Tag: organ

Pachelbel: Chaconne in F minor
Johann Fischer: Chaconne in F major, de la Suite Euterpe
Mendelssohn: Andante with Variations in D
Joseph Bonnet: Romance sans Paroles
Parry: Elegy for 7^th April 1913
J.S. Bach: Prelude and Fugue in B minor

Paul Rosoman, organ

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 13 November 2013, 12.15pm

One of the pleasures of hearing an organ recital at St. Andrew’s is the fact that here are two organs; on this occasion both were played – firstly the small baroque organ downstairs, then the main organ, in the upstairs gallery.

Informed by excellent programme notes, the audience heard a variety of works from late seventeenth century to early twentieth century.  One of the most delightful was the first, the Chaconne by Pachelbel.  It was so good to hear the baroque organ used
(it seems to be but sparsely used these days), and the changes in registrations that Rosoman employed from one variation to another.  Particularly lovely was the sound of the flutes.

Fischer’s composition was probably more diverse and imaginative than the Pachelbel, and very rhythmic.  However, it was without that spark of genius that Pachelbel had.

The remaining pieces were played on the main organ.  Mendelssohn’s organ music is very much of the nineteenth century.  As the programme note said, the composer was ‘a romantic whose music was rooted in classicism’.  Repeated notes could have
done with just a little more separation, otherwise this was a good performance of what I found to be a rather syrupy, hymn-like piece.  Having been taught by the late Maxwell Fernie almost entirely on baroque organ music, I do not find Mendelssohn’s (or
Liszt’s) organ music to my taste.

Joseph Bonnet was the most recent of the composers we heard (1884-1944).  Despite the title, I did not find the piece particularly Romantic, but very charming, simple, and tuneful.  It received plenty of variety of registration, to make for a pleasing recital work.

Parry’s Elegy written for the funeral of his brother-in-law, the Earl of Pembroke, did not have the spirit of his choral music, but was pleasant, and certainly elegiac, but not especially distinguished.

The Bach Prelude and Fugue is not among the great composer’s well-known organ works, nor did I find it one of his more
appealing or interesting, though one could appreciate the counterpoint, and the intricacy of the finger and foot work required from the performer.  There was a bright mixture of stops chosen for the Prelude, but little change for the Fugue – maybe another reed was added.  Nevertheless, it received a fine performance, and gave a rousing end to a thoughtfully chosen and well-played recital.

Both organs sounded in fine form – and that is in large part a tribute to the organist.

 

TGIF recital at St Paul’s

Robert Costin (organ)

Bach’s Goldberg Variations – a selection

Friday 26 July, 12:45 pm

On one of his frequent return visits to New Zealand (he was assistant organist at St Paul’s in the mid 1990s), Robert Costin made time to play at one of the cathedral’s Friday lunchtime recitals that enjoy the title TGIF (Thank God it’s Friday is the full liturgical title).

He has created an organ adaptation of the Goldberg Variations, which he has recorded on the organ of Pembroke College, Cambridge. That is a small chapel organ of two manuals and pedal board; the 1708 organ has been considerably modified but the most recent work on it has restored it significantly. That recording, which I bought at the Friday recital, offers a much less exciting and colourful account, though admirably clear and no doubt closer to Bach’s aesthetic, than Costin was able to offer on the opulent if seriously hybrid organ in the present cathedral.

The lunchtime concerts are restricted to about 45 minutes; this was of scarcely a half hour’s duration, consisting of the Aria and fourteen of the thirty variations.

The unregenerate, such as this reviewer, finds great pleasure in the Cathedral organ and he thoroughly enjoyed this performance, and would have been happy to have been subjected to the entire work.

The great variety of ways in which Bach’s music can be treated, given some basic constraints, of an educated taste, is always a surprise. I found myself won over as the Aria began, projecting a very open and sophisticated statement. And the first variation followed suit in its sheer joyous optimism. There was something essentially of Bach in the adaptations even though there were obviously sounds that organs of his day could not have produced.

