andyorgan

I was going to join in this discussion yesterday, about regardless of how helpful, constructive and well thought through the advice of the local organ adviser is (of which we had two when there was a change of personnel) and how much the church/organist and congregation agree with the said advice, when you are ready tomove forward, you come across a really unmovable organisation with little regard for the needs of the parish concerned, I am not going to mention them by name. However, Heckelphone has done the job for me and his quote above is, I believe, the motto for the said organisation. I would go further and say that there is scant regard for how flawed the original design for an organ may have been.

Excellent, the memory not as bad as my children would have me believe!

I have the Lemare arrangement, its in the Elgar/German Volume. Allegro music got me the volume in pretty quick time. Did I recall correctly that there was a William McVicker arrangement from B and H realeased in the last couple of years?

I don't want to burst anyone's bubble here, especially as I am a big Sibelius fan, but it's not regarded as the 'best' nonation programme by many in the industry. That honour falls to Score. It held domination for a long time, especially as it was a DOS programme (remember, pre-Windows?). However, its prblem now is that it still only runs in DOS, though it doesn't need a particularly powerful computer to run it. However, I would agree that Sibelius is at the moment the most user friendly, and as one previous contributor commented, most of the smaller publishing houses (and a couple of the biggies who out source some of the engraving) use Sibelius. Its also had some ringing endorsements from John Rutter and some big players in the film industry.

THanks for this, it lookds quite good, particularly the 'lead sheet/worksheet' options. These are a little fiddly in Sibelius and involve much trial and error! However, not all the web pages are in English, and it doesn't work on a Mac; here endeth my interest in it!

Yes, forgot to mention that Sibelius does save to pdf, and I have emailed pdfs to people, which worked well (no reason why it shouldn't!). I have also cut and pasted parts of Sib scores into Word documents to use as work sheets and exam questions at school; a handy tool. I suspect Finale does the same. I used Finale for a while before Sibelius was out for PC and Mac (I spoke to so many people at Sib c1996/97 who swore it would never, I repeat never come out on those platforms, 'the programming was too complicated', and I persuaded my then school to purchase an Acorn Risc computer!) Does anyone have any experience of it working with Linux?

Title says it all, am going through a list of likely titles that fit in with themes for recitals, and wondered if anyone played, or had recordings of the following: -Anton Heiller (Tanz Toccata) -Ernst Leitner (Totentanz Chaconne uber 'Der grimmig Tod') -Josef Doppelbauer (Fantasia Hommage a Buxtehude OR Toccata und Fuge 'In memoriam Ravel) Grateful thanks!

Sibelius is really very good, and I use it all the time; compositions, arrangements and worksheets for use in lessons, very user friendly. However, I don't 'like' my students to use, because they come to rely on it as a compositional tool, and it isn't that. I view it (and strongly encourage them to) as a word prcessor for music. It doesn't help with the composing, but it jolly well makes it look good when you've finished it, and it has a large amount of flexibility built in.

Nope, its too good and too short for Krebs. I play a fair bit of Krebs, and 568 has the brevity and concentration of development that much Krebs doesn't have. The C major is the one I play the most, and he just about gets away with it, but the C minor, D major and the E major, just have too much endless spinning of subjects and motifs. I really enjoy 568, I'll be gutted if it turns out to be by someone else! I agree that its hard to find a stylistic equivalent in JSB, but hey, surely he might have had a different waft of inspiration that day?

Yes, I know what you mean! Its school confirmation on Sunday, and it resembles a huge social gathering with little respect for what is actually taking place.

One very eminent cathedral organist once told me, he gives them 5 minues, and then silence.

It is, and I think you'll find 97 is also a very rare beast.

Yes, but not many of them manage to get the bit right in the middle with the syncopated octaves (on the 3rd line?) It wasn't that much fun when I did Grade 3!

The only time I've ever been close enough to see this practice, was Gillian Weir at Symphony Hall. For her, I would guess that she probably knows the music from memory, and that the card is simply an aide-memoire. With the slightly reidiculous detached console they have in the middle of the floor, I suppose it does mean there are no page turner/stop puller 'will she/he won't she/he/ moments and discussion about how well/badly dressed they are compared to the player. In other words, no distractions!

Yes, nice to hear some fellow Mac fans appear! However, there is already a device for this (or there was). In my D of M role at school, I can remember being bombarded with material about an 'electronic' music stand device, that meant no paper. I haven't bought one, but the marketing has gone very quiet. Does anyone know if its still going? I also use Sib for the occasional rewrite/arrangement/diff page turn (v proud of my Vierne 5 slow mov't recopy without all the double sharps/flats!!), and an app might be useful for the iPhone/iPad. However, the biggest challenge will surely be the refelctive qualities of the screen and the dubious lighting we often find ourselves having to us in the organ loft. I know the e-readers get round this with a slightly opaque surface, but you can altern those all the time as you are holding them. Does anyone have any experience of an e-reader?

Well, I went to evensong yesterday to hear it for the last time for a month (visiting choir). Actually, the real reason was to see if they had installed Daniel's Hptwk system, but I couldn't see it anywhere.

We did the Southwark Monday lunch one last year. If you've not been before, sit as close to the front as you can, organ sounds best there!

Indeed, it was Peter King who I first heard play this as we were waiting as a visiting choir for the next service to start. Empowered by this bit of musical jollity, one of our chief fundraisers for the refurbed organ suggested that Thomas Trotter might like to play it at the opening recital, which he did. I think this coincided with his cd from Symphony Hall which contained the same suite. I've played no.s 3, 4 and 5. Four is jolly useful communion music, you're right that 3 is more tricky when the left hand has the tune, and five is a good crash. I wrote an article on American music sometime ago and was sent absolutely piles of Locklair to play through, so I feel I might have been through a lot of it. There is a very useful suite of pieces for manuals only which would suit a smaller instrument. I'm currently debating whether 'Dance the Joy' from the new UMP book ed.Titterington is worth the learn. Its very much in the Rubrics mode with constantly changing rhythms/metres etc. The bits that always stub me are the pedal glissandi, anyone any practical suggestions with those.

There's also a very good recording from the refurbed organ in the Usher Hall in Edinburgh. I have a feeling its on the Delphian one (just reissued) but of not, it will be on the Priory one.

Hang on, who is putting this list together? Symphony No.2? Grand choeur in G minor? They're not even particularly good pieces of Guilmant. If they needed so much of him (and let's face it, he's not the first name that springs to mind for memorable organ music, and this from a bit of a fan), what about the Grand choeur in D, or Symphony Nos 5 or 8?

Thanks HG, but that just raises another question, what is the reference to Psalm 103?

As already mentioned, I've also just taken possession of the Tango. However, can anyone explain the reference to Psalm 303 (yes, 303) in the title, or am I missing something blindingly obvious?

Sorry, I've done the inexcusable, I pressed Delete instead of Reply. Can you send it again, and then I promise to be the 'source'!!

Excellent, my memory did indeed serve me correctly for once. Anyone got the full text? Sorry for the poor English, my grammar does indeed give the wrong idea!

A well timed posting as my postman delivered this morning, the Tango and Sonata from the very same place. Is someone on commission here...........