Martin Cooke

Not sure if it is just me, but news of the Canterbury organ has disappeared from the Harrison and Harrison website now. Still nothing on the cathedral website either.

Does anyone know more about the extent of the revoicing undertaken by Ruffati at Keble in recent weeks - see the Keble website where this is mentioned.

I am sure other board members have been following progress at King's - the organ seems now to be fully reinstated. Here is a link to a close up shot of the console and I am interested in those page turn pistons. Presumably, these link up to a tablet. Does anyone have experience of playing from a tablet? If so, could you tell us more and provide a few pointers? Elsewhere on the King's Choir Facebook site, there is a juxtaposition of photos showing the console before and after restoration. On the 'before' pic, there is a stop knob down underneath the keyboards on the right hand side. Does anyone know what this was for?

Thank you so much DKP - I knew I had it, but to be honest, I had forgotten all about those Bristol Collection volumes, not finding other items all that valuable.

I've been reading Arthur Wills' autobiography Full with Wills which is most interesting an enjoyable. Is this piece in a Novello album or published separately? I am sure I have it but can't find it!

Absolutely! This is a very exciting volume but as Philip says, some are not for the fainthearted and would need a good deal of practice. (The introduction to Howells' Michael, for instance.) Many items would be great for use in chapels of many independent schools (my world) where there is the luxury of congregational practice so that adequate warning can be given of bravura introductions and interludes, to say nothing of the chance to use the descants and the whole shooting match. The same applies, of course to major choral places though without the 'congo' I presume. It's good finally to have some arrangements of some of the more popular 'newer' hymns - There is a Redeemer, Shine, Jesus, shine - (aaaaargh - I can hear pcnd's reaction already!) - The Servant King, etc, oh, and... In Christ alone. I can't imagine what sort of a hullabaloo I have just started in mentioning those! I only wish Novello had gone for a spiral binding. I know they can look a bit naff - and I am bound to say that the June Nixon volume from Kevin Mayhew which I have enthusiastically endorsed in this post is a bit in that zone - but Carols for Choirs 5, for example, is very neatly done so that the spiral binding is covered by a cardboard spine which helps it to look better on the shelves as well as being more readily identified, of course. For people like me, who believe that hymn singing is a wonderful community activity, and want to help others to share the joy... and who have the resources at their disposal to make a success of all of this... this volume is great fun. If only I hadn't just retired!!

This does indeed look to be a corker of a volume and I hope my copy will be arriving today. Yesterday, I took delivery of the latest OUP Hymn Settings volume - Autumn Festivals. Again, this is full of interest and I can imagine myself using at least half of the contents. Some of is will take some learning mind. There are a number of American hymns and in some cases, having looked out the sources on line, it seems that some of the preludes and better than the hymns they are based on. Still, that could just as easily be the case with some English/Welsh tunes. I suppose I am thinking of Rhosymedre. If I were playing regularly these days - (I have just retired) - I would be looking at Malcolm Archer's jaunty piece based on We plough the fields and scatter, for starters. Paul Leddington Wright's delicious little piece on Engelberg would also be getting an early outing. There is always a bit of a compromise when buying an album of music I suppose. When I look back to boyhood, and OUP were producing things like An Album of Praise, and An Album of Postludes etc - you know, the volumes with the old organ case from St George's, Hanover Square on the front - I don't think I ever really got my teeth into more than one piece in any of them - it was the Gordon Jacob piece in Album of Praise.

Hello Friedrich - very helpful indeed - thank you so much! All the best; Martin.

I'm just getting my fingers round the E major Chorale and I am using the Durand edition which I have had since 1973 but only tackled the A minor in any serious way up to now. So, after the opening alternating passages on Great and Swell, one finds the instruction "Gamba, Oboe in - draw Vox Humana, tremulant." Up to this point one is playing on the Swell using 'fonds' with the Oboe. Is this next section meant to be with Vox Humana alone or should fonds other than the Gamba still be drawn - so, I have a diapason, a lieblich available. Second question... amongst 'fonds', is it appropriate to include a celestes on the swell? I know that really it comes down to what sounds right in the end but any thoughts welcome. Many thaks; Martin.

