Fiffaro

I purchased mine from the Organ Historical Society last year for USD 215 plus postage. In Australian dollars, my currency, that's less than 2/3 of the EUR 215 price. I've mentioned this society before, but for those that missed the link, here it is again. http://www.ohscatalog.com/ The US dollar has lost so much value in the last few months against most currencies, it is worth a browse! It is the edition to purchase for those serious about their Buxtehude.

One of the advantages of learning from Radulescu was that you were always in the company of extremely talented students. Yes, Bine is a wonderful organist, but Radulescu attracted a large number of other students that really are extraordinary organists. When I think of the likes of Brett Leighton, Thomas Daniel Schlee, Guido Meyer, Wolfgang Zerer, Juergen Essl, Michael Kitzinger and so many others, I am reluctant to try ranking them.

For those who might like to search for Bine's CDs, the surname is 'Bryndorf' with an 'f'. I own both Bine and Vogel's Buxtehude recordings - still to acquire Bine's 6th, though - and recommend them happily. For those who like Koopman's approach, he is recording the complete works of Buxtehude. Some short samples of the organ works can be found on his web site at: http://www.tonkoopman.nl/buxvol03cd1nr01.mp3 John Scott's performance of the organ works of Buxtehude at Saint Thomas' is still available online, free! http://www.saintthomaschurch.org/stream-Bux.html

Sorry, David, I forgot about that book, so I didn't bother giving the title. I was referring to his encyclopedic tome "Tuning: Containing the Perfection of Eighteenth-Century Temperament; The Lost Art of Nineteenth-Century Temperament; and The Science of Equal Temperament."

I so agree, pcnd5584. Whether one is sympathetic or not to the use of non-anachronistic temperaments, the simplistic and wildly incorrect 'sharpened sevenths' type statements should be challenged. My approach is to refer to quarter comma meantone (and it helps to have an instrument so tuned when demonstrating, but it is not necessary) and have the person who made the statement think about the leading note in, say G major. The f-sharp is tuned pure from the d, hence is already flatter than in equal temperament. But, the d is tuned from the g*, and the interval is narrow by a quarter of the Syntonic comma, hence the fifth is narrower than in equal temperament and the d lower, resulting in a leading note significantly lower than in equal temperament. My next step is to lead them to understand that the beauty of historic temperaments is that such sweeping statements are guaranteed to be incorrect; not all leading notes will be lower than equal, not all thirds will be pure or even narrower than equal; that we have entered into a world where the lack of 'everything being identical' is the very point and the reason why some of us are so enthusiastic. On an instrument as inherently unmusical as the organ, or harpsichord etc, any little help is welcome. *Or the g is tuned from the d, depending on your own preference, but the result is identical, of course.

I like your wording. Perhaps you have read the same source as I have, possibly Jorgensen, that after analysing tuning instructions around the middle of the 19th century argues that even though they thought they were tuning equal temperament, their methods were faulty and the results were slightly non-equal tempered. Sorry, I am not able to check Jorgensen, which is long out of print. (I feel an ebay search coming on...) So, the detective work is not only for records of tuning using equal temperament, but also what method was used, and hence how truly equal the result would have been.

Paul, you might enjoy reading the relevant section in Snyder's book “Dieterich Buxtehude: Organist in Lübeck”. The second edition has more up-to-date information than the first. Werckmeister and Buxtehude were friends, and the picture painted by Snyder indicates that Werckmeister was no theoretician out of touch with reality. Unfortunately, I've loaned my copy to a colleague, or I'd post some pertinent quotes. If I remember correctly, the organ in the Marienkirche was retuned to a Werckmeister temperament, but the date of the retuning is one of the changes between editions, so I might stand to be corrected here. That's an interesting comment. I was first taught to tune quarter comma meantone because of the ease of tuning pure thirds. For me, and the harpsichordist who first taught me to tune, major thirds are easier to tune pure as the pitch where the harmonics of the two notes first coincide is higher than that for fifths. Hence, small deviations from pure result in faster beating, and hence are more noticeable than for fifths. I suspect that the preoccupation with tuning systems based on fifths had something to do with the ear's intolerance of out-of-tune octaves and fifths compared to major thirds. (Note, ease of tuning does not equate to intolerance if out-of-tune.)

But who would want to hear Mendelssohn's organ music performed on an instrument tuned to equal temperament? Would Mendelssohn have encountered any organs that were so tuned? I once heard someone describe equal temperament, on no less august a radio network as the Australian Broadcast Corporation, as the aural equivalent of plastic cheese. Now, excuse me while I duck for cover. Probably underneath my harpsichord, currently tuned to Werckmeister IV after an all Handel concert today. (Now, who will dare to suggest that Werckmeister IV is anachronistic for Handel's music?)

