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Music & organs

The man that hath no music in himself
Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, strategems, and spoils.
The motions of his spirit are dull as night
And his affections dark as Erebus.
Let no such man be trusted. Mark the music.

William Shakespeare

The sheepskin hanging on my study wall says I'm a musicologist. I have done some writing, including articles on Hindemith's organ concertos and Thomson's Four Saints in Three Acts. There's also a book about Restoration theatre music. Then there's the evil side of me that reviews things. I've put in my two cents worth about concerts, books, scores, and recordings-most often in The Diapason.

I haven't played a church service since 1984-partly for philosophical reasons, partly because I'd rather sleep in on Sunday mornings. I still do the odd recital. (Some folks think very odd.) Recent and upcoming programs include music by Alain, Bach, Bellini, Boyce, Buxtehude, Couperin, Mathias, Mozart, Scarlatti, Thomson, Vaughan Williams, and Widor. The lack of Romantic repertoire is due partly to taste and partly to carpal tunnel syndrome.

Orgelbear and his II/3 house organ, affectionately known as "Pile O' Pipes".

Choristers are less like instrumental musicians and more like actors in their sense of community and joy of performing. I sing as often as possible, most often with the Raleigh Oratorio Society. Recent and upcoming ROS concerts with the North Carolina Symphony include Stravinsky's Symphony of Psalms, Mendelssohn's Elijah, and the North American premiere of Martinu's Epic of Gilgamesh.

Orgelbear as a Mantuan courtier/chorster in the Triangle Opera production of Rigoletto

Orgelbear in bib and tucker
for an ROS concert.

The three recordings that shaped
(or warped) my musical tastes.

One day, when I was five years old, my parents took me to the public library in the little town where we lived. Up on the third floor was an old, dusty, little-used collection of records-mostly 78s-that folks had gotten rid of when the new-fangled lps came out. I dug around in the shelves and came up with a real pretty red vinyl Silvertone recording. I was fascinated by the color, so I checked it out and took it home.

The music that was on the record was a revelation-late Brahms piano music. How that music beguiled a five year old is a mystery, but I was hooked.

One Sunday afternoon not too long after that, the local radio station played the Reiner/Chicago recording of the "New World" Symphony. I decided that anything that took that long to be over MUST be important.

J. BRAHMS

A few years later, when I was a member of the Columbia Record Club (Rural Ohio didn't have many classical record stores)-I failed to return the selection card one month. So, quite by accident, Glenn Gould's recording of Bach's Art of Fugue arrived by mail. It was Gould's only organ lp, as eccentric as any recording he ever made. But it was my real introduction to Bach and to the organ (one of the shrill neobaroque screamers Casavant was turning out in the early 60s), and I met the great loves of my musical life.

G. Gould