I'm sure that many of us have heard of the term, "Book of the Month Club" at somepoint.  I think this used to be quite common, and there seemed to be a LOT of books that fell into this category!  I guess it depended upon the individual reader to determine for themselves just which "book" or "month" they accepted as "the" book of THE month!

I used to think that this was sort of a cheap way of building up your reading library.  Not cheap in terms of money spent, but rather in time spent.  Why should you bother to read a lot of books if somebody else can do it for you?  You let them find the books, do the reading, write the reviews, and you just read (maybe!) the book that they recommended.

But I didn't get the point...

In reality, this wasn't the idea at all!  It was to help the reader become open to new ideas, authors, and possibilities.  It wasn't supposed to do the work for you.  It encouraged you, the reader, to read! Of course it DID make some money for the club that you belonged to, but, that's a narrow way of looking at it...

Reading is a staple of learning, like listening is for a musician.  When I was a student, there was a joke that said, "You can always tell who is an organist - they are the ones who don't know how to listen!"

In reality, I think just the opposite is true.  We organists have SO much to listen to!  Not just the music, but we need to keep a constant ear on the mechanical state of our instrument and how the temperature or humidity affects it, and then there's the complaining parishioners, the demands of a difficult priest, minister, or rabbi, and, well, the list goes on and on!  So, I'd say that organists have (or should!) develop the skills of being a great listener.

When you think or organ music, you think of Bach!  You can't think of organ music without the old master.  Afterall, when he wrote the "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor," he wrote an all-time greatest hit that EVERYONE knows!  Of course, maybe he didn't even write it, but that's another discussion.

Like the Book of the Month Club, let's try having a knock-off - the Bach of the Month Club!  

As organists we all play Bach - we all know Bach - we all love Bach.  Over the period of one month there usually appears lots of Bach uploads.  The performances are as diverse as the styles in which Bach composed.  Some are loud, soft, expert, well-meaning student-like, brilliant and virtuosic, or introverted and soul-searching, but ALL of them are Bach.

During the coming month, let's look at the huge and wonderful variety of Bach uploads that we get.  They may be familiar works to you, or the may be "new" ones.  Let's see which ones we like and why - or why not.

As long as we listen and learn, it really doesn't matter whether we are the performer or the audience.  What better place to begin than with B-A-C-H...

You know, I wonder if somebody could ever write a piece on the NAME of Bach?!?