Martin Cooke

I agree with Vox's points entirely - variety of choice in the best sense, and friendly introductions to the music are what is needed in most settings. I can imagine it being different in a university college chapel or for a generally more erudite audience. In general terms, I find audiences and congregations are appreciative if they are told a little story about the music or composer and if they know why one has chosen to play something - a chance to hear a certain stop, or to mark a centenary or whatever. One of the things I have enjoyed doing pre-Covid is demonstrating the organ to visiting organists associations. For these I tend to choose snippets of repertoire that is not necessarily mainstream but illustrates the main features/families and solo stops of the organ in as musical a way as I can manage. Veering slightly off-topic, as we are wont to do... Yesterday was the feast of St Francis. I played the Bédard Cat Suite before the service - this became a tribute to dear Doorkins Magnificat, resident and very popular feline at Southwark Cathedral who died last week. See here. (I played the Suite in reverse order starting with the Toccata so as to arrive at a more gentle piece immediately before the service started.) At the gradual I used John Rutter's new solo piano arrangement of his own All things bright and beautiful. Then, at the offertory, I had been looking to play something based on Lasst uns erfruen, and the hymn All creatures of our God and King. I had been counting on the Choveaux but couldn't read it sufficiently well in my 'no page turner' score. Rebecca Groome te Velde's and also June Nixon's were both too short. Gordon Slater's is a tad dull, and in any case, I just didn't have time to do it justice, so I discovered Alec Rowley's in volume 2 of his cream Choral Prelude volumes - Ashdown. It's here. I found it really rather satisfactory - an arresting start, and nice languid middle section with plenty of opportunity to solo out some of the themes, and a powerful introduction to a stately final section. Not in any sense a foot-tapper, of course, but a 'good piece!' Plenty of rubato needed. Then I played Le Cygne during Communion which is always apt in Bradford on Avon as there are swans almost always on the river near the church. And, indeed, as I arrived yesterday, there were two noisily flying along the swollen river as I crossed the footbridge - quite a sight! I followed the Saint-Saens with the Meditation on Slane, calling to mind the hymn Lord of creation. This was by Charles Callahan - from his Celtic Suite - appropriately wistful but perhaps a little lascivious harmonically. I couldn't keep up the creation theme for the final voluntary and closed with the Wesley Choral Song.

This sounds very interesting. Where is the sheet, please?

Many thanks for these ideas, folks. I'm a bit reticent about contacting JSW to ask a favour like that. Why, I can't help but feel, should he want to fiddle about with a scanner - assuming he has one - for someone he's never heard of and is unlikely to be in need of a favour returned? Good to see reference above to 'Ora Labora' - not a tune I knew until I was having a rummage on the St Thomas website (or, more likely youTube) one day and found a recording of it accompanied by Gerre Hancock who then went on to improvise a voluntary on it - I think it might have been his last service at St Thomas. OK - here it is - worth a listen.

You do see people using A3 comb bound art books which they glue photocopied sheets into. I have done this for a few pieces - for example, the JSB chorale prelude Christ unser Herr zum Jordan kam - but if there are lots of pages, I find I have to shrink the music so small, I then can't read it well enough - this is a problem with perpetuum mobile type pieces where your hands can't leave the keys. I was hopign to play the Nicholas Choveaux piece based on Lasst uns erfruen for the Feast of St Francis on Sunday, but once the Toccata kicks in, and there is no opportunity to make a page turn, I now find I just can't read it sufficiently well in the edition I have produced. You can see Daniel Cook managing all of this sort of thing very well in some of his Youtube contributions - and I have learned a lot by observing him - though it is only common sense. Thing is, I can normally rely on a page turner.

Catching up on my reading, I have finally reached volume 40 of the BIOS Journal - 2016. In it, there is a very interesting article about the organ music of T Tertius Noble of York Minster and St Thomas Fifth Avenue fame. I have virtually no organ music by him - there's the piece in the Novello Canterbury Album, a couple of bits and pieces in IMSLP and then I picked a Choral Prelude on Melcombe on eBay a few years back. I am very keen to get hold of a copy of his piece Autumn written in 1932 but publish by Schmidt in the USA. I am sorry that this request also appears on the 'other site' but I just wonder if anyone here can assist. It seems that a lot of his pieces that were published by Schmidt were taken up by OUP and published over here, but, sadly for me, only those written between 1923 and 1927. Can anyone help? If anyone has copies of his other choral preludes especially those on well-known tunes, I would be very interested in seeing copies. Many thanks in keen anticipation of your help! Martin.

That was most useful, Steve, thank you. Could a small set up like this be of any use as a CCTV system between organist and conductor or is there a delay?

Sorry - here's the link - http://www.purr-n-fur.org.uk/famous/faith.html

Do tell us more about Paul Hale's experiences with it.

Do tell us more about your interest in these organs, Achiles. Are you a cat lover as well, by any chance? This site tells the story of Faith the cat at St Augustine's and it seems the air raid was on Monday 9th September. It's a lovely story.