Variation 4 using pedals prominently created an even bolder and more colourful effect than could be obtained on either harpsichord or an organ of Bach’s time.  Certain variations such as No 13, using light stops and charming, delicate embellishments, lost nothing at all of such refinement.  No 16, in French ouverture style, offered a fine extrovert contrast that used power of the bigger stops to rousing effect.

Even though we heard fewer than half of the variations, Costin had chosen a very representative group; only a listener with the entire work in the memory might have regretted missing certain ones.

The charm of this performance lay in the enjoyment of the taste and skill of an organist who was clearly fully familiar with and in such full command of the instrument that he could have transformed music of much less intrinsic beauty and profundity into a totally rewarding experience.

You will find details of the CD on Costin’s website: www.robertcostin.com  or www.stonerecords.co.uk

 

A Mews Celebration, to commemorate the 20^th anniversary of the death of Dr Douglas K. Mews 
Music by or arranged by Dr Douglas K Mews
Bach Choir, conducted by Douglas Mews, with Eleanor Carter, cello

St. Andrew’s on The Terrace

Sunday, 28 April 2013 5pm

Dr Douglas K. Mews was Associate Professor of Music at theUniversityofAucklandfrom 1974 until his retirement in 1984.  He was also Director of Music at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Auckland from 1970 to 1982.

He was a composer, and a lively, instructive and entertaining broadcaster on what was then the Concert Programme, his soft Newfoundland accent being very easy to listen to.

There is a complaint that the general view is that ‘the only good composers are dead ones’, in terms of programming and public appreciation, in New Zealand we seem almost to have the reverse view: contemporary composers such as Anthony Ritchie, David Hamilton and Gareth Farr are frequently performed, less so dead composers.  I  do not imply that those named should not be performed – of course they should.  But, apart from the Dominion String Quartet’s exemplary promotion of Alfred Hill, there is not enough music heard from our past.

The concert began with two motets and a mass.  First, ‘A sound came from heaven’, which has been heard from the National Youth Choir of New Zealand. Unaccompanied, as were all the items in the first half of the concert, it proceeded well – a very effective piece and performance, aside from the lack of unanimity on the opening note.  The final sentence, ‘Come, O Holy Spirit’ suffered the same fate as the beginning.

The Mass’s opening, ‘Lord have mercy’ had a much better unison start. The setting interspersed Latin with English.  ‘Gloria’, was highly musical, varied and enjoyable.  The section beginning ‘For you alone are the Holy One’ was positively jolly in its setting.

‘An Introit of Beatitudes’ followed.  Here, particularly, was Douglas Mews’s fine and inspiring word-setting, the music following the natural speech rhythms.  Plainsong basis it might have had, but there were lovely harmonies, as well as much unison singing – always difficult, as the tenors found, introducing extra notes, and not sustaining repeated notes on pitch.

‘Holy, Holy’ was loud and joyful.  While the music was largely in an English tradition, it was not reminiscent of any other composer. It was complex in places, with cross-rhythms and crossings of vocal parts.

From unaccompanied voices to unaccompanied cello: Eleanor Carter, now a member of the NZSO (and Wellingtonorganist), was a student of Professor Mews at AucklandUniversity.  She played Five Melodies of Passion and Dispassion.  The first piece began with a big sound.  It was interesting to hear how resonant the solo cello was in St. Andrew’s. 

The piece suggested anguish, concern, anxiety, and ended with pizzicato, but no feeling of resolution.  The next piece was soft and mellow, in the form of question and answer between treble phrases and bass ones.  This questioning continued through much of the piece, followed by a more affirmative section, with a question at the end.

The third part began with some rough stuff – many short notes, and a querulous, even cross, argumentative tone.  One could almost hear words in this conversation, especially the expletive at the end.

Piece number four was all calmness again (dispassion?), with long sustained notes.  It seemed to be the calm of resignation rather than of happy repose.  Gentle pizzicato preceded a solemn ending. 

