Hawks organist, Bea Schalk, has 74-year love affair with church organ
by Peter Jakey, Managing Editor
Bea ?Beattie? (Brietzke) Schalk, 86, of Hawks has been playing the organ since she was 12 years old. She learned to play the piano from the Rev. Louis Heinecke?s wife, Agnes, in 1935 for 25 cents a lesson. ?She had bread dough on her fingers, teaching me how to the play piano,? Bea vividly remembers. Schalk watched Agnes play the organ at St. Michael Lutheran Church as a young girl, but when the Heineckes moved to take over a church in Utica, the church was left without an organist.
At 12 years old, and no organ lessons to speak of, a young and nervous Bea took over the pump organ at the right of the altar and hasn?t stopped playing since. IN THE choir/organ loft at Faith Lutheran Church of Hawks Tuesday morning, Bea lifts her fingers up and down, pressing the right combination of keys to put together the notes of her favorite hymn, ?A Mighty Fortress is our God.?
Looking straight ahead at the sheets of music on the easel in front of her, she doesn?t speak again until after finishing it. ?I really love that song,? she said Then, with about being asked, Bea begins to play ______. ?This is kicking it up a notch,? she comments, as the tempo picks up. A few moments later, without out any break in the song, she says, ?now this is adding trumpet to it,? as the added sound of a trumpet-sounding instrument can be heard.
?Isn?t that a beauty? she said with heartfelt conviction. ?It?s my love. I love to play.? Schalk has played for every Lutheran church in the area, and from the time her first husband Hank died in 1988 to 1995, she played for three churches every weekend, including St. Paul of Posen Saturday nights, Faith Lutheran at the usual time of 9 a.m. and then Holy Cross of Onaway at 10:45 a.m.
In 1995, Schalk decided to focus on one church, and that?s what she?s been doing ever since. BEA WALKS the two flights of stairs to the choir/organ loft, and the one big step onto the organ bench, with her back to the sanctuary. Even though Bea has been going to church all of her life, and knows the services and songs front wards backwards, she has a mirror positioned to the left of the easel to keep an eye on what is going on below.
?I am going to continue to do it until the Lord tells me I?ve had it,? said Schalk. ?They say they?ll move the organ downstairs, so I don?t have to climb those stairs. I said, ?no, you won?t. You are not going to move that organ.? Oh my Lord, the trouble they had getting it up here.? Bea said her right has been acting ?goofy,? but it doesn?t seem to affect her when it is time to play. ?Once I get on these keys, you don?t think of fingers not working. It is just automatic,? she said.
WHEN BEA married Hank Brietzke in 1943, they became members of Faith Lutheran and she became the fulltime organist. The 66 years since has been an almost uninterrupted run, excluding the time spent raising the coupl
There have been many weddings and funerals over the years. Just recently, she was asked to play for some dear friends. ?Shirley Fairbanks, that was the rough one,? said Bea. ?Grace Henry asked me two days before she died if I would play at her funeral and I told her that I would.? Just this summer, she played at Rich Kamyszek?s wedding, although the ceremonies are getting fewer and fewer.
?Now, the older I get, the more I don?t want to do those things anymore, because it is a lot of preparation. You have your rehearsal the night before, which takes forever. Then you are playing a half hour before the wedding starts and all this commotion.? Some of the people and sermons may have changed over the years, but Bea?s music has been there year after year ? always in the background but always heard.