Martin Cooke
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Posts posted by Martin Cooke
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Back to Liverpool and the Elgar... a delightfully spacious, elegant and masterful performance in every way... and I've only focused on the first movement for now. Beautiful use of the organ, showing just how a large organ can be used to great effect. I couldn't help feeling what an extra dimension those swell box dials are for the performer. I'm not 'there' with my iPad yet!!
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On 14/08/2023 at 04:59, S_L said:
Previous Organ recitals at the 'Proms' have been on a Sunday, not the best time for organists to turn out to listen to one of their number! This year's Recital is on a Saturday afternoon - at 14h00 - on the 26th. It is being given by the Canadian Organist, Isabelle Demers with a programme that includes two of her transcriptions, a world Premiere by Rachel Laurin, as well as works by Bach, in an arrangement by Marcel Dupre, Reger, Coleridge-Taylor and the Elergy by William Grant Still.
Interesting programme, I hope to be able to listen to it.
Thanks, S_L - she's a great player. Very sad to read of the death of Rachel Laurin a day or two ago. She was a great composer for the organ.
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I had the pleasure of hearing the Bristol organ this week - gosh, what HUGE 16fts on the pedal! Earlier in this thread there was a link to the proposed new scheme for the organ - we all discussed Quints and Clarion Mixtures etc. The link no longer works and I just wondered if anyone could revitalise it or, in some other way, bring it back to an available state, as it were. I guess I might be looking you, Dave, but glad of anyone's help. I see that the latest lunch hour recital poster announced that the organ will be off to Durham later this year. I am sure the result will be splendid - certainly a bit nearer for me than York, Canterbury or Norwich!
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8 hours ago, Barry Oakley said:
Of course, Compton only had tungsten light available at the time and this, in the case of Holy Trinity (Hull Minster), because of console orientation, could prove a problem on bright, sunny days. The brightness of the illuminated stops needed to be subdued to a contrasting warm glow to give indication of on or off. This was achieved thanks to the diameter of the old imperial half-penny coin. It would form a perfect template for brown paper discs to be cut and placed behind the stop-face to achieve the warm glow. I understand that eventual renovation of the Compton console will see LED’s used.
I think LEDs have been used to replace some of the 'shot' originals in the console at Downside.
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Welcome, Nick. There are some genuine experts who visit this site from time to time and it will be interesting to see what they say. My own view is that the sudden demise of a pipe organ depends entirely upon what has actually gone wrong and how costly, feasible and appropriate it would be to put that single matter right without attending to other issues. I guess that apart from the blower, the main issue is to do with electric action failing. How frequently an instrument needs cleaning and major attention must depend greatly on the amount of use, the quality of the original work and any subsequent rebuilding, and the local environment. If you're not 'in amongst it', as it were, at a major cathedral, church, chapel etc, it is all too easy to underestimate just how much an instrument might be used. At the moment Gloucester is awaiting a new organ and it is not the first to be out of action for a considerable period. Chichester had to be mothballed between 1973-1986 when it became too unreliable for daily use. Bristol have made provision for this eventuality by having a Viscount instrument installed a year or so ago, 'just in case'. Something similar is going on at the Former Royal Chapel, Greenwich where the pipe organ appears to be silent at the moment and a Viscount is in operation. There must be some major instruments coming up for work - Chichester might be on that list, Truro, too, perhaps. Organ builders are very good at 'keeping things going' and doing piecemeal work - Westminster Abbey is one such example - Liverpool Anglican is another... and I suppose those are large enough instruments to allow for whole sections to be out of action from time to time - it's hard to imagine a digital organ 'doing time' in Westminster Abbey or St Paul's. In fact, I know that it was a stipulation at St Paul's during the 1972-1977 Mander rebuild, that enough of the organ always had to be available at any one time for daily use. I believe that there were just three days' silence, as it were, when the new console was connected. Sometimes, of course, it isn't the organ that fails but something else that causes the organ grief. I saw pictures not all that long ago of Lance Foy and his family working on parts of the Truro cathedral organ where a leaking roof had caused trouble. And there was storm damage at Worcester a couple of years ago.
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Does anyone have any info as to where an organ arrangement of this piece may be found, by any chance, please? I would have sworn on a stack of bibles that I had one somewhere but I can't pin it down. There's a piano arrangement on imslp, but has anyone come across on in the Mayhew series, perhaps... or in one of those old Scott albums - (Red, Blue, Orange, Grey etc)? Many thanks. I've been asked to think about playing it after a funeral.
