Middleton
... must not allow myself to deteriorate in rough surroundings, and I have made it a rule never to mingle with any but the best, Mr. Disston. My father," impressively, "was a prominent undertaker in Philadelphia, and as organist in a large Methodist church in that city I came in contact with the best people, so you understand," blandly, ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... happy to have the assistance of the society's organist, but as we have not yet been introduced, perhaps she would prefer that I did not ...
— Miss Dexie - A Romance of the Provinces • Stanford Eveleth
... past over heated railways, treading fiery pavements, and lodging in red-hot city hotels. But now the music and the day's decline filled me with a sense of religious calm, and for a moment I envied Berkeley. After his practicing was over the organist locked the chapel door, and we paced up and down in the fir-grove on the matting of dark red needles, and watched the river, whose eastern half still shone in the evening light. After supper we sat out on the piazza, which commanded a ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 8 • Various
... without interruption, and it had cost him three days. He showed his regard for the authoress in a more substantial way than by compliments and criticism. His last act, before going out of office, in 1783, was to procure for Dr. Burney the appointment of organist ...
— Burke • John Morley
... dance, and she wanted now only to inform us that she could sing too, when the Psalm was given out, her Voice was distinguished above all the rest, or rather People did not exert their own in order to hear her. Never was any heard so sweet and so strong. The Organist observed it, and he thought fit to play to her only, and she swelled every Note; when she found she had thrown us all out, and had the last Verse to herself in such a manner as the whole Congregation was ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... we catch another incidental glimpse of the young musician in his adopted country. By that time, he had found himself once more a regular post as oboist to the Durham militia, then quartered for its muster at Pontefract. A certain Dr. Miller, an organist at Doncaster, was dining one evening at the officers' mess; when his host happened to speak to him in high praise of a young German they had in their band, who was really, he said, a most remarkable and spirited performer. ...
— Biographies of Working Men • Grant Allen
... Doolittle! we will make a cathedral of it! bishops, priests, deacons, wardens, vestry, and choir; organ, organist, amid bellows! By the Lord Harry, as Benjamin says, we will clap a steeple on the other end of it, and make two churches of it. What say you, Duke, will you pay? ha! my ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... [Performance of Music.] — N. musician, artiste, performer, player, minstrel; bard &c (poet) 597; [specific types of musicians] accompanist, accordionist, instrumentalist, organist, pianist, violinist, flautist; harper, fiddler, fifer^, trumpeter, piper, drummer; catgut scraper. band, orchestral waits. vocalist, melodist; singer, warbler; songster, chaunter^, chauntress^, songstress; cantatrice^. ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... quiet corner Soapy came to a standstill. Here was an old church, quaint and rambling and gabled. Through one violet-stained window a soft light glowed, where, no doubt, the organist loitered over the keys, making sure of his mastery of the coming Sabbath anthem. For there drifted out to Soapy's ears sweet music that caught and held him transfixed against the convolutions of ...
— The Four Million • O. Henry
... succeeded Mr. W. S. Bambridge as organist at the college a little over two years ago, is leaving to go to Rugby, as organist there. Since he has been at Marlborough Mr. Dyson has given a large number of much-appreciated recitals in the college chapel. The organ is still undergoing ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, February 25, 1914 • Various
... me an opportunity to see the people, el Senor Cura allowed them to come and dance on his veranda. His organist was a musical genius, and a composer of no mean ability, and on the cabinet organ the priest had brought from Durango on mule-back he played not only hymns, but ...
— Unknown Mexico, Volume 1 (of 2) • Carl Lumholtz
... he was sitting back in his chair with his eyes shut. His thin, dry face, with a dove-coloured tinge where he shaved (his face was like that of an old Catholic organist), wore an expression of meek submission. Without answering my greeting or opening his ...
