The Second Anniversary of SIMPLY WORSHIP

Presents the Premiere of

THE GLORY OF HIS PRESENCE

A Unique Five-Movement Worship Experience

In the summer of 2017, our family was at a theater that presented an ad for the Van Cliburn competitions.  I was so excited, but then I found out that the final evening would be in an Oklahoma City theater.  Disappointed I went online and discovered that the whole competition had been released online.  The winner of the competition Yekwon Sunwoo of Korea played the third piano concerto by Rachmaninoff, one of my favorites.  The Van Cliburn competition is the super bowl for classical pianists.  Van Cliburn became famous in 1958 during the cold war with Russia.  Russia instituted a piano competition as a slam against American talent.  Van Cliburn, a Baptist boy from Texas, was 23.  He wowed the Russians with both Tchaikowsky and Rachmaninoff, then played a Russian piece as an encore.  The judges didn't know what to do.  The head judge took off to the Kremlin to talk to Kruschev who asked, "Was he the best?" When the judge said, "Yes," he declared, "Then give him the prize."  His fame won him a New York City ticker-tape parade (the only one for a classical musician), the first classical album to go platinum (it went triple platinum), and, also in 1958, at a music teacher's guild banquet, a gift of $10,000 was awarded to set up the Van Cliburn piano competition held every 4 years. 

This was all so inspiring to me.  I had played the Tchaikowsky #1 as a wedding gift for my daughter Melissa and Gary.  I wanted to do something for the Lord.  Thus was born the idea for this composition.  And on January 19, 2018, one day after my birthday, I played it for about 45 guests in our home to honor the second anniversary of Simply Worship - what a wonderful evening it was!  It is unfortunate that I forgot to turn the recorder on until I started talking about the end of the first movement.  It was preceded by what I had said before this about the Van Cliburn competition.  I pray this will be a blessing to you.