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I don't have a copy, I'm afraid, f-w, and it doesn't seem to be available (for free) in all the usual online haunts either digitally or physically. You have probably spotted that Bardon publish it, and Musicroom offer it, presumably as a reprint, but both seem pretty expensive - the latter at £20+. Musicroom have two or three discount schemes that would reduce it by 10%. Otherwise, I'm out of ideas!
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Thank you so much, Andrew - much appreciated.
Martin.
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Ha! Yes, I'm sorry that that snippet is so brief but I was having the world of trouble trying to get our forum to accept anything larger in terms of file size. The piece is actually of reasonable length, I assure you!
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Hello folks - can anyone help me identify the title of this piece by Guilmant, please? I think it's a 'Grand Choeur' but I'm blowed if I can find it online anywhere. Ideally, I'd like to know where to find a copy or the album with it in. Any help most gratefully received. It's a very worthwhile piece! Sorry - not sure if I have uploaded the file correctly!
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Many thanks, Colin - yes, that was what I was after.
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Could one of you possibly post the link to this, please?
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Yes... it would be so much better value if there were a nice organ to play! (But I can recommend their Gardener's Breakfast complete with Hadspen sausage!)
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We paid a visit to this amazing place yesterday which, I guess is probably best described as being close to Wincanton. It is stunning. So much there that is interesting. Amongst many other wonderful features is a brand new but old style barn - it is the topmost building on the right hand side of the picture that that link will take you to. Gosh, an organ would be wonderful in there, in the same spirit as the London Bridge station organ. But... in the meantime, well worth a visit - but you need to get your head around the membership/entrance arrangements before you get there!
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I am really beginning to wonder whether I shall bother with it. The constant delays seem to me bizarre!
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57 minutes ago, AndrewG said:
BBC Sounds app for Radio 3 lists it as an Improvisation by Peter Holder (following on from the RVW Rhosymedre and before the Parry). Assuming that’s the section you mean? (Maybe explained by rumour that service started a couple of minutes late!)
Yes, I saw that, but I took that to be what was definitely quite a lengthy improvisation that preceded the piece I'm talking about. My hunch is that it's a 'proper' piece!... but I may be wrong, of course.
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Yes, that's it - thank you, Peter - and that's the first time I've heard more than the first few bars - it's very clearly not Handel as I first mooted. It is redolent of so many things. I'm wondering if it's possibly an unpublished Harris piece or even a specially written work... a bit like the Grayston Ives Intrada for the Silver Jubilee procession in 1977.
Any thoughts or suggestions gladly received!
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8 hours ago, Paul Walton said:
Flourish for an Occasion, Harris
Ah, no, Paul - I didn't mean that. It was more or less immediately before the King and Queen's procession to I was glad. If I remember correctly, he improvised for a while - (I don't recall actually hearing Rhosymedre after the Harris, and then he launched into this other piece. Could you bear to have another listen?
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What was the piece played by Peter Holder at the start of the processions? It sounded as though it was going to be a Handel Overture but I think it was more romantic than that. E flat major??
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41 minutes ago, Phoneuma said:
Yes, the Panufnik was good, and I rather liked that Richard Strauss Fanfare, solid brass playing.
Yes, the Strauss was new to me but was a great choice. All of the music was really fantastic, with just the two exceptions in terms of new pieces. 'I was glad' was given a fabulous performance and I thought the Boyce was delightful too. The Abbey looked wonderful - we feel the need to visit asap.
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2 hours ago, Malcolm Riley said:
ALW's contribution was lacking a certain something (such as anything melodically memorable), not helped by a rather crass attempt at a modulation.
Yes, it was shame, and a lost opportunity. I'm sure it would have been better to have stuck with tried and tested repertoire. I don't know, but Hadley 'My belovèd spake', or Harwood's 'O how glorious', or 'Wood 'On Thou, the central orb' would have kit the spot so much more. Even the descending triads at the intro set my nerves jangling! And, whilst I have tried to appreciate the works of Judith Weir, I couldn't, again, on this occasion, unfortunately. What a contrast with the Holst 'Jupiter' that followed immediately afterwards!
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Just to say, I am pretty certain there was no heated discussion in THIS forum re the proposition of a new instrument in Charterhouse School chapel- that was all on the FB site. Meanwhile, Paul Hale lists Gloucester Cathedral as a 'current project' on the consultant tab of his website.
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Dr Stanley Monkhouse, FRCO, FRCSI - RIP
in General discussion
Posted
And what a delightful little piece the Madsen is - so fresh and 'different.'