Review

Reviewed Work(s): Play the Organ by David Sanger

Review by: Ann Bond
Source: The Musical Times, Vol. 132, No. 1779 (May, 1991), p. 264
Published by: Musical Times Publications Ltd.
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 MUSIC REVIEWS

David Sanger Play Play the

the Organ abandoning
abandoningthe
Organ Novello
Novello theinitial
initialrequirement
requirementin!
in! How
How manymanyteachers
teachers could
couldachieve
achieve
?9.95. that
that thethepupil
pupilshould
should have
havesome
some
so
so much?
much?The Theproof
proofofof thethepudding
pudding
A really good organ tutor for the previous
previouskeyboard
keyboard expertise.
expertise. I waswill
will of
I was of course
coursebe beininthe
the eating,
eating,and
and
beginner was desperately needed, personally
personallydoubtful
doubtful about
about this,
this,
this
this is is aa pudding
puddingthat thatshould
should notnot
be be
and National Learn the Organ Year mostly mostly on onlogistic
logistic grounds:
grounds: andand
swallowed
swallowedtoo tooquickly.
quickly. ButButI predict
I predict
has brought one into being. The all, isn't it uneconomical - even that this tutor will render as
outstanding thing about David unecological - to run an organ blower conspicuous a service to the organ
Sanger's Play the Organ is the way in in order to discover middle C and do world as Peter Hurford's recent
which he builds up, not merely the elementary finger exercises? And Making Music on the Organ - to which,
technique, but the taste and outlook why fight through rain and darkness incidentally, it makes a splendid
of the organist from the very first to unlock churches and consoles, and introduction.
chapter. He approaches the learning so on, when you can get this stage ANN BOND

of the instrument through the main- over at home in the warm? However,
stream of organ culture, and the book the rain and dark do undoubtedly Organ
OrganMusic Music
is saturated with an awareness of concentrate the mind wonderfully, Jaques
JaquesCasterede
Casterede Domine,
Domine, Dominus
Dominus
the continuity of past and present. and weed out the triflers; and I Noster
Noster...; ...;Gerard
Gerard Billaudot/UMP;
Billaudot/UMP;
Sanger's exercises are miniature have become convinced that the ?4.90

organ pieces which he has written in advantages of building up aNaji true

Hakim Hommage a Igor Stravinsky;
real historical styles, even if they are organ touch from the very outset, Alphonse
and Leduc/UMP; ?23.95;
only six bars long. Starting with little of not having to strip away lots Memor;of (UMP Organ Repertoire
versets, the student is very soon unhelpful piano habits, are so great Seriesasno. 15); ?7.50; Rondo for Christ-
playing delightful little preludes on to outweigh all the other objections. mas for trumpet in C and organ; (UMP
chorales well-known in this country. (Those who already have keyboard Repertoire Series no. 16); ?5.80
Extracts from the 'Wegweiser' ability can still learn much from his Variations et Fugue sur Trois
Odile Pierre
(probably studied by Bach), trios bymethod.) No#ls de Normande; Alphonse Leduc/
Rembt and Telemann, and pieces by Sanger's fingering is really worth UMP; an?7.35.
Bach himself appear in due course,article on its own, and worthy of Jaques
close Cast&rede's Domine, Dominus
and there is a particularly large attention. There are only aboutNoster half-a- is cast in a single movement
number of items by J. G. Walther, dozen instances of shifting (finger lasting for nearly 12 minutes in which
Bach's relative and contemporary, substitution) in the entire volume, four distinct kinds of musical material
whose chorale-based works are and these are introduced quite are alternated. These are a pompous
eminently suitable for the student. casually and without comment. rhetorical opening 'recitative', some
Lemmens and Niels Gade provide Marvellous!
the Instead of encouraging quietly indeterminate counterpoint in
pointers to Romantic style. As indiscriminate
can be hand-squirming in vaguely trio-sonata style, some
seen, all this indicates a fairly heavy music, Sanger leads the Messiaen-like twinklings and a few
contrapuntal
Germanic bias, and there are no pupil, through his carefully (but not
samp- flourishes in the familiar French
les of French or English 18th-century excessively) written-in fingering, toccata manner. That all this is more
writing. There are obvious towards reasonsgood habits in which surface than substance is, alas, vividly
for leaving the heavily ornamented changes of hand-position are linked demonstrated by the extraordinarily
French style until later, but with is musical articulation. It is banal
it good a chorale theme which acts as a
rather sad that a place could pity, not have binding ingredient here. Accordingly
I think, that in the later stages of
been found for a little of our own the book the pupil is not encouraged M. Cast&erde's eloquent explanatory
tradition. to work out, and write in, his own preface misses its mark.
However, it is marvellous to have a fingering; even more of a pity, Of the works by Naji Hakim much
tutor that will, from the outset, perhaps, that Sanger is not more the best seems the Homage to Stra-
quite naturally teach both 'modern' explicit about how this should be vinsky, an ambitious triptych whose
and 'historical' fingering as done, and about the intimate relation- first movement is evidently inspired
appropriate, and introduce the pupil ship between fingering, silence by Stravinsky's Symphonies of Wind
to both toes-only and toe-and-heel d'articulation, and musical accent. In Instruments with its alternations of
styles of pedalling; and that will instilfact, the words 'articulation' and strongly-contrasted ideas. Elsewhere
enlightened principles of registration, 'accent' nowhere appear. These couldthe ostinati and ritualistic dances
whilst recognising that most pupils of course be expounded by the pupil'sof the Rite of Spring are called to mind,
have access only to rather unen- own teacher - were it not for the fact and the music has a pleasing rhythmic
lightened instruments. There are that lamentably few run-of-the-mill impetus and variety, not least in the
almost ten pages of study for the organ teachers understand the virtuoso toccata with which it con-
crucial problem of combining left principles properly themselves. cludes. Memor is a work of similar
hand and pedals, plus full details of Sanger, on the other hand, has so ambitions, but the musical ideas are
major and minor scales and arpeggios. clearly conveyed a great number ofmuch less interesting, while the Rondo
All this is achieved within about 100 ideas to his complete beginners -for Christmas makes playful use of the
including ticklish things like the carol tune 'I1 est ne le divin Enfant'.
pages of good, clear print, in a small
but attractive organ-format volume stylish performance of ornaments -The effect is quite pleasing, even if the
which has been properly stitched to that I do wish he had tried to put atinnocent melody cannot quite justify
lie open well and withstand hard least something of this one across. the spiky harmonies with which M.
wear. It is a bargain at the price. Still... from rudiments of music to Hakim surrounds it.
Where Sanger parts company with trio-playing in 100 pages, with Odile Pierre's set of Variations is a
all previous organ tutors is in humour and common-sense thrown work of unashamed pastiche. The
264

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