Jump to content
Mander Organ Builders Forum

peterdoughty

Members
  • Posts

    49
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Recent Profile Visitors

The recent visitors block is disabled and is not being shown to other users.

peterdoughty's Achievements

Advanced Member

Advanced Member (3/3)

0

Reputation

  1. This was really interesting, contraviolone, thank you. I was thrown by the exit at the end - from organ chamber to bar! Here's the fruit of my evening's listening: an intimate and lovely collection of some Byrd on piano, harpsichord and organ from the Chapel and antechapel of New College Oxford, courtesy of Dónal McCann and Robert Quinney. They also sing, briefly. I will likely never have the privilege of spending time in such circles, but I'm very glad indeed YouTube is here to help!
  2. I went over from Belfast for a long weekend coach trip to Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford and environs with the Ulster Society of Organists and Choirmasters, back in the spring of 1995. Roy Massey met us off the coach at Lugwardine for lunch at the Crown and Anchor, and then a short recital on the lovely and relatively new instrument in St Peter's which he'd helped to design. After that, to the Cathedral at Hereford. He conducted us fairly briskly, and quite volubly as I remember, up the nave. Just as he was unhooking the ropes around the nave altar so we could all walk straight through under the corona, the hourly request for a few moments' silent contemplation started to be made over the loudspeakers. Not so sotto voce from our host: "Oh my God, he's going to pray."
  3. This is an utterly inconsequential post, but let's see where it leads us in terms of enjoyment, if anywhere. As the nights are now drawing in, I picked up my trusty old copy of M.R. James's ghost stories, opening it at the entertaining Number 13, which starts as follows: Upon searching on Google Maps for Viborg, you'll find several places of interest including the cathedral he mentions, and it's worth having a wander around the environs on Street View. Finderup church looks lovely. I was most intrigued, though, by his special mention of Hald - I poked around and think James must've been referring to the area around a lake and its neighbouring manor house, which does indeed look delightful, and now functions as a centre for writers and translators. 'But I am not writing a guide-book.' The reason I'm posting this is simply because, in the brief amount of poking around I've done online, I've found a 1960s church, Hald Ege Kirke, with a rather spare and beautiful design, housing a quirky little organ of five stops whose pedal pipes wrap around either side and partially enclose the console. (That link will hopefully show you a photo of the instrument and allow you to browse more pics of the church itself. I am not a churchgoer but I love the flavour of the place.) And I thought, hmm, I wonder if they'd like to see it on the Mander forum? So here we are. No details on the specification that I've been able to find, but the Wikipedia article mentions that the instrument was a gift from the builder Frede Aagaard and dates from 1980. Again, I can't find anything about that builder. I just liked the look of the instrument, and was interested in the environs. That's all! As you were...
  4. I would have commented on Anna Lapwood at the Proms, but really, as my formal musical education is limited, all I could really have thought of saying was 'cor blimey, I love the programme and the registration and she had everything going at the end!' and I doubt anyone'd thank me for that, which is why I just didn't say anything I hadn't noticed any animus from people on this forum towards Cameron Carpenter so far - perhaps it's been removed? - but I certainly noticed one very nasty set of comments on a group on Facebook about Anna Lapwood over the past week, and instantly made my displeasure known by reacting with a little 'angry face' emoji but saying nothing else. Not two minutes later, those of us who had done so were being taken to task in a brand new thread for allegedly overreacting and misinterpreting 'banter'. I really do despair of some people, honestly. Thankfully they don't speak for us all.
  5. Writing as someone who has an extensive and very well-worn collection of conventional organ CDs, I'll just add to this by saying that I've spent 2 days so far with Anna Lapwood's new disc. She certainly displays a different view of the instrument's qualities, and it's interesting to watch the first short introductory video here as well, which also shows she doesn't take herself seriously. There's a very harmonious mixture of youthful brightness and serious musicality. I personally think that many reviewers and the commentariat tended to disparage Cameron Carpenter back in the day because, possible homophobic tendencies aside, they felt he lacked that core musicality, that gravitas, to back up his lightning virtuosity and showman's facade. Perhaps they were right; Anna Lapwood certainly can't be accused of lacking it. Martin Cooke also references other young organists up the thread a bit, and I really do agree that they are all inspiring and will be vitally important in propelling other young people towards the nearest accessible console in years to come, even if they can't play a note yet. We simply must make them accessible, therefore!
  6. I don't have a suggested scheme, other than magically un-melting and reinstating the Downes instrument complete with the later additions! (I say that with a mixture of profound regret and a slight hint of a grin.) But since this is all imaginary anyhow, to it I'd also be adding a large, blending resonance / accompaniment department which would entirely satisfy the Cathedral authorities in terms of liturgical needs. In my daydreams, everyone would then have what they wanted and Philip Prosser, Ralph Downes and several others would not be spinning in their graves or doing the living person's alternative! (By the way, if anyone fancies saving for posterity a copy of the guide to the old instrument, intended for visiting organists, it's here.) But to be a little more exact here about one stop, namely the big solo reed, because sbarber49 asked about the St John's Cambridge Trompeta Real. (There'd be plenty of reasons for the College to keep that one where it is.) But yes, what about the Gloucester Trompette Militaire - was anything written for it during its time? I seem to remember Jonathan Hope saying something in the Priory DVD/Blu-Ray organ tour about it, perhaps that one note was specially voiced a bit more assertively than the others due to its use in the opening flourish of such and such a particularly favoured piece, but I can't put my hand to it just at the moment. If that was so, I'd hope for a nice new reed of sufficient vulgarity to replace it!
