sjf1967
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Posts posted by sjf1967
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same thing happened at Brownhill - 2 manual Hunter I think, already in atrocious condition when I knew it (early 80s or so) and now as far as I know walled up and replaced by a skiffle combo. Sic transit. How long were you at St Andrew's?I'm glad that organ inspired you. I almost shed a tear when I left in 2003/4 when the action pretty much finally died. Couldn't stand another year of playing the piano for services and seeing the organ just sitting there. It was my baby and I miss it dearly.
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A little light summer reading if you're interested....James Barr - Scope and Authority of the Bible; Keith Ward - What the Bible really teaches. Interesting stuff.Assuming that most Bibles are broadly similar, which you missed:-No, certain faiths leave out the bits that they don't like, such as the Apocrapha, not to mention Bel and the Dragon. Let's be frank, the Bible as it has come down to us has been more hacked about than anything else one cares to imagine.
R
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Ahhh - I lived 1 minute from St Andrew's as a small boy - and the thing that got me started on playing the organ was hearing Paul Derrett at St Andrew's for the Guinness Book of Records marathon organ playing record - in fact I was sitting next to him on the bench some of the time, and was there when he finished. I don['t expect him to remember that but it's a small world. Now you know who to blame....Not that one. St. Andrew's Torridon Road (Behind it). Red brick church. Superb 3 man 1908 Hunter pretty much untouched apart from the Swell to Gt. octave coupler added by Binns in 1959 and a new pedal board. Pneumatic Action, but it's in such a state (or the last I heard), that it's barely playable. Crying shame. -
Do you mean Brownhill Road Baptist in Catford? I had my first organ lesson there...wasn't working well then either.St. James Spanish Place is a glorious organ. I've heard it a couple of times. Don't hear much about it, but really you don't hear much about Hunter at all which I think is a real shame. His example at Catford was excellent, when it was playable. That wasn't particularly loud either. -
Fairly peripatetic, but most definitely not a virtuoso.... for what it's worth, the absolute ideal for me is the evening before in a quiet building, with a couple of hours or so on the day to check registration changes, plus a bit of slow practice on 8' flutes - I try not to play the whole prgramme through (knackering, and if I can't play it the night before then one morning won't make any difference). You really need somewhere to stay for that though, otherwise you risk ending up in the pub...If I'm doing something particularly hard (Riff-Raff or similar) I always make a separate trip at my own expense to work at that in advance. A couple of big concert halls allow a whole day, or even two, in advance, which is bliss. Sometimes you end up having to do it all on the day but this is not ideal. I sometimes find that the first day you play an organ it is disastrous - had one of those in Denmark last year, and had a sleepless night over it - but the next day you have somehow 'learnt' the feel of the organ and it feels comfortable. That scenario, as much as the business of registration etc, is the thing which I find always merits the extra time. Here we give recitalists the night before, plus the day itself from 10-4, during which time they can play as loud as they like (within reasonable limits) - that may be unusual but then the D and C here like music. Westminster Cathedral, by the way, is among the most terrifying organs to play - it's very loud (even the strings are fortissimo at the console), you sit right underneath it, the touch is simultaneously light and deep with almost no resistance, and the pedal board is strangely placed. Sunday pm recitalists only get a couple of hours to prepare and then straight in cold - not easy....I'm curious about how all you peripatetic virtuosi cope. If you are giving a recital on a sizeable three-manual instrument (or larger) which you have never played before, how much practice time do you find is a comfortable minimum? Personally, I'd love to get about four hours, but I count myself very lucky if I get half that. But it occurs to me that, if the recital you're giving is far away from home, your practice is probably going to have to be done on the day and you're not going to want to tire yourself out before-hand. -
David - I think it's a visual overload problem - there are so many accidentals and double sharps in the second section that your brain can't process them fast enough; you lose any sense of tonal centre and end up trying to read each chord again from scratch. Have you tried writing out the passage in question in enharmonic notation? It's essentially in a minor but just doesn't look like it, and I suspect that is part of the problem...the other thing that might help is piling up the arpeggiated groups and chordal clusters that follow as block chords, so you're programming your fingers to find the position quickly. Do you know what I mean? Haven't explained it very well. And choose your instrument carefully - any time lag and you'll come unstuck, as I discovered at the Methuen Music Hall in Boston....I've hit a brick wall with this piece. If you know it, could you help me by telling me how you got into it? I learned the first section and last section thoroughly, but really struggled with the second section (same as first but transposed a semitone). I had to skate through it for a couple of recitals so taught myself to be able to get through, making a vaguely idiomatically similar noise, without stopping. Now I want to polish it up and get it recordable, but every bar of the second section I improve results in me forgetting something else I already knew. How the hell do I get out of this rut? Or do I just accept that it's beyond me and go back to Eric Thiman? Can any of the many proper organists here offer any brain draining tips... before you all say it, I've tried going through slowly with metronome, doing hands alone, and all with no evident benefit... -
One big crock of sh**e!