— The House with the Mezzanine and Other Stories • Anton Tchekoff
... if earth grows dark, lift your eyes to the sky, that is light. To one walking in the woods at nightfall 'all the paths are dim,' but the strip of heaven above the trees is the brighter for the green gloom around. The organist's one hand may be keeping up one sustained note, while the other is wandering over the keys; and one part of a man's nature may be steadfastly rejoicing in the Lord, whilst the other is feeling the weight of sorrows that come from earth. The paradox of the Christian ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... is begun, but is not so well as last year. The Rosa Maricini, who is second woman, and whom I suppose you have heard, is now old. In the room of Amorevoli, they have got a dreadful bass, who, the Duke of Montagu says he believes, was organist at Aschaffenburgh. ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 1 • Horace Walpole
... him, that the other pieces in the collection are attributed to their proper writers. The late Mr. Douce, who was inclined to believe the song to have been written by Shakspere, once saw a copy of it with a fourth verse which was shown to him by the then organist of Chichester. The poem is not included in Mr. Collier's edition of Shakspere, nor in the Aldine edition of Shakspere's Poems, edited by the Rev. A. Dyce. Perhaps if you will be good enough to insert the song and ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 2, November 10 1849 • Various
... you are near at hand, and most of the choir are of our own town. I think he may generally be spared for a good term at each holiday time. The organist is very considerate in giving leave of absence, even if he should turn out to have a dangerously good voice for solos. I will let you know when to send him up for examination, which he will pass easily. Good-bye. You must write to me ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... The grand old church was crowded to the last inch of space, although admission was by ticket. Facing the chancel were the thirty famous women singers of Goeteborg, their cantor a woman, and the noted woman organist and composer, Elfrida Andree, who composed the music for the occasion. In the center of all was the little black-robed minister. It was said by many to be the most wonderful sermon of her life and after the service was over the pastor, with tears rolling down his cheeks, went up to her with hands ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... crowded with friends and neighbours. Mr. Perkins was flying about, getting things into readiness, and Miss Reade, who was the organist of the evening, was sitting on the platform, looking her sweetest and prettiest. She wore a delightful white lace hat with a fetching little wreath of tiny forget-me-nots around the brim, a white muslin dress with sprays ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... whittled out violins, and transformed simple reeds into lutes, upon which he played music of his own composition. In fact, so great was his skill in music that at twenty they wished to make him official organist and choirmaster of the Cathedral. His personal taste, however, ran more to painting; for some months he worked at his canvases with an ardor too great to last long. If ever a man was touched by the Spirit of the Renaissance, it was surely young Galileo. The Archbishop of Pisa said, "Upon ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... the best organs and organ-factories in New England, New York, and elsewhere in this country, and received several specifications and plans from builders. He proceeded at once, therefore, to Europe, examined the great English instruments, made the acquaintance of Mr. Hopkins, the well-known organist and recognized authority on all matters pertaining to the instrument, and took lessons of him in order to know better the handling of the keys and the resources of the instrument. In his company, Dr. Upham examined ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... the tip of the brush with feverish eagerness in the different pigments, making the circuit of the palette several times more quickly than the organist of a cathedral sweeps the octaves on the keyboard of his clavier for the "O Filii" ...
— The Unknown Masterpiece - 1845 • Honore De Balzac
... organist of the evening before was at that moment much perplexed. On two couches in her dressing-room were spread two frocks—a white and a blue. Bettina was meditating which of these two frocks she would wear to the opera that ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... "An organist!" exclaimed the lady, who had never heard the word 'obelisk.' Several of the guests could scarcely forbear laughing, and the sculptor would have had some difficulty in keeping his countenance, but the smile on his lips faded away; for he caught sight of a pair of dark-blue eyes close by ...
— Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... is proud of his progeny. He, like his contemporaries, was a Catholic, and he dissembled. About his birth it has only been conjectured that he was born in the earlier part of the sixteenth century. He was organist of Waltham Abbey in 1540, and remained there till the dissolution of the monasteries, when he became a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal. He and Byrde in 1575 got a patent giving them a monopoly of the printing of music and of music paper, and they printed their own works, which it is a good thing publishers ...
— Purcell • John F. Runciman
... a situation here at Holby, where he was organist till he died. Through all his life he never ceased to receive kindness and delicate acts of attention from Brandon. When in his last sickness Brandon came and staid with him till the end. He then wished to do something for Paolo, but Paolo preferred seeking his own ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... musing organist, Beginning doubtfully and far away, First lets his fingers wander as they list, And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay; Then, as the touch of his loved instrument Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme, First guessed by faint auroral ...
— The World's Best Poetry Volume IV. • Bliss Carman
... subsided, just as the unseen organist, apparently abandoning his more ambitious efforts, with sure touch swept into the familiar harmonies of the Eventide Hymn, and then, still with his hymnal in mind, jerked out the dozen stops and set the air rocking to the steady ...
