nfortin
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Posts posted by nfortin
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Well, now that the thread has gone thoroughly offtopic... yes, CP is generally excellent, but I do wish they hadn't followed EH/Songs of Praise practice by using the ABABCD harmonies for 'Dix'. The ABCDEF in AMR/AMNS is IMHO far more interesting.
Oh absolutely. So some of us have gone from using AMR but having to dig out an EH (or photocopy pages) for "Come down, O love divine" and "Who would true valour see", to using CP but insisting on digging out the AMRs for Dix. Whilst I don't dislike English Lane I'm not convinced that its jerky rhythms suit the gentle mood of "For the beauty of the earth" as well as the beautiful harmonisation of Dix in AMR. (I recommend this hymn to wedding couples, and they often choose it. I always play both tunes to them without trying to lead one way or the other but they more-or-less all want Dix. Its not even set as an option in CP.) As with any updated compilation, CP also has a few surprising omissions. We use our AMRs for "O God unseen yet ever near" as an occasional communion hymn, and I'm surprised that "Sent forth by God's Blessing", to The Ash Grove, has not survived from HHFT. We also use our AMRs for "Let all mortal flesh" as I like both the unison accompaniment and the harmonized version of the tune which seem to be unique to this book.
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To get back to "Breslau", this is one of a number of tunes where one's idea of how it goes is coloured by whether you grew up in an AMR environment as opposed to EH. In AMR the tune is written out in 4/2 time with the last chord at the half way point actually printed as a semibreve - ie. a 2-beat note. As each line of the tune starts on the ana crusis this makes little musical sense and hence this has generally been treated as either a 3-beat note or a 2-beat note followed by a 1-beat breath. As a child of AMR myself I find this by far the more singable way to play this tune as the congregation do need time to breathe.
There are many other examples where AMR printed more singable versions of tunes than the equivalent in EH, even though EH was almost certainly more historically correct. In CP, which I think is a superb hymn book, the EH versions have generally been brought back, but I suspect that there are many organists who, like myself, will stick to the AMR rhythms. The tune "Bristol" (Hark the glad sound) is another good example. In EH and now CP each line starts and ends with a 2-beat note, whereas in AMR all notes are 1-beat except at the end of the second line (the half way point) where a 3-beat notes occurs. I find this far more natural and more fluent to sing.
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An historic organ and an ambitious top player.
Pierre
Spot on there Pierre.
How about a clergyman and a pulpit?
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Question: what's the difference to the hearer between the first movement of the Bach Magnificat in D at A440 and the first movement of the Bach Magnificat in Eb at A415?
String players, in particular but not uniquely, will use an entirely different finguring strategy, and will have different possibilities for the use of open strings, when playing in E flat as opposed to D.
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Seems a bit rich when my impression of SOP is that they think every hymn has to be arranged for and accompanied by some variety of band. (Not that I watch very often, I'm at evensong anyway.)
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I chose the (not brilliant) piano at All Saints, Poplar to play the requested Dambusters March for the funeral of a veteran of WWII, over the less suitable organ.
IMHO the Dambusters March works very well on the organ, I've used it in recitals and its a popular choice with the punters.
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So how high up is the loft at Chester, from photos it doesn't look as high as Bath Abbey?
I'm due to play at Truro for the first time later this year, should I be nervous?
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I saw this page of Cologne Cathedral http://www.koelner-dom.de/16955.html?&L=1 and the Klais mounted high up on the wall. I am ***** scared of heights and nothing on this planet would get me up there! Even St Michaels Croydon worried me quite a bit at first! Anyone else uncomfortable with heights and had to play with your fingernails digging into the top manual?
Regards, Oliver.
I have no head for heights either, but I'm generally OK with organ lofts. Lichfield worried me a little, its quite high up and feels as if there's absolutely nothing behind you (although you couldn't possibly fall out), but once I got sat down & started it was not a problem.
I used to be very active as a bell ringer and once forced myself to overcome my fears enough to get onto the ringing platform in Pershore Abbey. Never again!
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What is the point in singing "O Come" at the END? "O go away all ye faithful"? It makes a wonderful opener.
I can see your point, but by the same reasoning we'd have to change the last verse to be "...born tomorrow morning". I feel that the "Yea Lord, we greet thee" verse works well as a climactic moment at the end of the service and prefer to keep a sense of unfolding drama a little longer at the beginning.
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Carol Service:
Once in royal David's city (procession)
O come, all ye faithful
Midnight Mass:
Of the Father's love (procession)
O come, all ye faithful
Christmas Day:
O come, all ye faithful
Hark! the herald angels sing
I go along with much of this. If I didn't start the carol service with Once in royal, solo verse 'n all, I'd probably be linched.
For midnight I always start with Of the Father's love, which I adore, and finish with O come all ye faithful. Hark! the jelly babies I do as little as I can get away with, same applies to The first nowell.