Hmmm. Nothing like a reasoned assessment, is there! The stop you disliked so much is a Cromorne...I'm saying no more on the subject. I know the instrument very well indeed and I am still certain it's a fine thing. Sound clips (from a couple of my CDs I'm afraid) for those who haven't heard it may be found at http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B000025...lance&n=229816;
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I'm sure everyone who is pronouncing on the defects Ch Ch organ has experienced hearing it in the building.......just checking.....Aunt Mabel1I came across some recordings of my great aunt Mabel playing in the 1970's at the pinicle of her career. I thought the organ sounds remarkably like Christchurch Oxford.
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Makes a change from being screamed at in the head, as per C.C. Oxford. IMO a rather nasty thing. The old job there was better, and certainly more ideal for the Anglican Liturgy. It's still my least favourite job, even if I do respect it as a sound for certain repertoire. But just that.
RIn defence of Ch Ch - I played, or stood underneath it, pretty much every day for 6 years and I don't ever remember being screamed at.....it's an admirable bit of voicing - the building gives no help at all, and at Christmas or other big occasions, with 1000 people in the building, there was almost a negative acoustic. It still sounded beautifully blended and could do a more convincing job of Howells than the old organ could do of Stravinsky or Leighton - it was also quite colourful enough for psalms, but you had to know it well to make them work. Of course it needed using carefully - not compulsory to use the Positif Cymbale every bar - some people hated it because you couldn't just push pistons but had to prepare registration schemes carefully. You also had to play right notes all the time! But a really tremendous organ - still one of my favourites. Anyway, no point arguing about taste in tonal finishing. My personal worst? Derby Cathedral, by some distance.
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Never heard this organ live yet, and as a Londoner, I should really. But I'll be giving this Saturday a miss as DGWs undoubtedly superb playing seems to always put my teeth on edge. My dentist has now forbidden me from going to any of her recitals and is even threatening a house visit to do a spot check on my CD collection. Never mind. I'll probably pop along to Duncan Terrace on 29 July when ....... now, let me see who is playing .............. oh, really!
Do come and say hello, Jeremy....I might even buy you a pint!
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Alas no....but the rebuilt organ looks very fine - one of my favourites.Dame G of W, St John the Evangelist, Duncan Terrace, IslingtonThis Sat 7.45
Free admission
Any other board members going?
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Andrew - having seen your posting on another forum that it was a boy singing it, have you thought of trawling throught the Better Land series of recordings? It may well be on there somewhere. Roffensis may be able to advise....Didn't phrase the question very well.Were we going to sing it, I could find many a DCM tune.
A congregant (?) remembers it from his boyhood and would like a a copy of the tune he knew for his personal use. He heard it on a recording in the 1920/30's
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Can anyone suggest where I might find the tune for the following please? request received from a parishioner...
Crikey - one for the Chamber of Horrors and no mistake. No idea if it's the original melody, but Kingsfold will fit very well (NEH 376) - and so would any DCM tune.