The final piece began with rapid pizzicato, then turned to powerful passion.  These features alternated, incorporating anguished outbursts.  There were cries from both extremes of the instrument’s range, and running pizzicato before an ending which incorporated the opening phrase of Saint-Saëns’ ‘Swan’ from The Carnival of the Animals – perhaps the most well-known cello solo there is.

The second half began with settings of two poems by Karol Wojtyla, who became Pope John Paul II.  He worked in a quarry during the Nazi occupation of Poland, and wrote a cycle of poems entitled The Quarry; we heard them in English translation. 

The first “Hands….. are a landscape” began in unison (again, the pitch was a little wayward) then went into close harmony.  The words about the physical effects of labour included “shoulders and veins vaulted” at which point the music had a vaulted sound: multi-part writing, as the words are “For a moment he is in a Gothic building”.  These and other words were first spoken and then sung.  At the final line “Some hands are for toil, some for the cross”, the interval of a second was held well, with a low bass ending. 

Eleanor Carter played percussion in these songs – large stones at two different pitches, used sparingly.  This was most telling at the end of the first song, where they doubtless represented the hammering of nails into a cross.

The second song, ‘In memory of a fellow-worker’, used not only the stones, but also two different bells, which chimed three times at appropriate intervals.  The setting featured sprechstimme, a cross between speaking and singing, and some awkward intervals, all of which were managed well.  The men were accurate and characterful on the whole.  Angular phrases contrasted with legato ones.  The whole was wrought, and performed, with sombre effect.

Douglas Mews played his father’s Sesqui Suite for solo piano (no prizes for guessing the year in which it was written) of three sections: ‘Auckland Awakening’, in which bass notes intoned, with a gentle phrase at the top of the treble that gradually opened out to a mainly quiet awakening; ‘Auckland Awhiowhio’, in which the spritely wind (no, that’s not a misspelling) was all over the place – will-o’-the-wisp, some of it very high at the top of Mt. Eden, other gusts at ground level; ‘Auckland Awash’ with a surging sea, featuring ripples and crashes of waves.  This was scene-painting, impressionistic music.  It was played with great accomplishment and sensitivity to the varying moods and subtleties.   

The lighter part of the programme began with an original Mews setting of Lear’s well-known ‘The Owl and the Pussy-cat’.  More delightful word-painting, especially the spoken “Dear Pig, are you willing…” followed by a high squeak “I will”.  The choir demonstrated precision and good tone.

Arrangements followed: of Simon and Garfunkel’s version of ‘Scarborough Fair’; where the men lost pitch to some extent; the spiritual ‘Little David’, which featured a semi-chorus of sopranos, and excellent contrast in dynamics.

Finally, arrangements of three Maori songs: ‘Hoki hoki’ (which I always find a tear-jerker), ‘Akoako o Te Rangi’, which began effectively with men and altos humming while sopranos sang the melody line, and finally that most often sung song, ‘Pokarekare ana’.  This was a superb arrangement beautifully sung, with good consistency of pronunciation, despite the pitch dropping.

This was evocative music and both entrancing and interesting to hear.  Some of it should certainly be heard more often.  The range of genres of music and of invention was impressive; the whole was a magnificent tribute to an importantNew Zealandcomposer.  For the choir’s part, there was much that was difficult without the support of accompaniment, and all members acquitted themselves well.

 

 

Bach: Prelude and Fugue in C major, BWV 870, Prelude and Fugue in C minor, BWV 871, from The Well-Tempered Clavier
Matthew Camidge (1764-1844): Concerto no.2 in G minor
Handel: Suite no.3 in D minor, HWV 28

Douglas Mews, chamber organ

St Andrew’s on The Terrace

Wednesday, 27 March 2013, 12.15pm

I was asked by the young man to whom I gave a ride into town on Wednesday, when I told him I was going to an organ recital: “Why do skeletons not play music in church?” Answer:  “Because they have no organs.”  But St. Andrew’s on The Terrace has two, and it was refreshing to hear the chamber organ this time.