— On the Firing Line • Anna Chapin Ray and Hamilton Brock Fuller
... young organist was also the choir leader, for her expressive face was turned toward the singers, and her lovely head kept time. Now and then a motion of the hand seemed to give a direction or warning. And the choir too sang with great sweetness and expression. ...
— The City of Fire • Grace Livingston Hill
... replied Dr. Grey; and, taking up the pen, he added, "Edward Oakley, Esq., late organist of Saint Bede's." It was the last earthly memento of one who, born a gentleman and a genius, had so lived, that, as all Avonsbridge well knew, the greatest blessing which could have happened to his daughter was his death. But, as by some strange and merciful law of compensation often occurs, ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... the horsemen of the emperor Buried here their serjeant-major, Whom a Swedish cannon-ball had Wounded mortally at Rhinefeld, And they blew as a farewell then The Reveille for their dead comrade— Though 'tis long since it has happened, I have never heard such sounds here. Only on the organ plays my Organist, and that quite poorly; Therefore I am struck with wonder To encounter such an Orpheus. Will you treat to such fine music The wild beasts here of our forest, Stag and doe, and fox and badger? Or, perhaps, was it a signal, Like the call of the ...
— The Trumpeter of Saekkingen - A Song from the Upper Rhine. • Joseph Victor von Scheffel
... is most strongly developed. Prince Albert, regent of Brunswick, is not only a composer of rare genius, but likewise a most talented organist. His son, Prince Joachim, has inherited his talent for composition, and is the author of some eight works, which have been printed for circulation, in court circles only, and have not become the property of the public; the cleverest of them being a festal march, ...
— The Secret Memoirs of the Courts of Europe: William II, Germany; Francis Joseph, Austria-Hungary, Volume I. (of 2) • Mme. La Marquise de Fontenoy
... of course, indelicate to interrupt these solemn frolics; so we edged ourselves to chairs, for all the world like belated comers in a concert-room, and patiently waited for the end. At length the organist, having exhausted his supply of breath, ceased abruptly in the middle of a bar. With the cessation of the strain the dancers likewise came to a full stop, swayed a moment, still embracing, and then separated, and looked ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 13 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of methodism, but also with the situation of the Chapel in the middle of the village. On the dark December evenings there would be perhaps not more than half a dozen worshippers, each one of whom would have brought his own candle and stuck it on the shelf of the pew. The organist would have two candles for the harmonium; the choir of three little boys and one little girl would have two between them; the altar would have two; the Vicar would have two. But when all the candle-light was put together, it left most of the church in shadow; indeed, it ...
— The Altar Steps • Compton MacKenzie
... striving and meritorious comrade in Art, and interest myself in the further progress— which is his due," wrote Liszt to the late Schuberth. Meanwhile Gottschalg was long ago advanced to the post of Court organist in Weimar. He is widely known as the editor of the "Chorgesang" [chorus singing] and of ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated
... consisted of four people, boxed in before the organ at the right of the pulpit) I began to count people with colored spots. First there was the tenor with a purple spot on his left cheek and on his sandy hair and beard. But the organist and soprano were splashed with scarlet. Then I forget to count, because I noticed that the 'alto had a new violet hat, which eclipsed the soprano's old green one. I wondered whether she had gone to Boston to buy it, or had "patronized home industries"—a ...
— Penguin Persons & Peppermints • Walter Prichard Eaton
... thought him not only the cleverest, but the best of men. It seemed to me right that such a man should be autocratic. A beneficent autocracy became my ideal of government. That my rector's will should be law to his wife, his servants, his curates, his organist, his choir, to those attached to his schools, to those who benefited by the charities he organized, seemed to me more than right and proper. I could have wished to see it law to all the world. If any one ventured to question any decision of his, or to speak a word against him, I felt almost ...
— The Dweller on the Threshold • Robert Smythe Hichens
... employed in blowing a cathedral organ, said after the performance of a fine anthem, "I think we performed very well to-day."—"We performed!" answered the organist; "I think it was I performed, or I am much mistaken." Shortly after another celebrated piece of music was to be played. In the middle of the anthem the organ stopped; the organist cried out in a passion, "Why don't you blow?" The fellow popped out his head from behind the ...
