Zion Lutheran Church organist retires after 50 years of music

Mark Twain once said, “Find a job that you love doing, and you will never work a day in your life.” For Caroline Helm of Granton, she was able to find that passion, sharing her love of music with the congregation of Zion Lutheran Church of Granton for the past 50 years. On Sunday, she officially retired from playing the organ after decades of providing musical accompaniment to their hymns, an accomplishment that was celebrated by the congregation following their Sunday service.

Helm has been a lifelong musician. At age 8, she took her first instruction on the piano, taking lessons for two years. After that point, she said she learned on her own, until she was asked at age 16 to be a part-time organist at Pine Valley Lutheran Church. It was there that she played organ for the first time.

“I played on a pump organ, and that is played using both of your feet,” she said. “I played that all through high school, and that was my first experience on the organ.”

She continued to play part-time as an organist in the years that followed. She met her husband Roger and they were married on May 18, 1963. They began raising their family together and worshipping at Zion Lutheran Church in Granton. As she played part-time, she learned more about this complex instrument from Virginia Karnitz, whowastheorganistforPineValleyLutheran Church, and Wilma (Billie) Garbisch, who was the organist for Zion Lutheran Church.

That was the way it was until Garbisch passed away on July 30, 1975. As Garbisch had passed away on a Saturday, Helm said she came to church with quite a surprising change of plans the next day.

“One day our organist passed away. It was a Saturday night it happened. They met me in the parking lot on Sunday morning and asked, ‘Will you be our organist?’ That was how I started 50 years ago. I started with a panic,” she said.

Despite the surprising start, Helm quickly got the hang of playing at church services week in and week out. Over time, this extended to other services held at the church as well, including not only holidays, but also special events such as weddings, funerals, baptisms, and confirmations. Being a part of all these special occasions, she said, helped connect her to her church community.

“The congregation is home,” she said.

Please see Organist, page 7 “They feel like my family. I have played for so many of their celebrations — a baby’s baptism, their weddings, funerals, confirmations — and you get to know them all.”

That wasn’t to say there were not challenges that came with the work. Being a full-time organist requires a great deal of dedication, and Helm said making sure she stayed healthy was always important. There were also some challenges in the music itself. While she has her favorite tunes — “The Lord is My Shepherd” and “On Eagle’s Wings” — there are also difficult pieces. “For All the Saints” was her least favorite tune to play. Weddings too were a challenge.

“You wanted to make it perfect,” she said about weddings. “It is their special day, and you want to make it just right for them.”

In addition to playing music for the church, Helm has taken an active part in the life of Zion Lutheran in other ways, helping with Bible study, serving meals, Ladies Aid, and also teaching music at Sunday School, allowing the next generation to learn an appreciation for music.

“I always dreamed of being a music teacher,” she said. “But I never got the opportunity until I was able to help teach Sunday School. It was like a dream come true.”

In total, Helm has played for seven pastors at Zion Lutheran Church. She also helped fill in on occasion at Christ Lutheran Church in Chili, which is the sister parish to Zion Lutheran. But after 50 years, she decided it was time to step down from full-time organ playing so she could spend time with her husband Roger and worship on the weekends together.

“It’s a passion, not a job,” she said. “I loved it. My passion was my music. It has been an amazing journey, or I wouldn’t have kept it up! It definitely is bittersweet, but part of the reason why I am doing this is that I want to be able to sit with my husband for services. I haven’t been able to do that for 50 years. It will be nice to be able to worship and not have my attention divided. I did enjoy it, so I am going to miss it.”

Helm will continue to play on occasion at Zion Lutheran, as she will not be able to completely step away from doing the thing she loves. But the congregation at Zion Lutheran knows she had a special talent that will be dearly missed every week.

“We’re going to miss her,” said Rev. Dan Zimmerman of Zion Lutheran Church. “Music is a big part of heaven, with the angels and saints singing praises to God. It’s been wonderful to have her lead our singing for all these years. It’s an important part of worship and a taste of what we look forward to in heaven.”