What was even more refreshing was to see it pulled to the centre of the platform, where it looked resplendent, and sounded much more direct and sonorous.  It was a little ironic that, playing in a position such that the audience could see Douglas Mews’s feet on the pedals, which is not the case usually at organ recitals, he chose music which incorporated very little in the way of pedal parts, as his spoken introductions informed us in advance.

Mews’s playing brought out all the character and melodic interest of the Bach pieces much more readily than is the case in their more frequently- heard piano renditions.  As my mother says on the old private recording I have of her playing the second of these preludes “The piano does not bring out the notes of the tune as does the organ or the clavichord”.  (Please excuse her grammar!)

For the second prelude, Mews chose a delightfully “chuffy” flute registration, followed by a brighter registration for the fugue.  All was well articulated, but the notes were not made staccato; thus the themes were not broken up.  Throughout, the performer’s technique and rhythm were impeccable, barring a very few wrong notes.

Matthew Camidge was new to me; as Douglas Mews said, his music looked back to the eighteenth century and the style of Handel rather than being typical of the new century, and being English, made little use of the pedals even though they had been integral to German organ music for well over 100 years.

The first movement, adagio, incorporated a number of changes of registration to include reed pipes (for which Mews had an assistant to perform some of the manipulation of stops), which added interest.  This was followed by an athletic allegro, that incorporated a few pedal notes.  The third movement, adagio, went back to flutes.  This movement employed more chromaticism than occurred in Handel’s music.  The jolly opening theme of the final gavotte reminded me of one of Bach’s organ works to which some wit applied the words (in honour of a nineteenth century editor of Bach’s music): “O Ebenezer Prout, you are a funny man”; it was a sprightly dance.

Handel, though a noted organist, wrote nothing for the instrument except for the concertos, which is a pity.  However, this harpsichord suite sounded splendid on the organ, and the link is that the last movement of this suite is also the final movement of his Op.7 no.4 organ concerto.  Despite it being written for harpsichord, Douglas Mews was able to find moments to employ the pedals to good effect in the opening Prelude.  Certainly there is a greater variety of timbres and tones on even a small organ than could be obtained from the harpsichord.

The Allegro movement was played without pedals; there were lots of notes, and the whole was in a dotted rhythm.  The third movement, Allemande, was quite lovely with a flute registration, and to my mind calm and beautiful compared to what its sound would be on the harpsichord.  Of course a rather different technique is required to play the suite on the organ instead of on the harpsichord.

The Courante certainly ran, in bright tones.  Decorated notes were played with exemplary clarity and the pedals were put to use again, both near the end here, and in the next movement, Air and Variations, an extended movement that showed great invention on the part of Handel.  Adding a 2-foot stop gave a tinkling bell-like sound that was most appealing (no pun intended).

The Presto finale I certainly recognised from the organ concerto – though here it was faster than on my recording of the latter – prestidigitation indeed.

We were privileged to hear an expert playing this fine music.

 

Joyeux Noël: organ music for Christmas by French composers

Dianne Halliday

St. Peter’s Church, Willis Street

Friday, 21 December, 7pm

Dianne Halliday gave her audience a wonderful conspectus of French organ music for Christmas, mainly. but not exclusively, from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  It was a pity that the composers’ dates were not in the printed programme.  However, I was able to find all except one, in a variety of sources, but chiefly Wikipedia.

The opening piece was ‘Chant du Roi René’ from Les Livres de Noëls by Alexandre Guilmant, who lived from 1837 to 1911.  It was a lively, rhythmic piece based on traditional Noëls, featuring a full diapason choir, as a rousing opening to the recital.

In complete contrast were two Noëls by seventeenth century composer André Raison.  Here, soft reeds contrasted with flutes in the first piece, with a tremulant at the end, while the second featured a medieval-style melody.  Michel Corrette flourished from 1707 to 1795 – like all the other composers in the programme except one, he confirmed my observation that organists are a long-lived lot.  His Première Suite de Noëls consisted of four movements.  Among the four delightful pieces was ‘Une jeune pucelle’ (A young virgin), on flutes, and ‘Noël Provençale (tambourin)’, a polyphonic piece that introduced a stop that sounded like a Jew’s harp.

