Things cats know: Hallowe'en edition

A random organ case

Sacred Heart Catholic Church, Kew, where I played for a funeral a couple of years ago.  Here's a closeup of one of the cases.

And the console.

It's a surprisingly effective instrument for Reger and Karg-Elert.  Finally, here's a view in the opposite direction.

Out and about on Sunday

Next Sunday I'm back at St Stephen's, Richmond.  Apparently I did such a good job over the last couple of months, the organist has decided to take a week away so they can have me again...

The parish will be keeping All Saints Sunday, so all those people who were getting around in Hallowe'en costumes last weekend turned out to be a touch early.

Here's what I'm planning to play.

Largo from Sonata V [BWV 529] -- J.S. Bach

Grands Jeux -- Francois Couperin

You can leave your hat on...

Music in the bear-pit: a modern parable in aid of funding policy...?

Things cats know 2

A moment of sunrise and moonshine

Text with translation here.

Out and about on Sunday

This week I'm playing at St Bartholomew's, Burnley, again.  They're about to receive their new director of music, so hopefully many good things will be afoot there in the near future.

The organ music this week will be as follows.

Aria-Prelude -- Joseph Jongen

March -- Percy Grainger

In spring

Things cats know 1

Just in case you can't make it

Here are a couple of tracks from a practice tape of the programme I'm in the middle of performing right about now.

Trio Sonata in e minor [BWV 528] -- J.S. Bach
   Adagio-Vivace
   Andante
   Un poco Allegro

Prelude in G (Op. 109, No. 2a) -- Camille Saint-Saëns

These sound best if you listen to these with earphones.  There is one movement -- the Andante from the Bach -- that was balanced more effectively in the building than on the recording.

One of the many things I've enjoyed about preparing this programme is the opportunity to re-explore a lot of the colours in the instrument.  It was built by George Fincham in 1874, and initially placed in the Fitzroy Town Hall.  It was exhibited in the Intercolonial Exhibition of 1875, from where it was sold to the parish priest at Richmond, and installed on a balcony at the back of St Igantius's the following year.  Since then it has been moved to a chapel on the north side of the building (by the compass; liturgically it's the south), and most recently to the south transept (again, by the compass).

One feature that strikes a lot of people on seeing this instrument for the first time is the unusual pattern of decoration on the facade pipes.  In the nineteenth century it was common to paint the visible portion of the facade pipes.  I think Fincham was proud of his metal casting, so he chose to have a sparing amount of stencilling, while allowing the metal to be seen.  The effect is very rich, and I can imagine it would have been very striking when all the paint and gilding was fresh.

What really strikes me most is the classical conception of this instrument.  Both manuals have a logical chorus design, capped off with mixtures and reeds.  The pedal includes an 8' Principal, which is a very useful stop.  There is a blank spot where a stop knob for a pedal reed might have been intended, which would follow on from the structure of the manual divisions.

It would be nice to say that this was an 'untouched' example of Fincham's work.  It's certainly one of the most significant.  Somewhere along the line the swell lost its oboe, which was replaced by some well-meaning soul with a very throaty clarinet.  I'm a bit ambivalent about whether this was necessarily a bad change in and of itself; certainly an oboe would be more characteristic, and probably more useful.  A more pressing issue is the lack of wind.  Either the blower is too small, or someone has done something well-meaning (but ultimately malevolent), but the bottom line is that the whole thing falls over when you use a large amount of foundation stops in a big combination.  In putting today's programme together, I wanted to see what could be done to make the instrument sound happy making a musical sound in the bigger combinations.

The recordings were made during the day yesterday, so there is some ambient noise from people wandering around, automatic doors rumbling open and shut, and some officiously inconsiderate prig rattling keys (why do some people feel the need to do this?).  There's also a fair amount of action noise; one of the joys of playing old instruments.  Maybe I'll have an opportunity to station the recorder further from the organ at some stage, which might help to eliminate that source of extra-musical sound.

On the upside, the Bach piece was recorded in one unbroken take, although I had to break it up into separate tracks to keep the file sizes down to a reasonable level. It's a piece that usually comes off second-best during rehearsal -- it is a very demanding piece to work on over time -- but seems to come together just right for performances.  That probably tells you more about me than the piece...

If you're at a loose end this afternoon

Who's for Biblical marriage?

In the light of the video in the last post, something that's been doing the rounds for a while.

You have to watch this right to the end

I thought this was going to be another of those scary-weird speeches.  If nothing else, it serves to highlight the old canker about how the more things change, with a nice twist at the end...

From the backlog

Just a random selection of pieces from earlier entries.

Canon in C -- Robert Schumann

Prelude on a Theme of Orlando Gibbons -- A.E. Floyd

Erbarme Dich -- J.S. Bach

Coming up

Out and about on Sunday

This week I'm filling in at St Bartholomew's, Burnley.  St Bart's is  a daughter parish of St Stephen's, where I've been playing for the past few weeks, so there's a certain aspect of continuity about all of this.

The main organ music moments are the prelude and postlude, so here's what I'll be playing this week.

Sonata IV [BWV 528] -- J.S. Bach

Prelude and Fugue in c minor (Op. 37) -- Felix Mendelssohn

Recital programme for Sunday

On Sunday I'll be playing a short recital at St Ignatius Catholic Church, Richmond.  It's part of a series of three recitals being held in aid of the Richmond Hill Churches Food Centre.

The programme for St Ignatius will be as follows:

Sinfonia from Solomon --G.F. Handel

Sonata IV [BWV 528] -- J.S. Bach
   Adagio-Vivace
   Andante
   Un poco Allegro

Prelude (Op. 109, No 2a) -- Camille Saint-Saëns


Prelude and Fugue in c minor (Op. 37) -- Felix Mendelssohn

Recent practice tapes

Over the last few weeks I've been making practice recordings of various pieces in preparation for services at St Stephen's, Richmond.

Only three really turned out satisfactorily for sharing, so I thought it might be worth gathering them together here.

Click on the titles to hear the pieces.

Cantilena -- John Longhurst

Forlana -- Gerald Finzi

Tuba Tune -- Dulcie Holland

Before Eve, the Apple

Coming up

Another new look

I thought it was getting on for time to do a little freshen up of the template here.  The dynamic view was taking a bit of time to load, and really wasn't completely natural for a largely text-driven effort such as this.

The new template returns things closer to a classic Blogger interface.  All of the expected material in the right-hand sidebar is now available to view without relying on retractable menus.

The background image is from a series of photos I took about four of years ago on one of my rides through the city.  It was a warm December day, so the sky was very clear.  This particular view was taken from the Main Yarra bicycle trail, and shows the Yarra River at the Swan Street Bridge.  The large building to the right of centre is Melbourne Central, which dominates the top of Swanston Street.

Out and about on Sunday

This week is the last Sunday for my time playing the organ at St Stephen's, Richmond.

It's been one of the more interesting gigs I've had this year.  There's not a choir as such, but a singing group has been meeting for a while.  Over the last eight weeks we've done a fair bit of work to build a more confident sound, and the results have been noticed.  The regular organist is probably going to find a more energized and efficient choral group when he gets back.

The organ music this week is as follows.

Adagio-Vivace from Sonata IV [BWV 528] -- J.S. Bach

Sinfonia from Solomon -- G.F. Handel

Out and about on Sunday

The locum continues at St Stephen's, Richmond, this week.  I finish up there next week, and then on to another place.  Here's this week's pieces.

Fugue in c minor (Op. 37) -- Felix Mendelssohn

Un poco allegro from Sonata IV [BWV 528] -- J.S. Bach