handsoff

Lovely photographs Nigel. Thank you for sharing them.

A bit like the 32' pipes in the "old" Worcester cathedral organ - the castellated tops remind me of the chimney of "Rocket"...

I can absolutely echo what MM said above. I haven't played much at all in the last 30 years or so, apart from a bit of "tootling" over the last 18 months just to amuse myself. I must have mentioned this to someone because I've been asked to play for a service, just 5 hymns and 2 voluntaries, in a couple of weeks and have been practising a lot for the last 2 weeks. My word! My fingers have really ached, my shoulders hurt and my left leg goes dead because the organ on which I have practised is quite uncomfortable with a fixed bench that is too high and too close to the keyboards. (Funny, but I never thought that when I was organist there when I was 17!). I am determined to do a good job at the service and have been playing one line of a hymn over and over until it's right then adding the next line and so. The technique and strength is beginning to come back but it has been hard work. I can't imagine the sort of work that must be necessary to learn something really hard, even if one has talent; something that I lack in bucketloads... Lesson learned - keep mouth firmly shut when in "church" company!

Switch off the blower and blame the trip switch? It used to happen at least once a month for real on one instrument that I used to play - the first choirboy to the pumping handle got an extra 1/- in his pay which was quite a bonus when the quarterly envelope contained 10/- for full attendance.

I especially liked his impression of JSB piloting an aircraft about to land in the UK... I felt that it rather non-plussed Sara Mohr-Pietsch The transcriptions were very enjoyable; the last three movements of the Suite No 3 worked especially well, and as for the encore - cor!

I wouldn't say that it has little impact in the Nave but it does not obliterate everything else as do some solo reeds in other cathedrals. My impression is that it is exactly right for 1) leading a large congregation and 2) giving some fire and brilliance to the tutti in solo organ works. Worthwhile? Yes, certainly. It adds a new dimension to the already thrilling sound of the Gloucester organ. I've just listened to the end of the Choral Evensong (final hymn onwards) and consider that the BBC engineers captured the sound of the organ well. On Monday, I noticed a pair of microphones suspended perhaps 30' to the west of the tiered choirs stalls, which were placed almost against the screen, and about 20' from the floor. I don't know if these were the BBC's mikes but they were placed in the right place to capture the sound of both the choir and organ and gave an accurate representation of the sound in the nave as I heard it on Monday from my position next to the aisle in about the 10th row from the front. For anyone who didn't hear either broadcast I think that using the "listen again" facility on the BBC website will give a realistic impression; the new reed was used to solo the tune in the playover of the hymn and, as Omega Consort said, between the Nunc and its Gloria.

Indeed. I thought that the BBC had stopped the dreadful habit of cutting short the final voluntary - and what a voluntary to curtail. I can't repeat what I shouted at the hi-fi...

If the cathedral organ by Nicholson which has just gained a new solo reed also had a 16' version, would that be a Double Gloucester?

I heard the organ yesterday at Ashley Grote's quite superb 3 Choirs recital. The new stop is not at all overpowering in the Nave but has a real presence both solo and in the tutti and is a very worthwhile addition. Is there room for 16' & 4' equivalents? Only kidding... Added Wednesday lunchtime... Choral Evensong comes live from Gloucester today (11 August) on Radio 3 at 4pm.

My apologies if this has been mentioned on another thread; I've had a quick search and couldn't immediately find anything. Priory now sell a DVD of the BBC Series along with a bonus CD.

I've just listened to some of it. The Lemare was OK but WM afterwards said that, in essence, it was too difficult for him and that his partner had to pick out the main theme of Tannhauser for him. Short thumbs or wide gaps between the manuals? I sat through about 10 minutes of the improvisation on themes from Tristan & Isolde and could stand no more. Unremittingly dull just about sums it up for me. We all know that the BBC top brass has an allergy to organ music and that any organ music they deign to give us in the Proms is to fill a gap in the afternoon schedule to mark some anniversary or other - Messiaen last year and Wagner this time and both from a performer who could, frankly, be bettered by any number of artists. I just wish that the BBC could be persuaded to timetable a proper organ concert in the Proms with something from the C17 up to today. Anyone on here could come up with a crowd pleasing programme without resorting to lollipops and those toccatas and also suggest a list of performers who would play the works sympathetically and musically. The RAH organ is a tremendous resource and deserves to be better used than it currently is. P

WM was interviewed on R3's "In Tune" last Friday and a recording of him playing The Finale from Widor V (what else...) was aired. Dreadful. It was played so fast that the rh arpeggios might as well have been chords. What a waste of Coventry Cathedral's finest. He also played an improvisation on the studio piano. Dreadful. Anodyne and aimless. I recorded his Prom on Sunday but doubt that I shall ever bother to play it.

