Contributed by Royce Eckhardt and Jill Hunt
Check out this funeral story:
I promise you, this is as true as if it happened yesterday. And I needed to wait a while before sharing this out of respect to the deceased’s loved ones and family.
There we were, playing a funeral. The man who had passed was truly loved by all. He was a great guy, we knew him personally and professionally for many years, so it was an odd mix of being an honor to play for his memorial service and the gravity and grief associated with the event.
We were a brass quintet composed of very good players. The tuba player is a really big guy, with probably the biggest tuba I’ve ever seen (6/4?), and he is known to park really low pedal notes on the ends of tunes… The organist is a good guy too, plays really well, and has at his fingertips a very significant instrument. I don’t know how many ranks but it is quite imposing. He always wears an old, ornate key hanging from his cassock. I’ve seen this key every time I’ve played there, but never knew what the key was for, or if it was simply ornamental or had some nostalgic significance.
On the organ console there is a curious looking, small box – about the size of a deck of cards, into which a key fits. I’d find out later that this was indeed significant.
OK, so in the run-through, as predicted, our tubist kept putting really low, powerful notes on the end of each tune. It was almost as if it was becoming a competition between the brasses and the organ to see who could play with the more dominant sound. The organist seemed to be getting irritated….
Enter the congregation, the family, et al, and the service commenced. There were hymns, two eulogies, lots of tears, and a few laughs….
We ended the service with the Gigout “Grand Choeur Dialogue,” which is well-known to many of you brass players.
We were to soon learn that that little box, no bigger than a deck of cards, was the mate to the key hanging from the organist’s cassock, and also that it was forbidden to be implemented. For, before the Gigout began, the organist surreptitiously inserted the key into the little box, turned it, and a heretofore unnoticed door nestled among the pipes silently swung open on hydraulic hinges. This “armed” a 64’ full length stop; one of very few ever constructed in the world. We later learned that it was forbidden to be used because architects had determined that if sounded, it might threaten the structural integrity of the entire church building.
We could see very well what the organist was up to, and as we played, we all silently acknowledged, OH S***! Now what!!!??? As we anticipated him stepping on the pedal that would fire that thing.
We got to the final chord, the tubist took a huge breath and nailed that low pedal C, the organist got a wicked look on his face, stood on that left-most pedal, and . . . nothing!!!
Out came a puff of dust, and a squirrel’s nest, complete with mama squirrel, came rocketing out of the pipe, flew across the altar, and landed squarely on the face of the deceased, who was in repose in an open casket.
Just as the congregation barely had time to react in horror, the 64’ pipe DID sound, the vibration of that enormous pipe causing the coffin lid to slam shut and the whole thing fell to the floor.
That had to be the strangest funeral I’ve ever played. At least we got paid.