Your a not alone in your findings!

It has been finished - some time ago now.

Very apposite that Joseph Wicks' organ arrangement of the Elgar orchestration has just been published - see here.

Reading Hart's Rules, it's embarrassing to find that I have been addressing envelopes incorrectly all my life - no commas on an envelope... anywhere... apparently! Who knew?

.... and there's a book on the subject, by Giles Brandreth... Have you eaten Grandma?

In the 70s, there was an Abbey Records LP played by Murray Sommerville at New College. I haven't got it any more, but the Teint may well have had an outing on this. One of the pieces for for organ and tape by Richard Stewart. In view of all the weird and wonderful sounds required in this piece, it would seem surprising if an experimental mutation were not employed, but would we know?! The noteworthy track on this record was a compelling performance of Reger's Hallelujah! Gott zu loben.

The 1962 Nicholson in St Michael's, Newquay (subsequently destroyed by fire) had a None on the Choir. With 8,4,2,2 2/3, it made a delightful bell like sound. I remember using it for the opening right hand part in the Rutter Sans Day carol, for example. It added a bit of magic.

I've ordered one.

Indeed, they don't! It's not completely silent, though - see page 24.

Ha! No cause for alarm... I was mistaken! The style guide in question makes clear that the opposite of what I said is correct. It doesn't actually say forums/fora, but it does give stratum/strata as one of several examples. Mind you, it does qualify its guidance by saying that foreign plurals apply 'where still in common usage.' Lord knows who decides which of these is in common usage. It's here if you fancy a good read!

Thanks rogbi - no, I have the music - it's the Elgar bit I need a quick answer to!!

I remember someone saying once that Sir Edward Elgar described the Londonderry Air as the finest tune ever written. Can anyone possibly corroborate this or know exactly what it was that Elgar said? Somewhere, recently, someone has been asking how to find the delightful Rawsthorne organ prelude on the LDA. I will be playing this at the Gradual in church on Sunday as the hymn 'I cannot tell why he, whom angels worship' references the gospel of the day, according to the RSCM's 'Sunday by Sunday' publication. A quick answer to the above would be great as I'd like to prime the Rector.

It is great to see several new 'names' popping up as newbies on this site - welcome, all of you! When the original announcement about Mander Organs was made, a number of us who couldn't live without our daily dose of forum activity, wondered what to do. A member of this forum, Steve G, sprang into action and set up a very similar one - here... https://houndscroft.co.uk/organ-forum/ Have a look! I am sure that we all hope the Mander Organs forum will continue - it seems to have over 1000 members, many of whom are very eminent in their field, though we only hear regularly from a tiny minority of members - fewer than 10%, I reckon. The new 'houndscroft' forum has a couple of extra 'tabs' - one for choral music, which many of us are involved with, and the other for digital organs, which a lot of us own, so some added interest. Please do not feel that for a moment I wish to divert action from here to there. A number of members have indicated on the other site that they welcome the new one and that they intend to keep up with both. And it seems to me that we live in an uncertain world, and so there is an element of eggs in the one basket or babies and bath water about having a good, 'oven ready' (oh dear!) other/additional option. The most important thing about both of these forums is that we all try to contribute. We all need to ask questions, relate stories, talk about interesting organs, music, articles, discoveries and experiences and not be shy about it! (And yes, I know that the plural of forum is meant to be 'fora' but that does seem very pedantic these days, and I think I saw in at least one university style guide recently that Latin plurals could/should be avoided). Best wishes to one an all and especially to newbies!

Ha! I also played Pastorale and Folk Tune. Yes, a wonderful treasure trove that volume. The only organ piece of his that I have failed to appreciate is Plaint. Do you know the Canzona from the Sonata, James?

Thanks for all these contributions and suggestions. Yes, length of the piece is quite important at the moment. The Thalben-Ball and Groom te Velde pieces are an ideal length for the Gradual as the clergy are not 'busy' whilst this is going on, but I find 4/5 minutes' worth is needed at the Offertory and even longer at Communion - though I don't stick to hymn based pieces then. Here, I played the Whitlock Duetto last Sunday followed by a piece of Bédard which I still had to extend. In a thread somewhere, someone mentioned Noel Rawsthorne's Londonderry Air piece. I could play that this coming Sunday as the hymn I cannot tell is one of those on the RSCM's suggested list. NR's compositions are always well worth perusing - two recent discoveries.... the piece based on 'Picardy' in the volume of Christmas carol preludes by him (Mayhew), and his piece based on Veni Creator Spiritus which is in a Mayhew volume of Pentecost music. The other piece worth having in this volume is Philip Moore's on the Howells tune 'Salisbury.' I can be more specific about these volumes if anyone wants me to be.

What some of us like about the other site is that it allows discussion of digital organs and choral music - the former, without fear of upsetting the host... not that there has been any discussion of note, on that topic, tbh. I have written to the MD of the new company asking if they might be willing to allow this wider range of topics and Steve has as well, but there has been no response just yet. Personally, I am happy to read and contribute to both sites for the time being.