As I said in my last post I went to First Unitarian Church of Dallas this morning for two reasons. First, I discovered that the music for the service was being provided by the resident jazz ensemble for the church. I wanted to hear how they fit into a service and understand the level of musicians that participate. Second, the Adult Forum was continuing their lecture and discussion of Transcendentalism, which sounded interesting. I was stimulated by the second, disappointed in the first.
The Adult Forum uses lectures from the Great Courses lecture series that are available on DVD. These lectures are produced and delivered by noteworthy college professors in the topic. They are an excellent way to learn about a particular study area. Especially when they are viewed in a classroom setting followed by further facilitated discussion. The video lecture gets everyone on the same page to help prepare for the follow-on discussion. The only downside at First Unitarian is that there is very little time left after the video portion to have much of a discussion. But the material is usually very stimulating.
The jazz at the service was very disappointing. The keyboard sounded like a bad lounge keyboard sound. The arrangements were very low key. The solos were very short, subdued and could have been written out since they seemed to have very little spontaneity. The drums were very low energy and repetitive. The only bright spot was that the vocalists sounded good.
Maybe this is what was desired since Unitarian services tend to be very dry and subdued. That's the opposite of jazz.
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