Dear Sir:
Two blocks south of here just off Hennepin is First Baptist Church which is celebrating its 175th anniversary on Sunday. Founded in 1841 by the Baptist missionary Harriet Lake for whom Lake Street and Lake Harriet are named who built a log cabin there in the woods that is now downtown Minneapolis and where the Unitarian missionary David Calhoun arrived soon after and she became Harriet Calhoun. Since 1841, First Baptist has been serving the people of New York and carrying out its commitment to sacred music of the highest quality. This commitment has almost killed us.
It began when a young Italian musician named Giuseppi Verdi arrived as First Baptist's first music director. A great musician but he was dramatic. He played the
organ so loud you wouldn't hear yourself sing --- and the key changes. He's start "Onward Christian Soldiers" in Ab and suddenly you were in F and C sharp ------- and he loved to have torches in the processional, carried by people riding camels.
He was replaced by Miss Evelyn Palmquist. She was very nice.
A young French musician names Claude Debussy came in 1896. He was sure talented but he'd play a prelude to a hymn and it went on and on and on: the guy couldn't find the melody in a paper sack --- he didn't know how to resolve something or when to quit trying. He played the processional and it wandered in and out and
all around and the choir wound up out in the street. We had no idea what he was doing half the time.
Miss Palmquist came back then. It was very nice of her.
So we got a guy named Puccini. He loved beautiful melody and he always had a soprano sing the anthem and it was rather long. He loved sopranos. And then one of them got pregnant. We replaced him with a Russian guy named Stravinsky --- he came highly recommended by the bishop, but gosh. The tempo problems; the guy couldn't keep a beat --- you'd be singing and he'd speed up and slow down --- weird chords: people looked at each other and shook their heads. And he refused to play for junior choir. That was the clincher. Out he went.
Charles Ives came in then. He loved hymns but he loved to play a whole string of them all at once. He called it polyphony, we called it insanity. He only lasted a few months.
Miss Palmquist returned soon after. It was nice to see her.
In 1921 the Rev. John Phillip Sousa became minister of music at First Baptist. Put piccolos and trombones in the choir loft, played everything in 4/4 time and had the ushers carry white rifles --- we lost a lot of folks to the Unitarian church that year.
Then we kind of swung the other way and got a fellow named Gershwin. Nice, polite, hair swept back--- somehow he didn't seem totally committed to fundamentalism and when he played the offertory and the ushers came by with the collection plate, people sometimes forgot and looked up and said, "I'd like a Manhattan, on the rocks, not too sweet, and a Gibson for my wife, sir."
Miss Palmquist replaced him. She is a very nice person.
The young John Cage came in 1946. Very quiet man. Then you'd hear him rap on the pipes with a fork or rub the keyboard with cellophane Talked about indeterminacy and chance elements in music. But we'd already had
that for years with the older sopranos.
Leonard Bernstein arrived in 1947. He was a colorful man. He liked all kinds of music and that was the problem. He'd be very spiritual for a while and then the choir would be dancing the samba with their hands over their heads.
Aaron Copland came for a few months. It was spring. He wanted people to hold hands and dance in a circle during the processional and wear calico hoop skirts and bonnets and Baptists don't do that sort of thing.
John Williams came and we experimented with laser beams and strobe lights and then we got over that.
So we got back Miss Palmquist. A hundred and sixty-two years old but still a trouper. She died a few years ago. We think she did. Her expression changed at the keyboard, she seemed to sag. So we buried her.
We replaced her with her grandson, Philip Palmquist. A nice person in his own way, a good musician, but he does get carried away sometimes like all of them and you just have to tell him. Shape up. Play the notes. You don't have to make a big impact. Just be there on time.