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[VeniVidi2009]

"Wet" and "dry" rooms

Krummhorn, I agree - the extraordinary long reverberation time found in big cathedrals like in Uppsala gives an extra "spice" to a great lot of organ music, and it is almost a must for a big lot - like for example the French music written for large organs. I will later on upload a work for TWO large organs - Esquisse Gothique#3 by Jean Langlais from 1975 - also recorded in Uppsala and played on this new Ruffatti organ plus the large old Åkerman organ from 1870. I guess you seldom can find more demanding music than that type, concerning sound pressure and reverberation and all that. But H4 handled also this rather nicely as you will hear. I will give you a notice here when that file is uploaded.

I also agree with JHNBRBR (at least partly) that smaller organs can be more rewarding to listen to in a little more dry environment than in a large cathedral. And it is definitely easier to record them in somewhat more "intimate" atmosphere.

But in my opinion a large organ in a large cathedral is something absolutely stunning to experience - when "right" music is performed.
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[jhnbrbr]

I agree that some reverberation enhances the sound, obviously, but if you have too much it's like playing a piano with the sustaining pedal permanently down - all the detail gets blurred and there's no such thing as a rest. A few years ago I attended a recital at Coventry Cathedral, and the first half, sitting in the main body of the cathedral, I found quite frustrating, but during the interval my companion and I and a few others moved to the choir stalls where the pipes were fairly close above us and the listening experience was - to my mind - greatly improved. Even so, I still prefer the more intimate surroundings of a parish church or college chapel.

 

[Soubasse]

Very valid points being made here regarding acoustics. It's my feeling that we're rather fortunate to have these very accurate digital recorders today. When I first started doing recordings (initially of my own recitals but then onto other performers), I worked hard to get the best possible quality and it would often take some time. Now with devices such as the H2/4, it's a lot simpler. It also acts as a reminder of the drawbacks of lively acoustics (because there is less "masking" of the true sound with tape noise or such like) and how the placement of the listener will substantially affect the experience as JHN has pointed out.

There is also the matter of compensation by the payer. I feel that a good organist should take this into account and alter their technique accordingly. It would make no sense for a performer who has been practicing in a dry acoustic, perhaps playing very legato, to use the same techniques in a larger building. By way of example, one of the best compliments I ever received was following a performance of Alain's Litanies in quite a large, lively acoustic (between 4 - 5 seconds) where I was told by one appreciative listener that it sounded as though I had picked up the organ and put it in a cupboard because he could hear every note (!). Fact of the matter was that I was (to my mind) seriously overdoing the articulation to the point where I felt I was playing everything ultra-staccato (which is most likely what it would have sounded like to someone much closer to the instrument), but I thought I had to do this in order to compensate for this "sustain pedal" sound that JHN mentioned. The next evening, I performed the same work in an acoustic with a reverb time of less than 1 second, so the playing technique altered quite dramtically.

On the other side of the coin, just personally I still think one of the most thrilling sounds is to hear a gigantic blast on full organ echo and fade around the walls of a huge space!

Veni, for my ears that is an excellent recording of Uppsala's new Ruffatti, it has just the right balance. The clarity of the voicing is highly evident and the reverberation is not overdone. (I still have very happy memories of performing the Vierne Final (Symphony #1) up on the Akerman some years ago, and again, it felt like I was playing the whole thing basically staccato, but from down below, it was apparently the right thing to have done).

 

[VeniVidi2009]

Ruffatti organ in Uppsala: New file uploaded

Hi all

Still another file is now uploaded on Youtube from one of the first performances with the new Ruffatti organ in Uppsala Cathedral in Sweden. This time it is the not so often played work by Jean Langlais: Esquisses Gothiques pour deux orgues: III. Séquence pour la fête de la dédicace.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E6ukzSEJv80&feature=channel_page

http://www.youtube.com/user/VeniVidi2009

It is performed by the two organists in the cathedral - Olle Johansson on the Åkerman organ and Andrew Canning on the new Ruffatti organ. Quite an amazing piece of music which for practical reasons is seldom played.

By the way - I read on Ruffatti´s site that the reverberation time in the Uppsala dome is 11 seconds which makes both the playing and the recording difficult, especially when using two large organs at the same time.

The only afterwork done with the sound file is some cutting of the lowest bass (from 100 Hz and downwords, made with Adobe Audition 3.0) that tended to dominate the sound way too much. I guess the quite small mics in the H4 couldn´t cope with the unusually high sound pressure from two such large organs. You should of course have mics with 1 inch membranes at such occasions. But the result is a more realistic picture of how I experienced the concert.

More material from that concert is available and maybe I will also upload a recording from the old Åkerman organ - which is the largest preserved organ in Sweden from its period. It has 50 stops but 11 of them were replaced in 1939 for more "baroque" ones and there are now plans to transfer the organ back to its original status. Hopefully they will get some interested sponsors for that project.

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