— The Jest Book - The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings • Mark Lemon
... of Florent Nepotis, Lady Margaret's organist, in charcoal. On Monday night Herr Lopez invited me to the great banquet on Shrove Tuesday, which lasted till two o'clock, and was very grand. Herr Lorenz Sterk has given me a Spanish fur. And to the above-mentioned feast came many very splendid masks, ...
— Memoirs of Journeys to Venice and the Low Countries - [This is our volunteer's translation of the title] • Albrecht Durer
... gold. And the river looked like a stream of liquid honey, upon which giant rose-leaves had been scattered, and a breeze was stirring in the grasses and among the leaves. The Sisters were busily repacking their baskets. Little Miss Wiercke, and her lank-haired young organist, sat under a bush, gazing in each other's eyes with the happy fatuity of lovers in the second stage, while the young lady who had kept the registers at the Public Library was teaching her Cornish mining-engineer to ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... of the organist turned in the direction of the voice, and he answered with a show of cheerfulness, "Not now, ...
— At the Little Brown House • Ruth Alberta Brown
... hotel. This hotel is unique in that it is run in connection with a Baptist church. The building is a beautiful specimen of Gothic architecture. The surplus money is used for the various church expenses. You may listen to the noted Belgian organist while resting in your own room. This undertaking has proven to be ...
— See America First • Orville O. Hiestand
... cottage piano and two violins in a desert of expanse, added a nervous chill. When at last the music struck up—somewhat hesitatingly and protestingly, from the circumstance that the player was the church organist, and fumbled mechanically for his stops, the attempt to make up a cotillon set was left to the heroic Brooks. Yet he barely escaped disaster when, in posing the couples, he incautiously begged them to look a little less as if they were waiting for the coffin ...
— Under the Redwoods • Bret Harte
... the displacement of these ecclesiastical bandsmen by an isolated organist (often at first a barrel-organist) or harmonium player; and despite certain advantages in point of control and accomplishment which were, no doubt, secured by installing the single artist, the change has tended to stultify the professed ...
— Under the Greenwood Tree • Thomas Hardy
... organ-blower, who was working his musical air-pump with one hand, and with two fingers and a thumb of the other insinuating a peeping-place through the curtain of the organ-gallery, was struck motionless by the double operation of curiosity and fear; while the organist, intent only on his performance, and spreading all his fingers to strike a swell of magnificent chords, felt his harmonic spirit ready to desert his body on being answered by the ghastly rattle of empty keys, and in the consequent agitato furioso of the internal ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... the musicians were rather startling. Thus Purcell was said to have written, among other things, an opera called Ebdon and Eneas; one stated that he was born 1543 and died 1595, probably confusing him with Tallis, that he wrote masses and reformed the church music; another that he was the organist of King's College Chapel, and wrote madrigals. One stated that he was born 1568 and died 1695; another, not knowing that he had so long passed the allotted period of man's existence, gave his dates 1693, 1685, thus giving him no limit of existence at all. One said he was a German, born somewhere ...
— Literary Blunders • Henry B. Wheatley
... gave high maneuverability to the boats. By playing on the controls with the skill of an organist, the pilot could ...
— Rip Foster Rides the Gray Planet • Blake Savage
... of a church is the most favorable place to average and appreciate its powers in. It is true, there were some soft and merciful passages occasionally, but the tramp-tramp of the tourists only allowed one to get fitful glimpses of them, so to speak. Then right away the organist would let ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... churchwarden has come with a face full of gloom to consult on the falling off in the offertory. The Scripture-reader has brought his "visiting book" to be inspected, and a special report on the character of a doubtful family in the parish. The organist drops in to report something wrong in the pedals. There is a letter to be written to the inspector of nuisances, directing his attention to certain odoriferous drains in Pig-and-Whistle Alley. The nurse brings her sick-list and her little bill for ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... "Psalms, Sonnets, and Songs of Sadness and Piety," the first Elizabethan song-book of importance. Few biographical particulars concerning Byrd have come down. As he was senior chorister of St. Paul's in 1554, he is conjectured to have been born about 1538. From 1563 to 1569 he was organist of Lincoln Cathedral. He and Tallis were granted a patent, which must have proved fairly lucrative, for the printing of music and the vending of music-paper. In later life he appears to have become a convert to Romanism. His last work was published ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... individuality that may be expressed on the notes of the piano by instantaneous changes in the values ascribed to single notes. By the same action of his finger the pianist not only makes the note, but also gives its value; while the method of the organist is to neglect the element of finger-pressure and to rely upon other methods for imparting emphasis ...