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The "St Anne" fugue was one of my set pieces for AB Grade 7 in about 1975
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Pardon the sycophancy, David, but I firmly disagree with MM on this one. Your design is a very 'English' scheme which (if built by a sufficiently skilled UK firm) would be particularly fine in accompaniment which is (after all) what would be needed.
I'd prefer to see the strings on the swell for 'seamless' accompaniment from pp without needing to change clavier. The logic for placing them on the choir to accompany the oboe means they then can't accompany the cremona. For anglican choral accompaniment I'd much rather have a corno or clarinet instead of the cremona. I'd also prefer a choir Nazard in preference to the cornet in this particular scheme.
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Are there any organs that small in America? I'd have to include the Pietro Yon Toccatina for Flute.
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I made a recruiting visit to our local (CofE church aided) primary school a couple of weeks ago, at what was described to me as their "Hymn Practice" assembly. I'm not knocking the school, which is excellent, in any way, but the hymn practice consisted of two songs, "The bell of creation" and another something about building a wall, neither of which had the slightest Christian content.
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Not really relevant, I know, but many years ago, when I was a student in Worcester I used to do most of my practice on the 3M instrument in St. John in Bedwardine. I've always remembered one occasion when after only a fairly short practice session I decided that it was just too cold and that it was pointless continuing. Just when I was on the point of packing up the vicar appeared through the connecting door from the adjoining vicarage with a mug of hot coffee saying "I thought you might need this". It gave me fresh heart and did seem to keep the fingers working for longer than would otherwise have been the case.
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Thank you - I am glad that you like it. On reflection, I would be quite interested to hear how a rebuilt Gloucester Cathedral organ with the above scheme would sound in the building. I think that I would be very happy with this instrument.
I suspect that will be a surprise to Neil!
I'd refrained from commenting earlier, although I was very surprised that you chose Gloucester as an example. I'm prepared to accept that a willingness to discuss what might have been doesn't in itself mean that you are unhappy with whats actually there now, although I suspect we would both agree that a scheme along the lines of your suggestion above would almost certainly have resulted in an instrument more suited to accompanying the daily round of choral services.
I'm interested jonadkins comment "...the strings, which for a supposedly french-style instrument sound remarkably un-french and insipid". Nothing that I've read about the HNB rebuild suggests that it was intended to produce a french-style instrument. Obviously the alterations made as a leaving present to David Briggs are a different matter. The strings are rather insipid, and certainly not at all french in character, but are also quite etherial in that accoustic.
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Nobody could give a damn for the voluntaries, of course (unless they interfere with the coffee).
Yep, that's about the measure of it. In my own church its got very bad before the 10:00am now, they complain if you play loudly before the service and yet anything less than mf is unlikely to be able to compete. It all goes very suddenly quiet when the vicar comes in to do the notices.
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As far as I can remember, it is that at S. Sulpice - although I am surprised that DJB left it there when he moved. (Unless, of course, the present incumbents happen to have a similar poster.)
Naturally, I cannot agree with either your assessment of the organ or its console....
and you'll be very shocked to hear the latest change at Gloucester - the sofa has gone!
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Benjamin Britten. Isn't it all about what you make of it? A New Year Carol, many of the folksong arrangements, solo songs like The Birds, Festival Te Deum and much of Ceremony of Carols can be made turgid, repetetive, uninspired and dull by simply playing the notes on the page. With a little sensitivity and the tiniest of nuances they become completely different creatures. A New Year Carol (it's in CFC2 and I think the white book as well) is the simplest imaginable little piece (as is Waly, waly) but I've witnessed it cause the most flint-hearted souls to well up tears in their eye sockets. It's worth looking up Britten and Pears on YouTube where there are many videos of them performing Schubert and Schumann. Watching Britten accompany is a lesson to us all.
Couldn't agree more. The recordings of the Britten/Pears recordings of the folk songs are a real treasure. Britten's playing is so alive and Pears, whether you like his tone or not, is a great communicator and consumate musician. I fail to see how Rejoice in the Lamb, or St. Nicolas, could possibly described as "deadly dull". The watchman smiting with his staff never fails to send a shiver down my spine, and the moment when the pickled boys first sing "Alleluia" must be one of the most effective and moving theatrical effects in the entire choral repertoire. The Church Parables I also find very effective, I've long had an ambition to sing Abraham and Issac with my daughter, but I doubt if we ever will.
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If an orchestra is a collection of different instruments which play as an ensemble and from time to time individual voices pop out of the texture to say their piece, then I suppose the organ could be regarded as an orchestra (and so could a choir, in some senses.) This applies equally to transcriptions and Romantic music as it does to earlier pieces. This is why I like trio sonatas - I like to hear the mathematics of a rising triad appearing in every voice, then upside down, then backwards, then everywhere at once. I love the "Allein Gott" trio in the Clavierubung where the chorale sticks its head over the parapet from time to time. I always find myself drawn to thinking of Trio 6 as two violinists challenging each other to a duel, periodically descending in to Vivaldiesque scrubbing away at arpeggios, and the poor cello player trying to keep up but actually displaying the greatest virtuosity of the lot. Equally nothing can beat the thrill of the great choral/orchestral works played cleverly. If I am ever told I must have my fingers cut off, I will first demand to accompany Elgar Spirit of the Lord and the Rutter and Faure requiems.
