Martin Cooke

Regarding the St Paul's Dome Chorus Cymbal, I agree that this had a thrilling effect - you hear it once or twice in some Dearnley recordings - but I think I read somewhere that this stop's composition was altered because it was difficult to keep in tune. Could that be right? Might JPM possibly comment?

The André Fleury piece (No 24 of 24 Pièces) mentioned above is on YouTube here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LP5kOybYzs8

Has the Whitlock Toccata from the Plymouth Suite been mentioned? This is pretty straightforward.

Mmm... and you can buy the Charlton on Amazon. New, it's £76, or several people are offering a second hand one for 90p!!! I've ordered one of those! The Dibble seems to be £47 new, and at the moment, I can't spot a cheaper option, but thanks to Vox's enthusiastic endorsement, I shall keep looking!

Ah!... Is that it?!

Has anyone heard anything more about a new organ for Canterbury? I can't find anything.

There is a copy available from sheetmusicwarehouse for £16 - quite steep that! Better value might be to treat yourself to a copy of the OUP album - The Complete Shorter Organ Works of PW. This contains the Five Short Pieces, Three Reflections, Four Extemporisations + the Psalm Sketches and the Hymn Preludes. Sadly I left my copy of the 5 SPs behind in the organ loft at Salisbury Cathedral after playing there for a service in about 1990 and haven't seen it since!

Does anyone have anything in mind to play in memory of Nelson Mandela, by any chance?

Thanks, Douglas. In the end, before the service, I played most of David Drinkell's splendid arrangement of Henry Wood's Fantasia on British Sea Songs - (leaving out Jack's the Lad and the clarinet cadenza, which I thought might be a bit much for a funeral, but including Tom Bowling) - ending with Rule Britannia. At the end, as the coffin was borne from the chancel I played Heart of Oak.

Thanks for the ideas - I had forgotten the previous thread on this topic, I'm afraid. I think I'm sorted now.

I have to play for the funeral of a retired RN officer. He had had a good innings and the family are up for something celebratory. I have David Drinkell's arrangement of the Henry Wood British Sea Songs, I can do Hearts of Oak... does anyone have any other reasonably sensible ideas? I've played the Overture to HMS Pinafore before now, but would draw the line at Yellow Submarine!! What else might there be? Is there a decent chorale prelude on Melita, for a start? Many thanks in anticipation of your assistance. Martin.

Alec Rowley - a long piece based on 64th Psalm - I can look it up if you want me to! If you are including pieces called Jubilate - then Armstrong Gibbs, Mathias.

Just been rummaging on itunes and the Richard Lea recording from Liverpool Met, as alluded to earlier, is there, of course. There is a Prelude, Elegy and Toccata listed which I don't think I've ever heard of before - I certainly don't recall it being published by OUP as (all?) other Mathias organ music has been. The Toccata is most exciting! Does anyone know about this?

I haven't sung it since school days - so 40 years ago and I somehow doubt if it is in use very much. I played through Jubilate and Postlude yesterday in a spare 10 minutes. The former needs a bit of work but Postlude's coming up soon.

Perhaps we all ought to learn a piece of Mathias in the next few weeks. I think I'm going to! Processional is good fun and was enhanced for me by the late 60's recording from St Paul's with Christopher Herrick using the Trompette Militaire for the main tune throughout. I think I'm going to revisit Toccata Giocosa, Postlude and Jubilate. At a school concert last night, one of the pupils played Andante Cantabile from his flute Sonatina and previously I have heard the first movement which is really quite exciting. It's on Youtube here. A babe is born is a great favourite - I've grown a bit tired of Sir Christèmas and find A babe is born a bit more grown up, if you know what I mean!

I see that the RSCM is publishing two large volumes of his organ music. Does anybody already play any of this and is it worth getting to know some of it? The volumes aren't cheap at £25 a pop but the contents is considerable.

I don't think I shall be rooting out a score of this piece!

Would anyone be able to point me in the right direction for a copy of this, by any chance, please? Many thanks; Martin.

I don't think many members would be disappointed if they took a look at these excellent new volumes - four of them - edited by David Patrick. The great thing is that there is plenty that many of us won't have come across before - ok, the odd Boyce or Handel voluntary were in the old CH Trevor volumes from the 70s, but there are several new names such as Francis Linley, Jacob Kirkman, Jonas Blewitt, John 'Christmas' Beckwith, and others to go along with folk like Maurice Greene, John Travers, William Walond many more names everyone will have come across, without possibly encountering the music produced here. In addition - and this was something missing in CH Trevor volumes - there are general performance notes, instruction in ornamentation and some interesting biographical details. I bought mine from Allegro Music - they're doing a deal on the four albums bought together. You can see some images of the volumes and the contents on the OUP Music website. [My subscription to Organists Review has lapsed and so I haven't seen any review or advert for these publications if one has been printed. Sorry, therefore, if this is old news.] Martin.

You may have seen the review of this second JSB recording of Robert Quinney's in the Sunday Times today - it's recorded at Trinity Cambridge - well worth downloading in my view - the Trinity organ sounds fabulous and RQ's embellishments to 565 will help spice up all of our performances I would think! I shall certainly be listening to it again with score and pencil!

Am I correct in thinking that he's playing from a ipad? How does this work, then?

I can't for the life of me find anything myself, but does anyone know of any piano arrangements of any of the Ray Goodwin war film music?

There's an arrangement for trumpet and piano in IMSLP - the trumpet part is written for B flat trumpet so you'll need to get your head round that but otherwise I think this may be your best bet. Mayhew has an arrangement of part of it (not sure which part) in something like 50 Classical Melodies for Organ - sorry, can't help more, I'm 200 miles from my music right now. Look up IMSLP - I'm sure you can make it work. Martin.

I have a large collection of Victorian music but regrettably, I have never come across this piece. Any point in asking Novello if they can print a copy off? They certainly used to do this sort of thing. Good luck!

Shame they have to have that ugly cable trailing up the back and side of the console when with a bit of thought and planning it (the cable) could so easily have been incorporated into the console with an outlet on the top. I always think the same with console lights - beautiful, well thought out consoles abound but are often adorned by an Argos-best anglepoise and with an extension lead cluttering the place up!