Stephen Tharp / Demessieux / St. John the Divine

[tierceguy]

Mark your calendars! According to his website, Stephen Tharp will be performing the complete works of Jeanne Demessieux at St. John the Divine in New York on Oct 10, 17, and 24, 2010. The concerts also include Dupre's Esquisse No.2 in B-flat minor, Cortege & Litanie, and the Final from Six Pieces. Demessieux loved the organ at St. John the Divine - which inspired her to write Te Deum - so these concerts will be particularly special.

[Corno Dolce]

Oh how I wish I could be there - One of my fav organists interpreting Demessieux and Dupré - I bet it will be a stunner of a program - Thanx for sharing.

Cheers,

CD

[acc]

Thanks for pointing that out, tierceguy! Too bad I'm on the wrong side of the Atlantic...

Just wondering: has anybody given a live performance of the whole set of "Six Études" (let alone all the rest) since Demessieux herself?

[tierceguy]

Well, if I remember correctly Pierre Labric recorded them all in one sitting if that counts. I actually wonder how many organists have even performed all of them - Stephen Tharp, Maxime Patel, Maurizio Ciampi, D'Arcy Trinkwon, Marcel Dupre and who else?

[acc]

Well, if I remember correctly Pierre Labric recorded them all in one sitting if that counts.

Good point — technically, that's indeed equivalent to a live performance. As far as I know, Maxime Patel has done the same thing.

I actually wonder how many organists have even performed all of them - Stephen Tharp, Maxime Patel, Maurizio Ciampi, D'Arcy Trinkwon, Marcel Dupre and who else?

It is not clear to me how well Dupré would have been able to play them, given that in the 1940s, he already started to have serious problems of arthritis.

According to Demessieux's diary, Rolande Falcinelli played two of them on one occasion in the 1940s. I don't know which ones, nor if she ever studied the other four.

Hampus Lindwall, maybe? After all, he is her successor at the Église du Saint-Esprit, and since he has recently done one of Falcinelli's Poèmes-Études, Demessieux should now be a cakewalk to him.

Next in line would be Cameron Carpenter and Paolo Oreni.

[tierceguy]

Have you heard Dupre's recording of his own Tryptique? It's been a while since I've listened to it but is from 10+ years after he performed the Etudes on his American tour and he still seems quite capable (though his subsequent St. Sulpice recordings tell a different story). Do you know if any recordings exist of Demessieux performing them other than a live Tierces released by Festivo? I once read a review of the Ciampi recording that mentioned her own "depressingly muddy" recordings of them at Victoria Hall but have never seen anything since then.

I have heard of Cameron doing Pointes and Octaves but not the other four. There is no doubt that he is capable but unfortunately he seems to be more interested in cheap theatrics at the moment...As for Paolo Oreni, I'm only familiar with improvisations.

[tierceguy]

Hampus Lindwall, maybe? After all, he is her successor at the Église du Saint-Esprit, and since he has recently done one of Falcinelli's Poèmes-Études, Demessieux should now be a cakewalk to him.

Speaking of the Poeme's-Etudes, are there any other recordings of them?

[mathetes1963]

October 2010? Is that accurate?

[acc]

Have you heard Dupre's recording of his own Tryptique? It's been a while since I've listened to it but is from 10+ years after he performed the Etudes on his American tour and he still seems quite capable (though his subsequent St. Sulpice recordings tell a different story).

I've just listened to that recording again: of course, he can still play much better than most of us ever will, but I still get the feeling that he sometimes reaches the limits of what he can do (in the Chaconne, listen for example to the variation with the appogiatura chords over the virtuoso C-Eb-D-C-Eb-C-F-Eb-D-Eb-C-D-... line in the pedal). And Demessieux's Études are a few rungs further up the ladder, I'm afraid.

Do you know if any recordings exist of Demessieux performing them other than a live Tierces released by Festivo? I once read a review of the Ciampi recording that mentioned her own "depressingly muddy" recordings of them at Victoria Hall but have never seen anything since then.

I wasn't aware of any Études recording in Geneva. As far as I know, she recorded the whole set twice: once at St. Mark in London for Decca, but that recording was never released (and the master tape may have been lost since, if I'm not mistaken). And another time at the Conservatoire in Liège, Belgium (where she taught the organ class), but there, the master tape suffered another fate: it's probably still contained in a huge pile of other master tapes in the Conservatoire's archives, but the tapes themselves only contain reference numbers, and the register has been lost!

Speaking of the Poeme's-Etudes, are there any other recordings of them?

Not as far as I know. Even Hampus Lindwall hasn't recorded them so far (and he's only one down, with three more to go).

According to http://www.augure-autourdejeanguillo...cu/Poemes.html, Rolande Ralcinelli herself stopped playing them after 1964 (at age 44).

[acc]

October 2010? Is that accurate?

According to http://www.stephentharp.com/html/itinerary.php, it is.