Inaugural Recital on the Sir Julian Hodge Memorial Organ

On November 4^th, at St Peter’s Church in Roath, Cardiff, the internationally renowned concert organist Dame Gillian Weir gave the official inaugural recital on the recently installed three manual organ built by the firm of Orgelbau Späth, Rapperswil, Switzerland. The organ has been hailed as a masterpiece of specification, construction and voicing, and, as Dame Gillian expertly demonstrated, is capable of the builders’ claim that it is more than competent in catering for the widest range of the organ literature.

Since the organ is in the west gallery, a video screen placed on the sanctuary allowed the audience to watch as well as hear Dame Gillian, and all were impressed by her manual dexterity and dazzling pedal work.

The music Dame Gillian chose for her recital covered four centuries, the earliest being Jan Sweelinck (1562-1621) whose Variations on “Mein junges Leben hat ein End” we heard, and the most modern was Marcel Dupré  (1878-1967), also with a set of Variations, this time “on an old Noel”.

It was perhaps fitting that JS Bach (1685-1750) should be represented twice in the programme, given his pre-eminence as a composer of organ music. Furthermore, the specification and voicing of the Späth instrument is one with which Bach would have been, more or less, acquainted. The first piece in the programme was his virtuoso Toccata in F major (BWV 540), which from its opening figure (pretty much an incessant feature of the entire work) to the grindingly discordant concluding chords, set the tone for the evening, and later we heard his Trio Sonata in E minor, a piece requiring less resources in terms of volume and power but an equally persuasive delivery and technical aptitude. Sweelinck’s Variations were a little more sedate (as the title would suggest) but one of the movements allowed the Zimbelstern to be showcased – this is a set of eight tuned bells which sound in rotation, as was very much a feature of organs of the baroque period.

Other examples of baroque and early classical music (Mozart’s Fantasia in F minor for an Orgeluhr, a kind of mechanical organ, K 608) were included but in order to demonstrate as fully as possible the versatility of the instrument a number of more modern French (and Belgian) works were performed. I have already mentioned the Dupré, but Henri Mulet’s Rosace, an evocation of the rose window in the Basilica of Sacrė-Coeur in Paris where the composer was for a while organist, allowed Dame Gillian to foreground her, and the organ’s, considerable scope for sensitivity without sliding into a redundant mawkishness unfortunately characteristic of many organs (and indeed players); perhaps this was a fitting piece to play at St Peter’s, which has its own impressive rose window! The concert officially ended with the Belgian Joseph Jongen’s sparkling and relentless Toccata in D flat Major; following a standing ovation Dame Gillian returned to the console to give an encore, the witty Humoresque El Organo Primitivo by Pietro Yon.  I believe a heard a couple of chuckles at the end of this!

This was a thrilling recital, testimony to the talents of one of Europe’s leading organists and also to the skill and dedication of Hans Späth and his team.

Following the recital, the celebration of the inauguration of the organ continued in St Peter’s Parish Hall where Gillian Weir and Hans Späth met with members of the audience and talked about their work.

 It is hoped that St Peter’s will now become a venue for more musical occasions of this nature, and plans are already underway to provide further organ recitals given by local performers as well as those from further afield, and also for concerts featuring ensembles and choirs.

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