Here we are - this is a note from an email from Allegro Music - Richard Priest. It's £7.95. I must say, I have found most DB pieces pretty impossible! David Briggs - Variation XV We are delighted to announce the arrival of a brand new publication from the Diocese of Hereford’s Organists’ Training Scheme (DHOTS). It is a 15th Variation to the Elgar’s Enigma Variations composed by David Briggs. The piece, written as a special tribute to Dr Roy Massey MBE for his 80th birthday, is a witty combination of Elgar’s “Enigma” theme, Henry Smart’s Postlude in D and Dr Massey’s own exuberant improvisatory style, and was premiered in Hereford Cathedral after a performance of the Enigma Variations. The edition is beautifully type-set by Roger Judd and includes background notes and colour photographs of both David and Roy.

Meant to add... need to find out now about David Briggs' new piece - 15th Variation. Can't remember where I read about it...

Thanks for this AJJ - all really worth a look, aren't they. Am I right in thinking that someone on the forum directed us to the website of Paul Page? He produces some very nice pieces which you can download for free - I have a few of these and especially enjoy Un petit café français... but - and here's the thing - his website seems to have closed overnight - let's hope it's temporary. Here at my school, we have a big chapel service every Friday afternoon and because we have more pupils than we can fit in chapel these days, we have experimented with different ways of dividing the school up. This term, we have had boys one week and girls the next - these are 13-18 year olds. Goodness, what an improvement in their singing! This Friday we had I vow to thee, my country as the first of three hymns so I wound things up by playing the new June Nixon Recessional on Thaxted before the service - loudly, of course - and then used her last verse harmonisation in the 2nd verse. Sorry to keep plugging the Hymns Amazing volume by her - but I can't get enough of it at the moment!

Yes, I played this too - a lovely piece. I have also recently played an interesting piece based on a tune called Bridegroom. It is by one of the US composers - a delightful and 'different' piece - tune on solo 4' flute against a drone on swell strings to begin with an then develops from there - well worth a look. I also indulged myself with Tambling Nicaea piece - quite a corker, this. Watch out for anything by Ashley Grote and David Thorne - always worthwhile. All David Thorne's contributions throughout the series are delightful.

Yes, Philip is absolutely correct - there are a number of American hymns represented in all the volumes and this might be seen as a drawback - but... I suppose we all play German and other chorale preludes on tunes that we don't sing over here. Chris Tambling would have been flattered to see BWV552 moving aside for his Nicaea piece. I want to get my fingers around the David Blackwell piece at the end of the Pentecost and Trinity volume which is dedicated to Chris's memory - it's based on Walk in the Light which is not a tune that is in my DNA as it were. I just wanted to mention, again, the June Nixon volumes I referred to above. I have now got a copy of the Hymns Amazing volume and, I have to say, the title is most apposite! [i originally bought the Preludes Amazing by mistake, but I have passed this on to a friend.] This volume really is a super addition to the repertoire - goodness me, June Nixon, is a fine composer and arranger. You will find here some really cracking last verse arrangements - worth buying just for those - but also some quite delightful preludes of all different species and styles on a wide range of well-known hymns. I played a good dozen of them yesterday and they are entirely straightforward but fresh, listenable, playable and useful. I think everyone would love the one on Thaxted, for a start. Then, as I said yesterday, you get a introduction, the hymn tune proper, an arrangement with alternative harmony, an interlude and then a last verse arrangement. All the last verses I tried were spot on - new and interesting with excellent harmonic progressions. I bought mine through Amazon just for the sake of speed it was £19.99 and I wouldn't have been disappointed if I had paid £29.99. It is great value. Preludes Amazing seems to be about £16.00 - don't hesitate to spend the extra fiver and get all those additions.

This is just the sort of thing I like to hear about - what's caught other people's attention so that new ideas are always germinating. Thanks Vox.

