The UK's leading Digital Church Organ specialist
Ian Higginson’s Sortie in B flat from his recent collection Organ Sound Colours, Vol. 1, could be a useful ‘going out’ voluntary for a church service. (You can find out more about this collection of pieces in the general introduction to this year’s tutorials.) < Sortie in B flat by Ian Higginson The piece is…
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This splendid partita is taken from An Oxfordshire Organ Book, published in 2019 by the Oxford and District Organists’ Association. (You can find out more about this collection of pieces in the general introduction to this year’s organ tutorials.) The partita is based on a hymn tune, Merton Chapel, which was written by Maggie Pemberton…
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Better late than never, thanks to a pandemic that some of you may have heard of, we bring you Viscount’s organ performance tutorials for 2021. This series concentrates on recent works by composers associated with the Viscount showroom’s local area of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire. You will get tips about playing each of the pieces from…
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In 2015 we recorded a series of performances by John Scott Whiteley, for a DVD entitled “Paths that lead away from Bach”. The sessions took place in the dramatic setting of Selby Abbey, where a Viscount Regent 356 organ was temporarily installed while the Abbey’s famous Hill organ was being restored. John Scott Whiteley English…
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You’ve started planning the details of your big wedding day – congratulations! When thinking about organ music for the church service itself most people have in mind some hymns they know and like, perhaps remembered from schooldays; but the world of the organ and its music can be a closed book to many. If you’re…
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As we near the end of 2020, a year of virus-related restrictions, it seems ironic and possibly even a little cruel to have chosen late in 2019 to feature wedding and memorial music in this year’s tutorials. It has been a year in which those important events in human experience have sometimes been limited in…
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The fifth piece in the 2020 organ tutorial series is Pachelbel’s famous (some might say infamous) Canon in D. For reasons that probably have a lot to do with Classic FM, movies, and wedding websites, it has become a firm favourite for the bridal procession at weddings. It was the hilarious topic of a sketch…
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The fourth piece in this year’s organ performance tutorial series is Arrival of the Queen of Sheba, written by England’s arguably greatest German import, George Frederick Handel. Jonathan Kingston and Francis Rumsey discuss what one might do with it on the organ, as it’s often asked for at weddings. The Queen of Sheba herself is…
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The third piece in this organ performance tutorial series is Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring by J.S. Bach. It’s a useful and relatively gentle piece that’s popular for weddings, perhaps at the signing of the registers, but could equally well be used for memorial services. < “Jesu Joy of Man’s Desiring” is a popular and…
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For the second piece in this year’s series Francis and Jonathan discuss the Solemn Melody by Sir Henry Walford Davies. Rather like Nimrod that they did in the first tutorial of 2020, this could be a useful piece for the end of a funeral. The work was originally scored for cello, strings and organ, so…
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In this amazingly troubled time for our world and this country I thought we needed something to distract us, if only briefly, from the avalanche of bad news that keeps hitting us from all directions. In my wilder moments I sometimes consider what music I might choose if I were ever to be asked to…
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For our first piece in this year’s series of organ performance tutorials, Jonathan Kingston and Francis Rumsey take a look at “Nimrod” from the Enigma Variations by Edward Elgar. It’s a useful, solemn piece for the beginning or end of a funeral, or perhaps for Remembrance Day, which needs careful management of dynamics. < Enigma…
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Our organ performance tutorials for 2020 concentrate on the playing of organ arrangements for weddings and memorial services. Often requested, this music is a regular feature of many organists’ work. Most of the pieces we’ve chosen to feature in our organ performance tutorials can be performed successfully on a wide range of different instruments. All…
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For our fifth tutorial in the organ registration tutorials series, Francis discusses the registration of hymn accompaniments with Jonathan Kingston. Accompanying hymns is many organists’ primary role, and feedback suggests that a number of you would like to hear a bit more about this. We’ve chosen three hymns —“Praise my soul the king of heaven”,…
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For the fourth tutorial in our 2019 series, Francis Rumsey discusses the registration of Franck’s organ works with Jonathan Kingston. They decided to use his Chorale in A minor as an example, because it typifies a number of the challenges faced by organists who need to create sounds similar to those Franck might have expected….
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In the third tutorial in our Organ Registration Tutorial series we’re using extracts from Herbert Howells Psalm Prelude. Jonathan and Francis discuss and demonstrate a challenge that most organists will have to master at some stage in their careers — what could be termed the “seamless crescendo”. Of course there’s no such thing as a…
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For our second tutorial in the Organ Registration Tutorial Series Jonathan and Francis take a look at Buxtehude’s big G minor Praeludium, as a way in to discussing how to register baroque music of the North German school. This piece is a great example of the so-called stylus phantasticus, and a precursor to Bach’s preludes or…
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Welcome to the first of five videos in our Organ Registration Tutorial Series for 2019! In this first tutorial we’ve chosen to discuss two contrasting chorale preludes by J. S. Bach – Ich ruf zu dir, Herr Jesu Christ (BWV 639) and the Trio on Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend (BWV 655). In…
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In the Organ Registration Tutorial Series Francis Rumsey and Jonathan Kingston discuss and demonstrate approaches to registration for distinctive genres and styles of organ music. The aim is to give you some ideas about stop combinations that might be appropriate, and tips about handling some of the organ management challenges. As will always be the…
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In 2018 we’ve added six more videos to our organ music library. These new choral organ accompaniment tutorial videos focus on works suitable for choir and organ. Combined with our Hymn of the Month posts, we now have 24 well known tunes in our library of organ music, for you to refer to for organ…
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Welcome to the sixth and final release in the Choral Organ Accompaniment series. Sussex Carol speaks “Christmas” from its first notes, it being well known as one of the mainstays of the traditional Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s College, Cambridge on Christmas Eve. For our 2018 tutorial series we’re concentrating on the…
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Our fifth release in the Choral Accompaniment series is the delightful anthem “Thou visitest the earth” by Maurice Greene. For our 2018 tutorial series we’re concentrating on the organ as a means of choral accompaniment. Church choral music was chosen to illustrate the accompaniment of various parts of the liturgy and to highlight some well-known…
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Welcome to our fourth release of the Choral Accompaniment series which is a setting of Psalm 20, to an Anglican chant by Gerald Knight. For our 2018 tutorial series we’re concentrating on the organ as a means of choral accompaniment. Church choral music was chosen to illustrate the accompaniment of various parts of the liturgy…
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Our third release in the Choral Organ Accompaniment series is a delightful pair of movements from Haydn’s Mass Sancti Joannis de Deo, often known as his “Little Organ Mass”. For our 2018 tutorial series we’re concentrating on the organ as a means of choral accompaniment. Church choral music was chosen to illustrate the accompaniment of…
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