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Try that here and see what you get - one side of the choir is too far away for the other to hear.....I'd like to see any choir get through James Macmillan or Judith Bingham without a bit of help from someone out front under those circumstances...His "s-s-s-strawberries and cream" he called that outfit. I sang under him as a boy (at Ch Ch - we started there in the same term), and the idea that we needed a conductor to follow was simply not there - we sang together, and an odd finger-wave from the bass on each side was enough to ensure unanimity at tricky moments.Paul
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That would be telling! ££££ might have something to do with it....Perhaps you can answer the age old question then, Stephen? Why is it virutally every organist's dream to give up the organ? i.e. become a cathedral organist and stand out front waving? (Unless you're called Dearnley, of course!)
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mjf - you are much too kind. I am sure you are at least as good a musician - I'm a cathedral organist remember. I wonder if we're related.....I agree generally about slowing down, although my preference is for a once-and-for-all change with the pedal entry rather than a progressive rallentando, and then maintain it through to the end.By the way, I'm not Stephen (sjf), but a mere mortal currently residing half way round the world. Be nice to be as fine a musician as he is, though ...
Rgds,
MJF
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Erm, wasn't Boely born in 1785...? Which means that he was playing Bach... from about fifty years after Bach's death?
And I think you've illustrated the subjectivity point pretty well if you think the Willan is the only piece of romantic British organ music worth playing... (and I didn't even mention Parry, Stanford or the Elgar Sonata).
I agree about Francis Jackson tho'. So that's two things. (Except that the Diversion isn't unique. How about the Langlais Dialogue sur les Mixtures?)
This might be up your collective street, chamade fans -
http://www.orgelsindrenthe.nl/engels/index.htm - follow links to organs, then to Havelte hermorvde kerk, tower.....
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Vox- I'm sorry to say I don't but I'll dig it out and have a look...That's the version I have. Do you play that polytonal Toccata by Slonimsky? It's such a wonderfully tongue-in-cheek bit of fun (at least, I hope that's how he meant it!) -
MM - There is an original solo version of the Shostakovich piece - it appears in a Peters Edition compilation of music from the Soviet Republic. This edition can be quite hard to find, and for a long time I resorted to rearranging a piano transcription of the Passacaglia - this piano version was itself a transcription of the orchestral version of the piece. I have a feeling (but don't know why) that the organ piece was the original, and S replaced it with an orchestral movement for the very good reason that not many opera houses have organs. But I could be wrong on that point..==================What's the saying?
"Don't assume.....it makes an ass of u an me"
I had "assumed" it to be a transcription when I read the bit about opera, but I am absolutely intrigued that it may well be a genuine organ work.
MM
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Andrew - the one that sounds best to you is the best I suppose - sometimes it's a small chorus, sometimes you can find a colourful quiet reed/flute combination (if you have a good Dulzian or something at your disposal) - andthey can sound very effective on just a 4' flute or a really singing 8' principal. Anything that dosn't obscure the polyphony.I have never been able to settle on the best registration for BWV 672/3/4Suggestions welcomed please!
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Not looking for argument, you understand, merely other opinions:
I hasten to add that I find no fault with the end of the Toccata, Adagio and Fugue, just the real exceptions amongst the solo works* that stand out because they are so odd. Oh I'm all for looking at the scores. But..... these moments do seem very odd indeed. It is not a question of anachronisms, I am comparing them with the rest of Bach's extant work.
Now, these scores* are unusual because they were (for the most part) meant for his own personal use and not widely disseminated during his lifetime. If Bach really liked the effect of an ending literally as abrupt as these scores suggest, why there is nothing like these last notes in any other of Bach's orchestral or choral works? Or, for that matter, in the keyboard music that Bach actually saw published?
If you know any other instances, please let me know!
Sorry if this sounds combative.
One possible interpretation is that these rests are there to imply the correct gap between this Prelude (let us say) and a work that is to follow in a certain performance. Other composers have done similar things.
