You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, they say, but then you can be really grateful when you get it back for a little while.
There are a bunch of posts in my archives about the couple who led music at our parish for ten years. They did a fantastic job straddling all the tensions that come with leading church music-- making it beautiful without making it a performance, keeping it reverent while also keeping it fun, ensuring that the egos and the perfectionism don't rear their ugly little heads too often.
I wrote in the summer of 2020 about how delighted I was to be playing with them again, and how much I missed the pre-pandemic version of normal. I didn't know then that the parish music ministry would never go back to the pre-pandemic version of normal, that they'd step down and the music program would remain fragmented and cobbled together. I mean, it's not bad but it's also not what it used to be.
Our pastor is leaving and this couple is leading music for his last Mass. They asked a bunch of us to be part of the ensemble, and we rehearsed tonight.
Early on we sang the Gloria, and I reveled in it: the keyboardist's distinctive up-tempo accompaniment, the subtle echo of the electric bass underneath, the three-part harmonies and the well-practiced dynamics. We dusted off familiar old arrangements and tried out some new ones. All of us had made a lot of music together in various combinations over the years, and it was a joy to be together doing this familiar thing again.
This couple has been pretty clear that they have moved on from the joint music ministry phase of their lives, and nobody really knows what our parish will be like under our new pastor. He might tell us it's going to be all Marty Haugen all the time (please no). It's unlikely that this group will come together again under these directors, at least in the foreseeable future. So here I am, basking in happy memories and grateful for the opportunity to sing together again -- saying goodbye to our longtime pastor amid a strange mix of wistfulness and joy.
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