Fantasia and Fugue in G major (Parry) - from CDA68089 - Hyperion Records

Reviews

‘The Choir of Westminster Abbey give solid, well-crafted performances … Onyx Brass play very well, with a wide range of dynamics, and many listeners may welcome their contribution … certainly, listeners can enjoy the dignity and grandeur of the sounds of choir, organ and brass ringing around the historic spaces of Westminster Abbey’ (Gramophone)

‘It's difficult to resist the spine-tingling monumentalism of the performance’ (BBC Music Magazine)» More

PERFORMANCE

RECORDING

‘Throughout, the artistry of James O'Donnell with his excellent choir, sub-organist Daniel Cook and Onyx Brass make an indelible impression, and Cook's virtuosic performance of the Fantasia & Fugue in G shows that he is at one with the Abbey's magnificent instrument’ (Choir & Organ)» More

‘This seems to me a highly rewarding release of the highest quality, deserving investigation by all interested in cathedral music. It’s a testament to the long experience and fine music-making James O’Donnell has brought to London audiences, from Westminster Abbey, Westminster Cathedral and the Proms, and from his recitals around the UK and the rest of the world. It has certainly given me enormous pleasure over the past three weeks’ (Audiophile Audition, USA)» More

‘The work that truly sends shivers up and down the spine in this programme is the anthem 'I Was Glad', written for the coronation of Edward VII in 1902 and sung at every coronation since It is not merely the grandeur of the piece that is so impressive but also the fact that Parry’s choral part-writing and his glorious shifts of harmony create such a stirring, vibrant, awesome majesty of sound, enhanced here by both organ and Onyx Brass’ (The Telegraph)» More

‘The performances on this disc achieve the highest standards. The sound is excellent; the choir is well focussed and ‘present’ while the organ is reported thrillingly … a magnificent disc’ (MusicWeb International)» More

‘Here is brainpower in abundance: supreme choral singing, combining beauty and power of tone with a sense of line and direction that comes from an intelligent awareness of what the music is all about. No mere going through the motions here, and the trebles, in particular, display a similar maturity of music thought that belies their young ages. Quite outstanding in every way’ (Elgar Society)» More

‘The choir performs as if born to this music and an excellent solo quartet for the Magnificat emerges from its ranks, including a treble solo of great clarity by the young Alexander Kyle’ (The Whole Note, Canada)» More

'Het Westminster Abbey Choir brengt de hymne naast andere befaamde koorwerken van Parry' (Kerknet.be, Belgium)» More

Introduction
English

A number of juvenilia for the organ survive from his Oxford years, but Parry did not turn his attentions seriously to the organ until 1877, when he composed a Fantasia and Fugue in G major. This, however, proved to be a first draft, for after revising the work thoroughly in 1882 he returned to it again in 1913 when, with a revised fantasia and a quite new fugue, it was published by Novello. The very ambience of the fantasia is overtly Bachian in character. Inspired, one suspects, by the spirit of Bach’s Fantasia and Fugue in G minor, BWV542 (the structural comparisons are even more pertinent in Parry’s earlier 1877 version), Parry creates a Romantic, neo-Gothic essay founded on the rhetoric of the Baroque North German organ style, yet, through the use of a more intense nineteenth-century sense of chromaticism and dissonance, there is also a strong sense of contemporaneity. The fugue’s considerable technical demands were intended to match the dexterity of its dedicatee, Sir Walter Parratt, organist at St George’s Chapel, Windsor, Organ Professor at the RCM, and renowned recitalist.

Recording details: June 2014
Westminster Abbey, London, United Kingdom
Produced by Adrian Peacock
Engineered by David Hinitt
Release date: September 2015
Total duration: 11 minutes 23 seconds

Cover artwork: Heraldic tile from the floor of the Chapter House at Westminster Abbey.
Copyright © Dean and Chapter of Westminster

Fantasia and Fugue in G major

Daniel Cook (organ)

Reviews

Introduction