Lockdown organ recital live from St Mary’s Petworth
Featuring French, German and English music, it will take place on Sunday, January 31 at 5pm and will be live streamed simultaneously on St Mary’s Petworth Facebook page and the church’s YouTube channel.
If you can’t listen at the time, you will be able to catch up with it after the event.
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Hide Ad“The aim of the recital is to celebrate the church festival of Candlemas and to lift people’s spirits at this time of pandemic,” Matthew said.
“The recital will be free to watch, but donations to church funds would be much appreciated at this time. Details of how to donate online will be available via Facebook and YouTube where programme details will also be posted.”
Anyone having difficulty with the donate option should simply leave a message on Facebook, Matthew said.
“I will be at the organ in St Mary’s and we have got a system set up where at the moment the services are going through something that puts them simultaneously on YouTube and Facebook. I will be using that and just an ordinary microphone and me introducing it.
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Hide Ad“The downside is that it is not really possible to have a page-turner easily because they would have to be in fairly close connection. I will probably photocopy some of the awkward page turns and manage with the rest. It will probably be only me there. The vicar will set up the live system and just disappear, I should think.”
Matthew’s only company will be the online comments as they come in: “I have always invited comments. I have done a bit of this before. We did a Songs of Praise livestream and I did a charity busk for Chestnut Tree. I will have my laptop right next to me.”
Matthew concedes it will still be quite strange: “I will just have to imagine people at home listening intently rather than just listening with me in the background while they do something else! But the advantage of this is that if you do miss it, you can listen later.”
As for the overall pandemic experience, Matthew admits he has been relatively lucky: “I have had teaching to fall back on. I have had more pupils this terms for various reasons, partly just luck. I have got a lot of new pupils, but the thing I most miss is the live concerts and weddings. I haven’t had a lot of examining work. But I have carried on playing most Sundays apart from a few Sundays when I was not allowed to during the first lockdown.
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Hide Ad“I suppose you do feel a bit isolated, but I don’t know how we would have done it without the technology, the WhatsApp groups and so on. If this had happened 30 or 40 years ago, it would all have been completely different.
“But with the lessons I am finding that I am getting more of a rapport with the parents, and the students perhaps seem to be practising more. The parents are usually around a lot more at the start of the lesson at the moment and they are often much more there in the background. They seem to be more aware of what is going on.”
The technology is great in other ways: “The livestreams can obviously reach a lot more people. The Petworth Festival found that when it was having its livestream events in the autumn. They were able to reach out a lot more. So, there are good things. There are opportunities as well as challenges.”
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