Clément Loret (Belgian-born, 1833-1909) followed; of his Six Noëls avec Variations Dianne Halliday played no.5, ‘Noël Arlesien’.  This was a delightfully inventive piece.  The title summed up what all the pieces on the programme were: variations on traditional Christmas songs and melodies.  Most had simple folk melodies which were then varied to great effect, both in the writing, and in the registrations used by Dianne Halliday.  Despite this and the range in dates of the composers, there was a certain sameness in the programme.  This one had many variations, and a great variety of registrations.  A simple melody was introduced sotto voce with the swell box closed, and then repeated with a 15^th stop added at the top, then a louder rendition, then more flutes for the next, and yet more variations to follow, most without pedal parts.  Last of all was a variation played in what is probably the upper reach of human hearing – a 2-foot rank?

The next composer, Nicolas Lebègue, lived from 1631 to 1702.  Laissez paître vos bêtes (Leave grazing your animals) was based on the same melody as Bizet used for the Prelude in his first L’Arlesienne suite.  The variations included a second on quiet reeds (Vox Humana?), followed by a third on full diapason chorus.

The name Charpentier is a well-known one in French composition circles, though I could find no evidence that Jean-Jacques Beauvarlet-Charpentier was the relative of the two famous composers of that name.  His dates were 1734 to 1794.  The two of his Douze Noëls played: no.5, ‘Noël pour une Elévation’ and ‘Noël dans le Gout [manner] de la Symphonie Concertante’ were charming variations on two traditional Christmas songs.  The second melody was titled ‘Où s’en vont ces gais bergers?’; one could, perhaps, hear the shepherds’ clumsy movements in the abrasive reeds, and their pipes in the gentler flute tones.

Jean-François Dandrieu’s two pieces were enchanting; he flourished from 1682 to 1738.  Following his music, we had Jean Bouvard’s Noël Vosgien.  He was the only one of the featured composers for whom I could not find any information.  The piece employed some rather different tonalities, and like the other pieces in the programme, was most appealing.

‘Noël cette Journée’ from Douze Noëls by Louis-Claude D’Aquin (1694-1772) is a piece that I did know, having a recording of it on an LP made by my late revered organ teacher, Maxwell Fernie.  I have a memory of a hymn or carol in English on the Noël’s melody, but could not track it down in any of the relevant books I have.

André Fleury (1903-1995) was the composer of  Variations sur un Noël Bourguignon.  We heard one of the pieces: ‘Lo qu’en la saison qu’ai jaule’.  An interesting reed stop opened the music, then the melody was heard on the pedals with quiet accompaniment.  Louder variations followed in this extremely effective piece.

The penultimate piece was by the appropriately-named Ếmile Bourdon (1884-1974); a Noël by the 17th century Nicholas Saboly, ‘Lei
plus sage – Dòu vesinage’, [a Noël setting in the Langue d’Oc of the
south of France].  Finally, Quatre Noëls Op.26, by Charles Quef (1873-1931).  The first, ‘Noël Lorraine’ was the most contemporary-sounding piece in the programme.  It ended in a march.  ‘Noël Mâconnais’ utilised a modal melody that introduced chunky variations.  ‘Noël Breton’ was calm, with a positive mood, while ‘Noël Parisienne’ was a very bright and attractive piece, with a strong melody and a spirited finish.

What an amazing selection of Christmas organ music from France this was!  Dianne Halliday revealed a rich tapestry of music we seldom hear.  Nearly all had ‘Noël’ in the title.  I had never heard of the majority of the composers.  The playing was always beautifully articulated; registrations all had clarity and euphony; the organist exploiting the beauties of the organ to the full.  The recital was quite long, and a tour de force for the performer, to use an appropriately French phrase.

