A swell addition: New organist firing up instrument for Congregational Church’s Christmas Eve

HADLEY — After five Christmas eves without organ accompaniment, Michael Stancill will be “pulling out all the stops” as he plays “O Come, All Ye Faithful” for the First Congregational Church of Hadley this year on Christmas Eve.

That phrase has colloquially become an expression meaning to go full throttle, but its origin refers to pulling the stop knobs of the organ, opening up its passageways to let out its mightiest sound — which according to Stancill, the church’s organist and musical director, is a must for Christmas’ traditional opening hymn, and an experience the congregation in Hadley has been missing for half a decade.

“Sometimes you can feel the whole building shake,” said Ruth Morse of the congregation’s music committee, adding that in addition to the uplifting, vigorous sounds from the organ, she has also noticed a tendency that more people tend to sing along with hymns when the organ is played as opposed to the piano, leading to a more immersive musical experience.

“I think it encourages people to sing because they’re not afraid someone else will hear them singing,” she said.

Unfortunately, Morse said, the former music director and organist was not available on Christmas Eve in recent years. Stancill, his successor, is especially ready to take the bench Tuesday evening after last year, which had been one of the first Christmases of his life he hadn’t played — after just moving back to the area and not having a church to play at — an experience he said was “just awful.”

As is evident in the church’s inability to find a substitute organist, “There’s not a lot of people going into it anymore,” he said, adding that, “There’s not a lot of churches with organs anymore, and there’s not a lot of schools with programs.”

Even when churches do have organs, he said, they often sound as if they belong in somebody’s living room. The First Congregational Church’s organ, however, built in 1902 in Springfield, isn’t a parlor room instrument.

“This is real live pipes,” he said of the organ, its pipes encased in a white wooden framework to the left of the sanctuary, and considers the organ to be “a link to those who played before.”

Stancill, rehearsing with the choir Thursday night, lamented the dwindling use of the instrument, and reflected on how the shrinking interest in religion across much of the country is reflected in a dwindling appreciation for music’s local, collective power — with local participatory music being replaced with music that is “professional” and “recorded 400 times until it’s perfect.”

“The enjoyment of listening and the joy of creating — that’s faded away,” he said. “Now you’re lucky if you can get through ‘Happy Birthday’ on tune.

“One hundred years ago every family that could had a piano in the house. That was the home entertainment system, and at least one person knew how to play it.”

Stancill, who said that his religious affiliation can be summarized as “Capiscopalian,” will mark his first year as the church’s music director in mid-January.

Baptized Catholic and raised Episcopalian, he previously served for the past 35 years as music director and organist for a Lutheran community in North Carolina.

“I started on piano when I was 10, but I’ve always loved the sound of the organ. And I mean, I have vivid memories of the organist in the Episcopal Church I grew up with. She was fabulous.”

His first job as organist was with the Methodist Church in the Middlesex County town of Townsend, north of Leominster — a job he ventured into with only his piano IQ carrying him. For a while there was a lot of experimentation, he said, especially with what to do with his feet (many of those early sessions featured him barefoot, he remembers).

“I had never touched an organ before I got the job. I auditioned and had never touched the organ pedal. They took me, and so I’m completely self-taught on the organ.”

After a lifetime relationship with the instruments, he was diagnosed with carpal tunnel syndrome in his right hand this fall, and has an operation scheduled for this coming February.

“I’m retired. I thought the challenges were supposed to stop here,” he remarked, adding that while it is a part of life to lose the things you love most, “I know it would devastate me to not be able to play. I don’t want to lose it too early.”

The Christmas Eve service begins at 7 p.m.

Samuel Gelinas can be reached at sgelinas@gazettenet.com.