Bill Thomas: Little Stories. The North Dakota Council On The Arts reports on arts groups that pivot in the face of disruption, so here's a quick quiz question: do you recognize this tune? [organ music] That is the doxology and you may be saying "Of course I recognize it! I have been singing it every Sunday for my whole life!" If you didn't recognize it, take our word for it. In many Christian churches, it is a very traditional and frequent part of services.
It is usually sung with an organ or piano accompaniment, so what do you do when a pandemic shuts your church down? This story has several things I like in it: an accordion, radio broadcast and people figuring out a great do-it-yourself solution. The North Dakota Council On The Arts asked Matthew Musacchia to write up this report which is read for us by Christine McClelland.
Christine: When the Covid-19 pandemic shut down church services, Judy Larson who lives in a North Dakota town near the South Dakota border was one of those who helped to keep the church music alive. Larson, a member of the local reformed Presbyterian church is a singer and accordion player and during the time church goers were at home, she worked with her pastor, Spencer Allen, to broadcast their services over the radio. To recreate the usual hymns and songs, Larson and her family first repurposed an outbuilding on their farm and turned it into a recording studio, complete with sound equipment and quote "ratty blankets or quilts" hung up to dampen the sound.
Then, she and her family, her husband Todd and all her children would record the hymns selected by their pastor. Her husband played the bass as well as both electric and acoustic guitars and all provided vocals. The only thing missing was a piano, so Larson used her accordion.
"It was just a necessity", said Larson. "I mean, we were going to be recording the church services and the music for the church services. It's just really hard to cover things like the Doxology without some sort of keyboard instrument." In this way, Larson and her family recreated the music normally heard during Sunday worship.
Singers: "Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him all creatures here below.".
Christine: Allen would record the sermon and other parts related to his duties and splicing these together, an entire service was created. This would be broadcast over the local radio as well as put up on the church's Facebook and YouTube page. Larson herself had only taken up the accordion during the last five years. However, beginning last summer and continuing until May, she received a grant under the North Dakota Council On The Arts folk arts and apprenticeship program to apprentice with noted North Dakotan musician Chuck Suchy to further her skill.
Learning traditional music from North Dakotan settlers, Larson became more well versed in the styles of Germany, Bohemia and Norway. While the songs she learned with Suchy weren't the same as the hymns she played on the radio, the apprenticeship did help in other ways. "I guess just knowing that people worked with what they had and even if you weren't the best player in the world," said Larson, "you were the music they had for Saturday nights and so you did your thing."
For Larson, one of the most rewarding parts of this is that because the service was sent out over the radio, people who normally would not have access to hearing the service on social media would be able to listen as well. Larson said that this was especially important to elders, in that she would receive good feedback from them such as cards and phone calls.
"We actually got some cards in the mail from some of the older congregants that just really thanked us for doing the music and making it seem like they were really there, rather than just having a sermon on YouTube, which they probably wouldn't have accessed," she said. "By making the entire service with music and the liturgy and the work of the people so to speak, that helps them feel they're still a part of something they can participate along."
In connecting the broadcast to what she had learned in her apprenticeship, Larson drew one parallel: "Just like music brought people together to participate in something together," she said, the dances like in the Bohemian Hall in the past, these church services brought people together in a way that they can participate together, even though they had to stay separated."
The broadcasts ran from middle of March and ended on May 17th.
Bill Thomas: That report was researched and written by Matthew Musacchia. It's part of a series called "Little Stories" at the Arts Council. They commissioned writers to tell some little stories about how people in the arts were responding to these challenging times and finding new ways to do things. You can see more of them at https://news.prairiepublic.org/programs/little-stories or you can go the North Dakota Council On The Arts website, https://www.arts.nd.gov/.
This project is supported in part by a grant from the North Dakota Council on The Arts which receives funding from the state legislature and the National Endowment for The Arts. I'm Bill Thomas.
See the Smithsonian Institution’s feature of this project,
https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/crisis-cultural-sustainability-north-dakota-covid