This is but one alternative idea.... there are others.
Interesting point Paul...a cursory look throws up the following examples of relatively short final notes (one tactus worth or shorter) without fermata and with rests precisely notated in non-organ works, in a variety of media; B minor Mass Christe (crotchet), Et in spiritum Sanctum (dotted crotchet); Double violin concerto slow movement - (dotted crotchet) and all three movements of the E major concerto are without fermata and relatively short; several examples in the violin and harpsichord obbligato sonatas; more than one in the Magnificat; several in the Brandenburgs 5 and 3). There are more, although of course the fermata in recaps of da capo arias does double duty. Williams suggests that with the increase in weight of musical sonorities in general over the last couple of centuries, we have lost the art of distinguishing cadence types, and I suspect he's right....as for publications - Schubler chorale BWV 646; Clav'ubung III - BWV 689; BWV 675 has the fermata over the double bar, not the last note; BWV 684; BWV 676. Countless examples in Clav. Part I, II and IV...I don't think BWV 544 is all that isolated an example of this phenomenon.
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I have always half suspected that the Toccata, Adagio and Fugue was actually written for the pedal harpsichord. After all, Bach had one. This would also explain the use of top D (51) which didn't exist on any of his organs; it also neatly explains the style of pedal part during the adagio. The chords that end the adagio would then be arpeggiated and gain a lot in excitement and interest.
The concluding Fugue is a dance in my book, and can be extremely effective on very few stops - so long as they are bright and quick-speaking.
Mind you, don't quote me! No doubt 'out there' is someone who knows the only true, historically correct, official line. This was why I posted a poll about the Fantasia, because I think although latest scholarship insists it should finish soft, I wish to resist this because it makes little musical sense to me.
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You want a further puzzling Bach question? How about the case of several major majestic pieces that finish with extremely short final chords. Do you play right up to the buffers without slowing down and jump off the edge with a true (mathematically and politically correct) quaver - lemming style? Or do you draw it out a little 'in the grand manner' and finish properly? I know which feels right to me.
Paul - I think politically correct is a bit loaded. The issue is complicated slightly by the issue of notational conventions and so forth - but the question for me is why in some cases - eg BWV 544i, 547ii - Bach and his copyists should have gone to the considerable trouble of notating a very specific value for the final chord, and rests in each idividual part to complete the bar if the duration of the last chord were of no consequence. If a grandiose ending feels better, fine - but you can't pretend that it's what the notation (as reproduced in a half decent edition, of course) implies. It's not about a correct official line - it's about looking properly at what's in the score, which after all is all there is. Very good article on all this in Peter Williams Vol 3 - "Certain details of performance - finals, fermatas and repeats" - 'the rests [in BWV 544i] have been written in so carefully as to leave the matter quite unambiguous'. Another quote from Williams - 'if the abruptness seems to offend common sense, does it do so because that common sense is an anachronism, or because the notation is implying something else as well - namely that there must be a rallentando?' Your idea of finishing 'properly' might be different from Bach's, but it's his piece after all....
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Please contact by email, certainly interested,
Chris at wc03@gre.ac.uk
What would be the approx cost plust postage to Essex.
Thanks
Chris - sorry, it's already been snapped up....S
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The middle section is harmonically very reminiscent of French Grand Plein Jeu movements, if the French title is going to influence registration choice - I can't think of a Grand Jeu movement which uses this kind of 'durezza' harmony. And one very reliable source for the piece (Walther's) indicates 'gayement' for the central section..No, I think that Paul is correct - a Grand Jeu is surely closer in spirit to the 'feel' of the texture.I alsi dislike the central section when it is played briskly. I have another recording, of Markus Willinger (Organist of Bamberg Cathedral); he plays the central section quite quickly. Played thus, I find that it loses its grandeur and that the inexorable build-up to the diminished seventh chord is almost thrown away.
If such stops are available, does anyone else draw a 32p flue (and reed, if possible), in order to supply the low B?
R
Recitals On Unfamiliar Organs
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