I don't know if the RSCM still run courses on accompaniment but if they do then that might be a worthwhile option, and your church may even pay the fee. I went to such a residential course at Addington Palace (yes, it was that long ago!) and found it immensely helpful, not just for psalms although that was quite intensively covered, but on all aspects of service accompaniment. P

There are several recordings of Rolande Falcinelli starting here. More than well worth a listen...

"The Organ Will Now Play....." "Not Without Me, It Won't!" Who's Toccata?

A friend of mine applied, along with just two others, for the organist and choirmaster position at a small parish church near here. All three were invited as part of the interview to play for part of a choir practice involving just a couple of hymns and a psalm together with sight-reading an obscure Victorian anthem which the choir had already learned. Although this needs the co-operation of the choir it seemed to be a good way of assessing basic accompaniment skills.

I wish that I had the nerve to take a Vuvuzela to Wimbledon tomorrow... PAAAARPPPP COME ON TIM!

Brilliant! I nearly fell off my chair

Thank you for the responses. It would have been a shame if the joins on the 32' pipes had been smoothed off as we should have lost a fascinating glimpse into the technology of the early nineteenth century and how the available skills and machinery were used for a quite different purpose to that originally intended. I wonder how many visitors to the South Transept actually notice those pipes? When I was there about 90% of people just wandered about randomly pointing their mobile phone cameras into the middle distance without appearing to take in any of the splendour around them. I've just listened again to a few tracks on the CD and the microphone placement really shows JSW's technique to the best advantage. With every note audible even in the fast passages the tiniest slip would have stood out like a sore thumb or 2, 3, 4, 5...

By some coincidence, I yesterday spent a few hours in York, largely at the premises of Principal Pipe Organs talking about the progress of the new organ for the Guild Chapel, Stratford-upon-Avon. After a very pleasant couple of hours in the company of Mr Coffin I made the pilgrimage to the Minster, without any hope of hearing the organ. That was fulfilled, then... I did, though, have a good look around and noticed that the 32' Open Diapason pipes on the south side looked almost as if they had been constructed by welding together a stack of dustbins and then painting them in a sort of limestone colour to fit in with the fabric of the Minster. I've seen a few similar ranks over the years but have never seen one constructed in a similar way. Does anyone know the history of them? Is this a normal method of making 32' pipes but in most cases the welds being filed down to make the job look better? While there I bought a discounted Priory CD of organ lollipops recorded by JSW a few years ago. I listened to it earlier today and thought that the organ sounded quite different to other times that I'd heard it, either live or recorded. It was a lot brighter with the Big T being much less prominent than one might expect. On reading the admittedly sparse sleeve notes it turned out that the recording was made with the main (or only?) microphone placed (suspended) over the case. I rather liked the sound - has anyone else here heard the disc and have a comment?

Just in case anyone interested is reading this now, Radio 3 is reviewing the above in the next hour or so. Edit - Not Nottre but Notre!

Ah, thank you Pierre. I'll see if my copy of Photoshop still works!

Now where's that photo of Wimborne Minster.....?

Thank you Nachthorn. I'll have a listen to those excerpts and maybe have an early shopping session. Beat the crowds and all that!

I have seen advertisements for Daniel Roth's recordings of some of the symphonies from St Sulpice; he is working his way through them and imagine that they will be worth a listen on that most exciting and colourful of instruments. * I have S-V C-C's recording from there of movements 1 & 6 of the 1st and wish that she had done the lot; the 1st movement especially is about the best I have heard. * There is also a new 2 disc recording made there of a recreation of a full mass including the Vierne Messe Solennelle and improvisations etc etc. Has anyone heard it? Mrs Handsoff is aware of it and as the longest day has passed her mind will soon turn to organising Christmas, in particular my present. I hope...