Recital time (or "Why on earth did I suggest this?")

I am scheduled to play the Symphonie Romane of Charles Marie Widor as the final installment of the Lenten concert series at the local Congregational Church (for those of you who are local, it is Wednesday, April 3, at noon). This is not a Lenten piece; it is an Easter piece, based on the Easter Gradual chant Haec dies. If I am ever to play it at a liturgically appropriate time, this is it: the Wednesday of Easter Week. It seemed like a good idea last fall when I suggested it to B.D., the organizer of the series.

There are, however, other things to do between now and then.

As anyone could have told me would happen, I did not get any work done on the piece in the fall. Or in January. Or in February (though I did work out the fingerings that month, in bits and pieces over several weeks around other tasks). I finally began the First Workout on March 8, and completed my preliminary work at the piano yesterday morning. Tomorrow morning I take it to the church to work out registrations, and then (because of rehearsals for other concerts in the series) I have no further time over there until Holy Week. That should be interesting.

I played the Symphonie Romane once before, back in about 1990. That was the one concert of my career that was broadcast on the regional public radio station and reviewed in a newspaper (the reviewer panned it, more because of a Daniel Pinkham piece and what he called a "cheesy" arrangement of Pachelbel's Canon for flute and organ. He hardly mentioned the Widor). But in those days, I did not write in the fingerings.

This time, I did. I then gave the long fourth movement (the hardest) a thorough First Workout at the piano, which took two days and about eight hours, then a second workout the next day (four hours). My experience seems to indicate that this second workout is almost as important as the first, and best done as soon as possible in order to more firmly establish the musical lines and the fingerings in the mind and body. The drawback is that, by the time I did two workouts on each of the four movements, it has now been a long time since I have so much as looked at the fourth movement. I hope that it has stayed with me.

Why the piano? I learned this lesson from the Liszt piece that I played last year. With nineteenth and twentieth century scores that are pianistic, it is effective to do some work on them at the piano. It strengthens the fingers and builds security in a way that playing them at the organ does not (especially an electric-action organ such as the one on which I will be playing it).

It has been a delight to live with the Widor intensively these past nine days, working on the upright piano in the choir room or (sometimes) on our beloved Steinway L up in the church. I just hope I can get it ready in the time that remains, hardly more than a fortnight.


Here is a link from the fine website "Organs of Paris" to information about the Church of Saint-Sulpice and its organ, where Widor was organist for sixty-four years (!). It is one of the finest instruments anywhere, a five-manual Cavaille-Coll still in essentially original condition. Widor was "seduced" by this instrument (his words), which was only eight years old when he began playing at the church, and it shaped all of his composition for the organ.

And here is a YouTube demonstration of the instrument with an improvisation by one of its two current organists, Daniel Roth:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4

One can see why Widor was seduced.
(One also sees how we get "organists' posture," as I noted in a recent essay! On a five-manual instrument, it is a long reach up to the top keyboards.)

Notice that there is no combination action, such as modern electrified instruments have. When Mr. Roth wishes to change the registration, he has to find a free hand. In this demonstration, he is always looking about for the next set of stops to pull or retire, and of course always thinking ahead. I can hardly imagine how the great blind organists such as Louis Vierne were able to manage at such organ consoles, which they most certainly did. I love the buildup in parts 3 and 4 from soft strings to full organ and back down.

Would that I could play like that!

As I have perhaps mentioned, I have attended exactly one national convention of the American Guild of Organists: the Detroit convention of 1986 wherein Messiaen's Livre du Saint Sacrement received its first performance. At that same convention, the week featured a series of masterclasses in improvisation. I wished to learn the art (I still do have that wish), and ended up in Daniel Roth's class. Many of the others in the class have since gone on to be world-class organists and improvisers, and already had considerable background. Not me; I was a rank beginner, entirely over my head -- so over my head that I learned very little that week. But Mr. Roth was gentle with me, the lowliest dunce in the class. When I played for him (stumbling all over an attempt at a simple A-B-A andante), he gave me good beginning advice and directed me to Marcel Dupré's book for further study. I am grateful to him for that.