I wish folks with or without perfect pitch didn't have the ability to detect the difference between a G-sharp and an A-flat. Then I'd avoid the occasional retuning during harpsichord recitals when using 1/4 comma meantone! Still, try doing that during an organ recital!!!

And for those who would like some more information on why certain other editions are best avoided, see: http://www.areditions.com/rr/embellish/1997_02/widor.html

Just to suggest another possibility. After reading a number of technical reviews of the current generation of solid memory devices, and comparing these to reviews of the latest Sony Minidisc player, I ordered a minidisc player. (I also talked to a recording engineer at one of our two classical music radio stations.) Of particular concern to me was the criticism of the input circuit performance of the solid state players. A brief few points for those who would judge this on the previous generations of players. Records in wave format (uncompressed). Digitally uploads files to your computer, including files recorded on earlier generation players that could not be directly uploaded previously. Has a significantly better ergonomic design. Can be set to start in manual recording volume mode as the default. Manual volume control is easy. Has an easy to read display, in both darkness and daylight Wonderful battery life, and, despite what some people have said, can be connected to an external battery pack through the USB connector. It is so far ahead of the previous top-of-the-line minidisc player, that I'm now kind of glad that someone relieved me of mine from my car. (Someone else relieved me of my organ playing shoes while I was performing recently. They smashed a window to get access. They must have been disappointed when they found the bag only contained shoes, not a computer. ) The only drawback, for me, so far - Sony's software must be used to access the device from your Mac or Windows computer. Since releasing this, Sony seem to have changed their policy so that drag and drop is possible. I bought mine from a Canadian shop at a better price than I could find elsewhere, and ordered 30 Minidiscs at the old price. http://www.minidisc-canada.com/shopexd.asp?id=734 I'll still use my trusty Tascam DAT deck when I can lug power chords around and take time to set up, but the Minidisc player is very good for when ease of set up and transport are required. If Sony would have released this model five years ago...

My aural teacher in first year University claimed that her 'perfect pitch' was acquired from an out-of-tune piano when she was a child, and hence was a terrible curse. A violinist with 'perfect pitch' was taken on in a HIP nurturing program that I am involved with. I've performed with her every couple of months for a number of years, now. At first, she complained of getting headaches as the organ would float away from A = 440 Hz with the weather and she was not able to tolerate even small shifts. Reading this thread has brought to mind that this no longer appears to be a problem, and that she is happy to play in the various pitches we commonly use when performing, as well as using a number of different temperaments. Clearly, she has at least learned to tolerate this without ongoing headaches, as she is most happy to continue in the program. I'll have a coffee with her when we can and I'd be happy to report back if readers are interested.

Many thanks, Barry, for you report. I don't mind music not sitting flat as I invariably photocopy my music and work from that, allowing me to write in markings with pen and in colour, knowing that I'm not defacing the original. That way, I can see my fingering in the less than ideal light with which organist sometimes must work. The increase in page numbers is worrying, though. I've become used to the density of French publications, and prefer that. I still tend to not play from my copy of the NBA for the same reason, preferring the old Peters or even the Novello edition where it was not so heavily edited. Excellent critical comments are so tempting...

My understanding is that some of the 48 were not composed as a pair, but were placed together to help make up the collection. Indeed, some were transposed for the occasion, (unfortunately for those who would like to discover Bach's temperament by analyzing intervals that were used or avoided in the 48). In such cases, there has to be a convincing musical reason for using a related tempo. Now, within a movement of Bach's music, I find there has to be a strong case for me not to look for and try a unifying relationship. I'm convinced that the E-flat major fugue has tempo relationships between the sections because I have heard it performed so convincingly that way (and for analytical reasons, too). Some bad performances where this was tried does not change my thinking, that in good hands, this is the way to try to perform the work.

For my taste, the pedal needs to be independent of the manuals in the second section, as so many times the manual part and the pedal have the same note, and to hear this is important in making sense of the linear aspect of the writing. Hence, I would avoid using the Sw/Ped and Gt/Ped couplers, and the Sw/Gt coupler at the same time. As a first approximation, I'd try for the manuals: Gt: Open Diapason 8 Claribel Flute 8 Octave 4 Mixture (15-19-22?) and for the pedal part: Ped: Sub Bass 16' and Sw/Ped with the swell having Violin Diapason 8 Rohr Flute 8 Gamba 8 Principal 4 Horn 8 Adding the swell Oboe 8' might help give the sound of the pedal some more 'bite' to help make it clearly audible.