— Twentieth Century Inventions - A Forecast • George Sutherland
... spite of all, I have never interrupted the study of music." Bach was as simple and loyal a citizen as any land could have, and from the early years when he was a fatherless boy to the days of his sad affliction, he sacrificed always. Think of the miles he walked to hear Buxterhude, the organist; and in the earlier years, when he lived with Johann Christopher, his brother, how eagerly he sought learning in the art that so fascinated him. It was a constant willingness to learn ...
— Music Talks with Children • Thomas Tapper
... were for three hours in the week at the High School, and on two afternoons she learnt from the old organist at Rockstone Church. She went and came alone, except when Miss Mohun happened to join her, and that was not often, 'For,' said that lady to her sister, 'Gillian always looks as if she thought I was acting spy upon her. I wish I could get on with that girl; ...
— Beechcroft at Rockstone • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Public Library, director of the Baldwin Savings and Loan Association, former Fire Commissioner, chairman of the Baldwin Lighting Commission, member of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Baldwin, and organist of the Men's Bible Class, as well as a teacher of the Sunday School. Mr. Bixby's conservative New England training made him a valuable worker for any cause he espoused. He never sought honor and publicity, rather preferring to do his ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Twenty-Fourth Annual Meeting • Northern Nut Growers Association
... the old organist, Adam Heyden, Ann's grand uncle, would come to seek her, and many sweet memories dwell in my mind of that worthy and gifted man, which I might set down were it not that I am Ann's debtor for so many things that made my childhood happy. It was she, for a certainty, who first taught ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... shut the door. "But for now, well, you're correct. Once our grasp tightens on the windpipe of the world, we're safe. From our office in Wall Street you and I can play the keys of the world-machine as an organist would finger his instrument. But there must be no leak; no publicity; no suspicion aroused. We'll play our music pianissimo, Wally, with rare accompaniments to the tune of 'great public utility, benefit to the public health,' and all that—the ...
— The Air Trust • George Allan England
... was built with my own hands, Sister Mary John and I. You don't know her yet; she is our organist, ...
— Sister Teresa • George Moore
... kappelmeister; and the old cathedral with its grained arches and cloistered aisles resounded with rare music, as the organist took his seat, and run his fingers over the keys with the careless ease of one who knows not only to control, but to infuse something of his own spirit into the otherwise senseless machine before him. Under his inspiration it became a living, breathing form; lifting ...
— Scenes in Switzerland • American Tract Society
... this skull might perhaps be thinking how peaceful it was to rest here in the sacred earth of the churchyard. But surely it was just as peaceful over there in the house in which the bones were placed; and if neither church nor provost, chaplain nor sexton, gravedigger nor organist, bell-ringer nor acolyte, no, not one of them had got his due, it was quite impossible that it should be otherwise. And when he came to consider further, he thought that he could discover in these bare bones and these bleached skulls, ...
— Garman and Worse - A Norwegian Novel • Alexander Lange Kielland
... most pathetic of such instances is that of Josse Boutmy (1680—1779), court organist at Brussels, and famous in his day,—which was a long day. When he was at the age of eighty and the father of twelve children, he had to stoop to appeals for charity; again at ninety-seven he appeals. At ninety-eight he pleads ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... another drops, And thou art secret as before. Sometimes with flooded ear I list And hear thee, wondrous organist, Through mighty continental stops A thunder of strange music pour;— Through pipes of earth and air and stone Thy inspiration deep is blown; Through mountains, forests, open downs, Lakes, railroads, prairies, states, and towns, Thy gathering fugue ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume V, Number 29, March, 1860 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... Committee of the Bandmasters and Pipe Majors of the various battalions is in charge of the program. Major Grassie is equal to the occasion, quiet, ready resourceful. With him associated is Major Watts, Adjutant of the 9th, as Musical Director; in peaceful times organist and choir master of a Presbyterian congregation in Edmonton ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy |
