The benefits of participating in the Secrets of organ playing contest (and an index)

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Since the 15th week of this year I have been a regular participant in @organduo's secrets of organ playing contest. This is a contest in which anyone who plays the organ can participate, irrespective of their playing level. An entry for this contest has to be played on a real organ or an electronic substitute of a real organ. In other words: it needs a pedalboard, wether you use it or not. Another requirement is that you film yourself playing your entry and that the film has to be unedited. An entry for the contest has to be played in one go, in a one-ytime-right manner.

The idea behind the contest is to stimulate regular practice. Unless one is very talented and trained and adept in sight-reading, playing in a one-time-right manner needs practice. The reason to join the contest for however, was not so much to stimulate myself to practice in general, but to practise in this one-time-right manner of playing.

For my website I started to create soundrecordings of my playing more than 4 years ago. Each composition I publish the score of, is accompanied by a sound recording of it. That was my personal stimulus to practice and it has raised my playing level considerably. As my publisghing rate was rather high (150 composition a year) my recording rate had to be high as well. And a sound recording has to be as near to errorless as is possible. Or at least, the playing errors can't be the smack-in-your-face kind of errors. As I used to work for the local radio station, I am quite adapt at sound editing. And I allowed myself to record pieces in max two fragments. For the publication I glued the two fragments together. And when I edit two sound fragment together, believe me, you can not hear the split.

The Secrets of organ playing contest does not allow editing. In my first entry I had an edit between the announcement and the performance. The performance it self was in one go. As editing is not allowed however, that entry was disqualified... Participating in this contest is therefore my way to train myself in playing a composition in one go, and to keep playing even when I make a mistake. And I make lots of mistakes. It generally takes several tries before I have played an entry for the contest in an acceptable way (to my ears).

Gradually, however, my recordings become better. It becomes easier to ignore the camera. And it becomes easier to play a piece in one go. I am still far from errorless. Nor am I consistent in this one-time-right manner of playing. Participating in this contest is however the best incentive for me to keep trying to play a composition in one go and to become better and better in it.

The number of participants is still quite low. I hope that this post stimulates more organists to participate (regularly). By participating you become a better player. And by participating you help grow the community of organists and lovers of organ music here on Steem. I am glad I decided to participate, and I am grateful to @organduo to have initiated this contest.

To end on a selfish note and for (largely my own) future reference, here's the list of my entries so far:

Week 15: Anonymus, Da Jesu an dem Kreuze stund
Week 16: Georg Wilhelm Saxer, Präludium, e moll
Week 17: Georg Wilhelm Saxer, Fuge, e moll
Week 18: Ernst Friedrich Richter, Präludium, a moll
Week 19: Ernst Friedrich Richter, Fuga, a moll
Week 20: Gottfried Heinrich Stölzel, Triosonate, c moll
Week 21: Anonymus, O Herre Gott begnade mich
Week 22: Anonymus, Komm heilieger Geist, Herre Gott
Week 23: Johann Schneider, Präludium und Fuge, g moll
Week 24: H.M.T, partita "Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ"
Week 26: Johann Peter Kellner, Präludium pro organo pleno
Week 27: Auke Jongbloed, Jesu der du meine Seele
Week 28: Friedrich Christian Samuel Mohrheim , Jesu der du meine Seele
Week 29: Joseph Rheinberger, Orgelsonate nr 3, Intermezzo
Week 30: Samuel Alexandre Rousseau, Berceuse
Week 33: Michael Schütz, Community