  7. That's a really superb disc, and likely to be a firm favourite in anyone's collection soon after they've bought it. It was for me anyway. I'm very eager to hear that Byrd now. On the subject of Byrd, there's also this capacious box set from Davitt Moroney on Hyperion, now download only, which contains his organ music: https://www.hyperion-records.co.uk/dc.asp?dc=D_CDS44461/7 Chandos produced an old favourite CD of mine of Blow, Gibbons, Clarke, Croft, Locke and Purcell, recorded on the Dallam organ of Guimiliau back in the early 1990s. (Edit: not a chamber organ though!) It's download only now: https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8035082--organ-music-robert-woolley
  8. Seconding these comments. I've always thought of this forum's value as resting very significantly in the sheer accumulation of knowledge, facts and reminiscences within its pages, and only secondarily as a conversational space. Not that I don't like the threads with plenty of photos of beautiful organ cases, or YouTube videos, because I love those too. This forum needs to be kept online, of course, as far as I'm concerned. I'm never sure whether, for example, anyone has any interest in starting a thread, or multiples, about our enjoyment or otherwise of various individual recordings or series we've encountered over the years. I'm not a working organist, just an amateur, so I can't regale anyone with any playing expertise whatever, but I've amassed a LOT of listening time since I first started buying CDs back in 1992. I stand ready to give unsolicited and inexpert reviews if needed. I'm not a churchgoer either, for example, so in recent years I've had to teach myself the very basics of what Evensong even means in the context of Christian belief and liturgy - largely through reading Wikipedia and other websites. I had thought of asking some questions here, but it's not primarily organ-related, and I was concerned about being off-topic. (This is what happens when you blind-buy one of the recent and marvellous St John's Cambridge 'Magnificat' CDs and a whole new world opens up.) If people feel that extremely non-technical questions or discussions would be welcome, I can certainly start a few in the fullness of time. Meanwhile, thanks to you all for all the previous threads and material here. This place is a gold-mine.
  9. A bit of clicking and creaking console and bench noise, but that vanishes after a while and I thought (over headphones) this is a very clean, immediate and magnificent performance of the Elgar Sonata. I mention cleanness because it's not the first thing you think of when hearing recordings from Liverpool. Very nicely done!
  10. Hello Martin - do you mean this bit onwards - at 29:54 on the linked video? It seems to be composed of a trumpet fanfare followed by a directly linked organ march development. I can't help with who the composer is - it's listed here as 'Fanfare for the Coronation of Their Majesties' but without attribution. The Order of Service (p.12) is of no help to us either. It simply states "A fanfare is sounded. All stand."
  11. I've not very much experience at all of live performances, sadly, but those I've been privileged to hear have therefore stuck in the memory. Hmm. In very roughly chronological order: Gillian Weir giving a masterclass at Armagh RC Cathedral, on the Franck Cantabile (I was a young teenage spectator). Possibly 1993. She performed it right through from memory after hearing all of the students and it was stunning. It was raining cats and dogs outside afterwards, and my now late Dad offered the passenger seat of our car for her to shelter in while she waited for her own car to pick her up. Her fur coat was something else. I made overawed and embarrassed conversation with her, such as I could. She was gracious and encouraging. Christopher Herrick came to Belfast's Ulster Hall to perform on the Hill / Mander instrument, at a time when the Organ Fireworks Hyperion series was in full swing, alongside his Bach, and he was receiving rave reviews all over the world. It was 1994. Do you know how many people were in the audience? Less than 10. Perhaps even less than 7, including me and my Dad. I felt awful for him. I trespassed backstage afterwards, to see whether I could find him, and he signed some of my CD booklets moments before leaving via the stage door, again alone to a car. No valedictory committee, nothing. Needless to say he never came back but his performance was kaleidoscopic. I can't remember exactly what he played but it was a collection of the Fireworks repertoire. Around the same time, John Scott came to St Anne's Cathedral in Belfast to give a recital to the Ulster Society of Organists and Choirmasters. He made the instrument sound like new, of course. I remember Philip Prosser, a local organ builder, talking to him afterwards about the work he'd recently done on the Swell whiffletrees to make them more reliable in preparation for his visit. In May 1995 the USOC had a trip to Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford and environs, and David Briggs improvised for us at Gloucester Cathedral. Utterly marvellous. Philip Prosser was with us, and had voiced sections of the instrument for Ralph Downes at that major rebuilding, so had plenty of detail of his own to share. Skip to more recent times, and I was in the Royal Festival Hall for Olivier Latry's 2014 recital in the inaugural series to celebrate the restored instrument there. Marvellous. Likewise, a couple of days later, Cameron Carpenter gave an absolutely inspired, fluid and striking improvised live soundtrack to the German expressionist silent film The Cabinet of Dr Caligari, which is one of the more extraordinary live organ experiences I've had. Quite jazzy, which was oddly fitting. As for a live performance I wish I'd heard - Gillian Weir performing Messiaen. Or Christopher Herrick performing Bach. My god. And I'm not even religious!
  12. Update - I emailed Martin Doering and he's fixed it! Carry on as you were.
  13. Thanks DHM! If it sounds like someone blowing their nose I'm not sure of its utility... they say it's mounted on the facade and a photo of the pipes is indeed given on the site linked to above. It looks to be mounted upside-down and of absurdly small scale and uniform length, which is why I ask about how it might sound. If nobody here is any the wiser, I might just write to Kuhn directly and ask... Edit: just after 4:40 on this video might be it...
×
×
  • Create New...