The choir of Westminster Abbey recently toured Australia. I attend their performance in Hamer Hall in Melbourne, where the sub-organist, Robert Quinney, played the Toccata from the T, A & F of Bach in the first half of the program, and Dupre's T&F in g minor in the second half. The choir exited the stage before each of the organ pieces, and the audience responded by starting to talk. Many of them continued when the organ music started, and some continued all the way through, despite 'sh's from people around them. Clearly, for some, organ music was not an integral part of the concert. I did wonder if these were the people who had become used to talking while the prelude and postlude were being played. Discouraging, or challenging?

I've yet to finish adding all Vierne's organ music to my repertoire. :angry: I'd prefer to attack what remains from a good, clean addition, not the often poor quality PDFs that are available on the Internet. The stage of life that I've achieved now means that I choose not to play continuo from miniature scores; the clearer the print, the better. Besides, I'm happy to encourage the scholarship that goes into a good critical edition by paying for it. This is, admittedly, more crucial in something like the Belotti's edition of Buxtehude, where I'm willing to pay a substantial premium in the hope that this will encourage Broude Brothers and Belotti to continue with the chorale based works. But, the same principle applies.

That would be most helpful. I look forward to the report. Thanks in advance.

Have any of the board members seen the new Carus edition of the complete organ works of Vierne, the editors of which are David Sanger and Jon Laukviks? Given the recent thread on a suitable edition for Widor's Toccata, which has spun off into an interesting thread on organ symphonies generally, including Vierne's, I thought it would be worthwhile asking people's opinions about this edition. Besides, if someone is able to comment on the scholarship in the critical commentaries and on the usefulness and suitability of this edition for us performers of his music, I might feel less worried about laying out so much money 'sight unseen'. http://www.carus-verlag.com/index.php3?BLi...ubscribe-vierne I received a brochure in the mail from Carus-Verlag listing the subscription price of EUR259 applying through to the end of April. Interestingly, no one responded to my comment on the Near edition of Widor. http://web16713.vs.netbenefit.co.uk/discus...ost&p=34657 Did this post get lost in the general chat about organ symphonies? It is, in my opinion, such an important edition it would be a shame if this were the case.

I recently purchased Widor's Symphonie VI, A-R Editions, edited by John Near, part of the Recent Researches in the Music of the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries series. The critical commentary is exemplary, and is surely required reading for any organist who would like to learn or play Widor's organ music. This edition would be my first choice for any future Widor purchase, and will eventually replace those that I already have. The only drawback is that they are not cheap, although the Organ Historical Trust has number 6 on special for USD 19 rather than USD 31. However, I don't begrudge the money as for me to research the information that is in the critical commentary would cost far more - and I don't have the time. (Besides, it is a tax deduction!) Furthermore, I'd like to do my little bit to encourage serious research before publication, rather than paying companies for reproductions of out-of-copyright edition that I can photocopy cheaper from my local university library.

In looking at the cello and organ repertoire, I stumbled across a recording of Herman Berlinski's Sinfonia No. 10 for cello and organ. I've not been able to locate a source for a score (perhaps it hasn't been published?) but wondered if any of the forum members would be able to help.

I listen to a number of Internet audio streams on my work PC. For those who have done this and then bought a dedicated Internet radio, what were the advantages? Between my work PC, dedicated media PC that I use for recording and playing back TV, the PC that acts as my Web server, my experimental Linux PC and at least one PC for each member of my family, I'm somewhat reticent to acquire yet another piece of hardware unless there are some very compelling advantages. Saves on the heating in winter, though.

Thank you, Pierre. I found that I was able to access the individual chapter links with the following URL: http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-09152005-095735/

Indeed. The textbook that was used for liturgy in my first year of study in the church music department in Vienna, 'Einfuehrung in die Liturgik', notes that 'As each Sunday [in Lent] is a small Easter celebration, the Sundays do not belong to Lent.' In this respect, the Anglican and Lutheran traditions are close. My memory of this season was that hymns were chosen to work with the readings or were general praise hymns, however there must be people reading this who remember better than I do. Even though I studied in the Lutheran stream, I worked in a RC church, and during Lent I'd partially close the wings on the organ - the facade pipes being symbolic of God's son, who disappeared into the wilderness for the 40 days of temptation.

The cheaper single point Audio Technica stereo microphones can suffer from the same problem as the Sony ECM-MS957 and 907 - very poor bass response. For example, AT's PRO24 lists a frequency response from 100 Hz to 17 kHz and AT's ATR25 specifies 70 to 18,000 Hz. A couple of friends in the recording industry have suggested I should have bought a pair of Audio Technica microphones instead of my Rode NT-3s, so my advice only concerns the need to check the frequency response of the cheaper offerings, particularly if they offer user selectable beam patterns via a switch. This is implemented in a way that wipes out low frequencies!