A REALLY GOOD SANDWICH
January 4, 2009
© by Susan Burkhalter
Here is a recipe for a really good sandwich. You make it out of things you probably already have at home. Ingredients: white bread or any kind you like (I use Wonder Bread), bologna – I like that made from pork and chicken; gherkins, which are small sweet pickles; mayonnaise—Hellmann’s is the only kind I use; peanut butter, but not organic: Skippy’s or Peter Pan are good.
Spread peanut butter on one slice of bread and mayonnaise on the other. Slice the pickles in half lengthwise and lay on the bread. Put on one slice of bologna. Your sandwich is ready to eat!
ALBERT SCHWEITZER, PART II
This list of books by Albert Schweitzer was on the title page of the book on which I’m reporting: “Albert Schweitzer, the Man and His Mind” by George Seaver
The Philosophy of Civilization
I. The Decay and the Restoration of Civilization; II Civilization and Ethics
The Quest of the Historical Jesus
The Mystery of the Kingdom of God
Paul and His Interpreters
The Mysticism of Paul The Apostle
On the Edge of the Primeval Forest & More from the Primeval Forest
J.S. Bach
Memoirs of Childhood and Youth
Christianity and the Religions of the World
[I think all of the above are published by The Macmillan Company]
Out of my Life and Thought
From my African Notebook — both of these pub. by Henry Holt and Company
Indian Thought and Its Development
Goethe — both of these published by The Beacon Press
II. book, “Albert Schweitzer, the Man and His Mind” by George Seaver
pub. Harper & Brothers, NY, 1947, 1955.
NOTE: All the quotations, with page numbers, given in this blog are from the book mentioned directly above, by George Seaver.
“PART I Memories of Childhood and Youth” p. 3: he was born January 14th, 1875 in Günsbach, Alsace. Later he was a doctor of philosophy, theology, music and medicine. He earned the first 3 degrees while in his twenties, studying at the University of Strasburg in Paris and Berlin. His father was a pastor. Both of his grandfathers were organists: the maternal grandfather, Pastor Schillinger, had a gift for improvisation.
The young Albert Schweitzer was a sensitive child and witnessing misery in humans or animals saddened him. He even composed an evening prayer to say for all living creatures: “’O heavenly Father, protect and bless all things that have breath; guard them from all evil, and let them sleep in peace.’” [p. 10, “Albert Schweitzer, The Man and His Mind”] The author of the book describes the boy Albert Schweitzer’s temperament on p. 10, “He was so quick to laugh at the funny side of things that risibility was almost an affliction, and one which his schoolfellows mercilessly exploited during lessons, nicknaming him “the Laugher.” Yet on his own confession he was by no means a merry character, since he inherited from his a mother a temperamental shyness and reserve.” He was close to his parents. He called his father “my dearest friend” and said of his mother, “ . . . we understood each other without using words” p. 12. He regretted later that “down to my 20th year, and even later, I did not exert myself sufficiently to express the gratitude that was really in my heart.” Dr. Schweitzer reflected that people he barely knew influenced him and “became powers within me” to be awakened consciously years later, “just as the beauty of a piece of music or of a landscape often strikes us first in our recollection of it.” p. 12. The author, Robert Seaver, felt that Compassion and Gratitude were what shaped Dr. Schweitzer.
A.S. (Albert Schweitzer) was precocious in music. He began the organ at age 8 and substituted in church for the organist at age 13. He began studies with Charles Marie Widor when he was 18.
As a school child he had the habit of daydreaming. He had to walk 2 miles to and from school in Mühlhausen every day through woods and over hills until he finally bought a bicycle. His favorite subjects were History and Natural Science. He possessed a “sense of awe in face of the beauty and mystery of the natural world [which] impelled him to try his hand at poetry and sketching, but they were failures: ‘only in musical improvisations have I ever felt myself to have any creative ability.’ . . .” p. 7
He sadly missed the services in his father’s little church at Günsbach, and especially his father’s sermons. “He missed the feeling of solemnity which those village services gave him and ‘the need for quiet and self-recollection without which I cannot realize the meaning of my life.’ In his view it is not at all necessary that a child shall understand all that takes place in a church service for adults: the main thing is that they shall feel ‘the sense of something that is serious and solemn.’ “ The author mentions that some of the churches in Alsace are peculiar in that “they are Catholic-Protestant combined. The priest says mass in the choir, and the pastor says prayers and preaches in the nave, at different times by mutual arrangement every Sunday.” The author says this was introduced by Louis XIV.
His piano teacher was Marie-Jaell Trautmann, a Liszt pupil, p. 19 He was introduced to the Music of Bach when he was 15 years old by his piano teacher, Eugene Münch. Three years later at the University of Strasbourg, his piano teacher’s brother, Ernest Münch, asked him to play the organ at St. Wilhelm’s for Bach Cantatas. Albert Schweitzer (A.S) auditioned to study with Charles Marie Widor in 1893 and studied with him for 6 years for free, since they became friends.
On page 20 of this book, there is a two-paragraph quotation from Widor who explains how A.S. solved an enigma regarding contrapuntal motives in Bach’s chorales and chorale preludes. Widor says, “[Bach’s musical logic] becomes obscure as soon as he takes up a chorale melody. Why these sometimes almost excessively abrupt entitheses of feeling? Why does he add to a chorale melody contrapuntal motives that have often no relation to the mood of the melody? . . .” A.S. explained that these passages depended on the texts of the old Lutheran hymns, which were written in German. Widor didn’t know enough German and had read French translations of those texts. When A.S. translated the poems into French from memory for Widor and compared them to the German texts, going through all of the chorale preludes, this made everything clear to Widor.
A.S. studied at the University of Strasburg. In 1896 while home in Günsbach for the spring holidays, he made a decision: “He resolved that he was justified in devoting his life to science and music till he was thirty and from that time onward to the direct service of suffering humanity, in some form or other which circumstances would indicate, ‘as man to my fellow-men.’” p. 27. In 1899 when he was studying theology he joined the faculty at Strasburg. He became a preacher at St. Nicholas.
In the February blog I will report on Dr. Schweitzer’s opinions of organs and organ building. Does anyone in the BACHorgan.com community know any other books or recordings that they could recommend by or about Dr. Schweitzer? Do you have a favorite book from the list near the beginning of this blog?
January 15th, 2009 at 5:25 pm Does anyone know how old Albert Schweitzer was when he first began as a substitute organist in church? I typed an error on his age, and had to return the book to the library, since it was a rare book and was wanted back.