Personally, away from organ music, I've always favoured the music which draws the greatest possible effect from the fewest possible resources. RVW has been mentioned as occasionally inducing boredom (I think 'cowpat' is the term affectionately applied to various English composers of that era) but many of his voice and piano songs contain the most economical, exciting and ascerbic harmonic writing imaginable, beaten only by Peter Warlock. As for the Ten Blake Songs (voice with oboe accompaniment) - such intricacy and richness drawn from only two parts really is quite amazing and, for me, beats hell out of Brahms or someone pounding hell out of my eardrums in forty parts for an hour. I'll do almost anything to take part in a concert of Warlock, RVW, Finzi, Wolf and Schumann songs (preferably performed by my fiancee....) but you will have to buy me a very big dinner indeed to get me to turn up to watch a Brahms and Beethoven orchestral shout.
But, curiously (to me), my dislike for Palestrina and Byrd and all that sort of thing is fairly irrational whereas it really ought not to be the case at all, ticking the economical and ascerbic boxes. I suppose it's because I seldom get to hear that sort of stuff done really, really, really well, but I find it quite predictable and often feel I could play along quite happily without taking too many wrong turns. I would rather hear a local choral society do something simple and well than try to bash through a Byrd mass getting flatter and flatter and slower and slower and constantly disagreeing about false relations.
Oh, and opera. Pass.
Well I agree with many of the above sentiments. I'm surprised you haven't mentioned Britten, he always strikes me as a master of creating maximum effect from minimum resources. I also tend to think of Handel in this regard.
Where I disagree is that Brahms and Beethoven don't have to be an orchestral shout. I could never come to terms with Brahms' Requiem until the combination of two circumstances occuring close together completly changed my viewpoint - namely the death of a close friend and mentor and the release of the John Elliot Gardiner recording. Similarly the Roy Goodman Beethoven symphonies are a far cry from the type of heavy. modern instrument travesties that are, unfortunately, the norm.
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Well I suppose it would be boring if we all liked the same things. Personally I can think of few passages of music as beautiful and sublime as the Benedictus in the Missa Solemnis, and at least Beethoven has made a serious attempt to reflect the meaning of the words throughout the mass in the way they are set to the music, rather than setting vocal solos as if they were purely orchestral as is often the case with the great JSB. (Don't get me wrong though, I think St. Matthew Passion is possibly the greatest choral work ever written)
I wonder how many members of this board play an orchestral instrument? Get out there and play some real music!
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....and you wonder why organists are not taken seriously as musicians?
Mozart is a genius. The music in Magic Flute for example is simply stupendous. Beethoven likewise, Missa Solemnis incomparable. Personally, given the choice of attending a top notch performance of La Boheme, or Traviata, or alternatively sitting through an evening of De Gringy and Couperin the opera would win hands down. (Mind you Wagner is a step too far!)
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For example, which would you rather have on a wall in your lounge?
This:
http://images.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=h...m%3D1%26hl%3Den
or this:
Mm, seems a bit like choosing between the electric chair or the gas chamber to me. Don't much fancy either!
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As you well know, I am one of those who much regret the passing of the old organ. However, I doubt whether there can ever have been a better documented installation of a significant new organ than this and for this we owe Adrian Lucas an enormous debt of thanks. I know from my friend and colleague John Wilderspin that Adrian is as keen photographer, and the quality of the photos that Adrian makes available never ceases to impress. Its obvious too that Adrian has a much better head for heights than myself!
On a selfish note, I was holding out a slim hope that my choir's visit to sing for a weekend in the spring next year might allow us an early experience of the new organ, but from the latest details this looks unlikely to say the least. Ah well, we're used to digital.
Which Are The Best Consoles?
in Nuts and bolts
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As one of the many regular contributers to have commented in the past on the comfort of classic H&H consoles, with a particular fondness for the one recently consigned to the scrap heap and also Exeter, I would have to say that, for me, St Mary Redcliffe is the exception that proves the rule. I dislike the layout of the swell stops, but the main problem is with the swell pedals and the toe pistons. I also find the pedal board to be rather cramped.
I notice Bath Abbey does not feature amongst anyones favourites, with its foul pedal board positioning this does not surprise me, it was much more comfortable in its HNB days. The unusually large stop knob heads in their carved panels still have a certain unique charm though.
I find the console at Hereford to be really comfortable and always feel immediately at home here. I would however agree with Paul that the huge array of stop-tab couplers under the music desk is not very user friendly and wonder how often the mirriad octave and suboctave couplers actually get used. Having played there again last Saturday I was thinking about a new thread for "Most dodgy organ loft staircases", but perhaps we'll keep that for another day!