 

 

Organ works by Buxtehude, J.S. Bach and Guilmant

Gedymin Grubba

St. Peter’s Anglican Church, Willis Street

Sunday, 4 November 2012, 3pm

When Polish organist Gedymin Grubba was here almost exactly two years ago, he played the relatively small baroque-style organ at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church.   How very different to play on the much larger, recently-restored William Hill organ at St. Peter’s!  Despite that, most of this programme was from the baroque era.

This time, more of the music was familiar to me, but I find some of the remarks I made in my review of that recital still apply.

The opening work was one of my favourites: J.S. Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E flat major, BWV 552.  It has a thrilling opening, and episodes of different character in both movements.  The Fugue is known in English as the ‘St. Anne’ because the  first theme resembles the St. Anne hymn tune used for ‘O God, our help in ages past’, a hymn that would have been unknown to Bach.  Walter Emery, in the Preface to my Novello edition of the music states ‘…the subject was a commonplace…’ and quotes the titles of contemporary fugues with similar themes.  ‘I record these resemblances as curiosities…’  Grubba chose a bold registration for this, but I found it had rather a buzzy overlay.

Rather than agreeing with the remark in my previous review, that the organist played “with an appropriately detached technique for this period of music”, I found this time the amount of lift, or detachment between notes and chords, too much – particularly in the fugue.  It broke up the line of the theme; the “singers” had to breathe far too often.  Maintaining a more legato line for the theme would have made the detached quavers in the final section of the fugue even more dramatic.

I would have liked a different registration for the fugue, rather than the same stops as were used for the prelude; this would have given more clarity to the parts.  It was also very slow for a chorale style of theme and its development – it became rather ponderous.

The Buxtehude chorale prelude Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist used flutes to accompany the melody on a reed stop (I think!), and this was very effective, but again, I found there were too many lifts in the melody line, to the extent that it became irritating. The line of the chorale melody was not always maintained, and the rhythm was jerky at times.  There needs to be phrasing, as in a sung or danced piece of music.  It is appropriate to separate repeated notes, but the first of the notes needs a little more time value than was often given here, otherwise the music sounds breathless, and the style interferes with the musical line.

Buxtehude’s Passacaglia in D minor found the pedal rather loud.  Yes, that is where the Passacaglia theme is to be found, as a ground bass, but I think we would still have heard it if played a little more lightly.  Again, to me the lifts were too long.  There is a style of playing baroque organ music where the notes are played more-or-less staccato, but these lifts were longer than that, and came every few notes through much (not all) of the music.

The Bach Prelude in B minor was not one I knew.   The 8ft., 4ft., 2ft. registration was most attractive, and the pedal part had a good sound.  In this piece there was more continuity – more legato playing.

The third in a group of three chorale preludes by Bach on Allein Gott in der Höh’ sei Ehr’ received a delicious registration, the 2ft. stop being used for the upper part, and a very contrasting registration for the left hand.  I enjoyed this piece very much; there was a lovely contrast between the three parts, yet the balance was maintained.

The last of the baroque items was Bach’s wonderful Fantasia in G minor, another of my favourites.  The dancing semi-quavers of the first section were very fast, so that they were not always distinct from each other, while the middle section, marked Grave was too fast and bouncy, losing its grave grandeur.  Again, too many separated notes spoiled the musical line.  The first chord in each couplet was not given enough value – and the buzzy sound returned with the registration used.  The final section, with its demi-semi-quaver triplets was beautifully played, with a lovely, registration.

The final work was the Scherzo from Guilmant’s Organ Symphony no.5, also played in a very detached manner, though there was phrasing, too.  The work contains some attractive melodies, but the scherzo rhythm was rather lost at times because of the nature of the playing.

As an encore, Grubba played from memory a showy march of his own composition, on full organ with reeds.

The printed programme listed the composers (with dates) and the titles and other details of the works, but there were no programme notes; additional proofreading would have been advantageous for both the titles of works and the notes about the performer.