I wonder how many members have caught up with the latest volume in the OUP Hymn Settings series - Pentecost and Trinity. I played a lovely piece by David Blackwell based on Down Ampney, last Sunday morning. Christopher Tambling's Tuba Tune on Nicaea will get a good outing on Sunday. There are some really excellent miniatures in this series and there is a further new volume coming out in July - Autumn Festivals. The Easter and Ascension volume also has some great pieces in it - a fabulous piece by James Biery on St Fulbert, a Crown Imperial-like piece on Lux Eoi by David Blackwell and a great piece by Paul Leddington-Wright on Guiting Power all stick in the memory but there are many others that folk here would enjoy, and which, in a more spacious age, I shall look forward to getting my teeth into. The price of these volumes varies according to size - all about £15 - £19. (There is an OUP website where you can see sample material from these albums - if you were to look up the Easter and Ascension volume, you can see extracts from the Biery and Blackwell pieces I have just mentioned.) Something else that I have just come across is a new volume from Kevin Mayhew - Preludes Amazing by June Nixon. [This volume in itself is of material extracted from something called Hymns Amazing which I haven't seen but which I believe contains not just preludes but introductions, pre-last verse interludes and last verse arrangements.] I have only just given this a cursory look but I have found anything by June Nixon to be superbly crafted and I have every reason to think this latest work to be in the same vein. Has anyone any other tips for new publications or discoveries at the moment?

I came across this site for the Southwark and South London Society of Organists by chance recently. Marilyn Harper, their Chairman, writes something worth reading every month it seems. I have enjoyed reading all her articles.

And someone else that we both know, I think, David — Ian Sadler — has recently been appointed to St James' Cathedral, Toronto.

Gosh - what a lovely tribute that film is. My own touchstones with Richard were from being a chorister at St Paul's when he was Assistant Sub-Organist. He would take probationers' practice one morning and his main duty appeared to be playing/assisting at the Sunday morning Mattins/Eurcharist double service. I'm not quite sure exactly what he did on these occasions as it was not the custom at St Paul's in those days to have one in the loft and one downstairs, but I think it was too much for one organist to manage on their own if the Communion setting was unaccompanied. Yes, thinking about it, there were things like the intonation for the Creed and Gloria for such settings as the Vaughan Williams that required two organists - I'm sure there was more to it than that! I don't remember his playing at all - partly because we didn't really know when he WAS playing! I expect he took his turn at weekday evensong from time to time but this must have been very rare. I have one recollection of his appearing downstairs to conduct an anthem because he looked so untidy! (This is a small boy's recollection, don't forget!) He was wearing the old chocolate and blue FRCO hood and appeared to have tied it in a knot on his back and his surplice was all over the place as well. Anyway, roll on a bit and I took part in one of Douglas Hopkins' 'Holiday Courses for Organists' at the RAM in 1973. Richard was a most congenial member of the staff team at that and I remember 'doing' the B minor 'Corelli' fugue with him on the old RAM Duke's Hall organ. Fast forward even further and I last met him at the garden party at Buckingham Palace about 20 years ago, and again, his tremendous friendliness was striking. He relished in reminiscing about old days at St Paul's and had a lot to say about the old school characters who had taught on that 1973 course - Hopkins, Hawkridge, Arthur Wills, etc.

Hello Dave - no, that's not quite right. These are entirely separate pieces. "Les Rameaux" (The Palms - as you rightly say) is the third of Trois Poèmes Evangéliques. Meanwhile Hommage à Rameau is something different altogether. It was originally a set of six pieces written in memory of, or as a tribute to Jean-Philippe Rameau, the French Baroque composer. All the best; Martin.

Does anybody have a copy of his Improvisation on a Tune by Orlando Gibbons that I might be able to have a copy of? I can't track it down in any of the usual sources - it was published by Cramer. Any leads gratefully appreciated. Many thanks - Martin.

Sorry to have been such a dead loss in terms of looking this up for you and obviously, today is much too late to be telling you this! The piece I was thinking about is by Stanley Vann and is called Fantasy Prelude on Men of Harlech. It seems, nowadays, to be in several of the Mayhew compilations but I believe it was first published in a volume called Music of the Islands.

Mmm... gruesome. I guess they didn't have sufficient rehearsal time.

Mmm... not sure - I don't remember the 'Toccata' appendage! I will go and check for you and get back.

Well worth a visit to the King's Cambridge Choir's site to read the latest on the organ work, but, it's particularly worth it to listen to a couple of beautiful evensongs on their webcast list accompanied by piano. If you're short of time, listen to Stanford in G Magnificat with piano duet accompaniment.