> in our church we use a hymn during communion
(supposedly to be sung by all, but in practice only the choir sings it).
The choir takes communion first, so I've made it a habit to do an
improvisation on the communion hymn tune, on the fly with no preparation
other than to think about it for a few minutes during the preceding
prayers.  It's challenging and fun; sometimes it comes out pretty lame,
and sometimes it's pretty decent.

I wish I dared.  Mine would be at least 90% lame, but perhaps improve with time.

One rector for whom I worked back-when recommended *complete* playovers of hymns as a rule, claiming that these are friendlier to visitors than playing only a phrase or two.  After thinking about this, I'm inclined to agree with him.  But today's congregations don't like services to be unnecessarily long, either.  Occasionally, I have been able to end Communion time with a brief piece on the closing hymn in the same key and in which the melody appears so clearly that it seems perfectly natural to dispense with a full playover before we actually sing it.  Only the thanksgiving prayer and blessing intervene, which are quite brief.  When this works, it seems to be a case of having your cake and eating it, too.

::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Note:  opinions  expressed on PIPORG-L are those of the  individual con-
tributors and not necessarily  those of the list owners  nor of the Uni-
versity at Albany.  For a brief  summary of list  commands, send mail to
[log in to unmask]  saying  GET LSVCMMDS.TXT  or see  the  web
page at http://www.albany.edu/piporg-l/lsvcmmds.html .
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::