Dafydd y Garreg Wen

Hear! Hear! (Played it myself last Sunday.)

I was amused that a writer in the Times praised the beauty of the words of the psalm, but attributed them to the Authorised Version. The writer didn’t realise that for the 1662 book, whilst biblical texts in general were altered to the A.V. (being the most recent translation), the option of updating the psalms was rejected, specifically on aesthetic grounds, and the old Coverdale (more or less) psalter was retained because it was better for singing … which is more or less the point you were making. Nothing changes, does it?

Thank you. I must tell the people at Llanrhaeadr when I next go there. The well-known photograph of Hope-Jones playing from outside S. John’s Birkenhead features one of these benches but the detail isn’t clear enough to answer the question. His coat tails almost look as if they are displaced by the projecting part, but they could just have fallen that way. Equally, had his coat been a few inches shorter the relevant part of the bench would have been visible!

Alas, no.

As one who has played this instrument liturgically from time to I can say that it is much more useful than most small, village church organs. Once you discard any preconceived ideas about octave couplers not being quite the thing, and embrace them as an integral part of the instrument as its designer intended it, you can do a lot with it. You can certainly play (some) Bach on it, effectively, if not exactly authentically. The Viol d'Orchestre is an extraordinarily keen rank. Hearing it you would almost think it a reed stop, and it does duty quite nicely for the soft solo reed that the instrument lacks. The Flute D'Amour is very chiffy. Not at all what one would expect. A neo-baroque enthusiast from the sixties and seventies would feel very at home with it.

“Nason flutes” were not unknown on English organs once upon a time: http://www.organstops.org/n/Nason.html

Are you sure that’s 2023 not 2024 (or even 2025)?

Very probably. But quite remarkable (if, alas, unsurprising in this case) for the date to have slipped yet again in the few weeks since the June announcement was posted.

The June update said November 2022. Has this date now shifted yet again? https://reh.hymnsam.co.uk/ The explanation given there for the extraordinary delay is: Make of this what you will ….

Thank you. A heartening tale.

How very confusing.

Fascinating. Thank you.

It’s not as easy as it used to be, but there are still ways of getting free access to most newspaper sites if all you want is an occasional article. Church Times obit here: https://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2022/27-may3-june/gazette/obituaries/obituary-simon-preston “transformed the medieval cathedral choir” made me smile. Gives the impression that the members had been there since the Middle Ages. Perhaps they had ….

But one that is easily circumvented.

Hmmm. That’s a bit of a stretch. He seems to have been elected by the Salisbury chapter on 2nd March. On 1st April that election was confirmed by the Metropolitan (Archbishop of Canterbury), which does have certain legal implications, but there is some way to go yet, for he will not be a bishop until his consecration (“episcopal ordination” if you prefer the new terminology) on 25th April. (In the best tradition of this forum for digression ….)

Most of the village churches round here have had their benches cut down, sometimes drastically, so for many players it’s a struggle to lift their feet sufficiently high to make playing the pedals feasible. I go round with a set of adjustable blocks I made to cope with these benches which are all low but of varying heights. The most inconvenient instrument I know in the area, however, has a bench of reasonable height for me, but it’s fixed a long way back from the keys. I can’t imagine anyone other than a gorilla finding it comfortable to play.

I see that the encores include a piece by Madeleine Dring - presumably the arrangement her of Jamaican Rumba which Thomas Trotter plays sometimes. I’ve tried playing the piano and oboe version of her delightful Danza Gaya on the organ, but found it jolly tricky.

For what it’s worth, I’d agree that Wesley was not a genius, but he did have a touch of genius. He was flawed as both man and musician/composer, but that is part of what makes him interesting. There is quirkiness about his compositions and his opinions that is intriguing - which is perhaps why this thread began in the first place, and also why it’s continued for so long ….

The earlier books (Routley’s also) are valuable, but Peter Horton’s Samuel Sebastian Wesley: A Life is much more comprehensive and more analytical. He is particularly illuminating on Wesley’s pre-Hereford career as a secular musician, and how his early experiences in the theatre influenced his church music (Gattens had earlier looked at this angle). Wesley’s early church compositions are more innovative than people realise. Later his style became more conservative as a result of studying (as we might put it) “early music” - but in that sort of study he was an innovator too (just of a different kind). As well as examining Wesley’s attested secular music, Horton convincingly argues that a single movement “symphony” in C minor attributed on its manuscript to Samuel Wesley is in fact the lost symphony in that key by Samuel Sebastian that he included in one of his Three Choirs Festivals.

Thank you, Colin, for this very full exposition. I was thinking something like that might be the case, but on the basis of much less knowledge and minimal expertise. It’s very valuable to have a full analysis of the various factors involved.

‘Tis indeed a great mystery. If Gladstone, a contemporary and pupil, could not understand it, what chance have we? A point that intrigued me in the three letters kindly made available by Paul H. was Wesley’s emphasis that it was the organ he was concerned about, the implication being that equal temperament might (perhaps) be acceptable for the piano. Was that merely a rhetorical concession, or did he genuinely feel that there was something about the organ that made equal temperament the more objectionable?

Thank you for the interesting Stove article. On a pedantic note, this bit is not quite right: “It’s sadly typical of Wesley that unlike almost every other church musician of consequence in Victorian Britain, he never had the smallest chance of obtaining a knighthood (although his widow did obtain a pension, by royal command).” As discussed recently in another thread, Wesley was offered a choice of either a knighthood or a civil list pension and opted for the money, but didn’t live to enjoy it for very long. Exceptionally his widow was allowed to continue to receive the pension.

Thank you likewise, Paul, for tracking down these letters and making them available. Highly illuminating. This is very close to what Wesley says in his second letter (cf. my final (“less plausible”!) suggestion): What, I ask, is the use of heaping together a lot of out-of-tune passages, as though we were not already well aware of the defects of organ tuning? Who ignores the terrible quality of the wolf. By accepting the wolf we get a great deal in very excellent tune, and we do not wholly destroy the good qualities of our organs as to tone and voicing. By equal temperament, we get everything of the kind so tempered with that the organ almost ceases to be a source of any pleasure. We get nothing good tune and the sensible ear has rest.

A question that has long puzzled me. Wesley was nothing if not inconsistent, so that may be part of an explanation. Your “cop-out” point is very valid, however. If we had truly accurate knowledge perhaps it would be less puzzling. Another possibility is that Wesley may well have disliked equal temperament, but since it was becoming more common nevertheless wrote for it. Wouldn’t be the first person simultaneously to object to, yet in his practice accept, an innovation. Less plausibly, perhaps he found the horrid sounds in meantone of those compositions you allude to somehow (in his own eccentric way) more tolerable than the way everything is slightly off in equal temperament.