REVIEWS

The American Organist

Alan Morrison’s colorful and thrilling playing concluded the day, with one of the finest organ recitals this reviewer has ever heard. Morrison premiered the convention’s commission of Dan Locklair’s Angels: Two Short Tone Poems for Organ (copies of which sold out at the exhibits during the reception after-ward). With unsurpassed technical virtuosity, he traversed Anne Wilson’s Toccata and Demessieux’s devilish etude, Octaves. However the evening’s monument of artistry came in Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. Imaginative and brilliant registration choices resulted in an aural experience surpassing Ravel’s orchestral transcription of the same work. 

Clevelandclassical.com

Alan Morrison plays elegant organ recital at First Baptist (January 9)

by Timothy Robson

Alan Morrison, Head of the Organ Department at the

Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, played an

elegant recital on Sunday afternoon, January 9, at First

Baptist Church of Great Cleveland. His technical facility

is astonishing; where most organists might leave their

"big piece" for the end of the concert, Mr. Morrison

started with one of the biggest in the organ repertoire,

Marcel Dupré's Prelude and Fugue in B Major, Op. 7,

No. 1, and moved on from there. It was a program of

showstoppers. Mr. Morrison played to his virtuosic

strength in music from the French Romantic tradition on

the first half of his program; the second half was devoted

to American composers, including a jazzy toccata by

Cleveland organist/composer Anne Wilson. Mr. Morrison

took full advantage of the church's large

Southfield/Schlicker organ. He had a special fondness for

the very low-sounding 32-foot foundation stop, whose velvety smoothness is felt more

than heard.

The Dupré prelude and fugue are notoriously difficult, with repeated big chords and the

widely-spaced intervals of the fugue. Mr. Morrison was up to the challenge. The "sunny"

key of B major was a fitting accompaniment to the bright, cold Cleveland day outside.

Maurice Duruflé's Scherzo was once described by British organist Dame Gillian Weir as

being like French champagne, light and bubbly. It has throughout the influence of

Debussy and Gregorian chant, which later came to full bloom in Duruflé's famous

Requiem. The arabesque-like figurations of this brief work also owe a debt to Duruflé's

teacher, Charles Tournemire. The piece has a serene ending, with the addition of the 32-foot stop.

Mr. Morrison's performance of Charles-Marie Widor's Andante sostenuto, from

Symphonie Gothique, op. 70, was otherworldly. In his spoken commentary, he described

his performance of this movement at the memorial service for Fred Rogers (of Mr.

Rogers' Neighborhood fame). He invited each audience member to meditate on a person

of importance to him or her during the playing of this slow movement. A huge flute

melody was pitted against gently rocking chords on string sounds. The second section of

the piece features the melody in the pedal, with a more complex manual accompaniment.

The third, closing section has a return to the opening registration, with the flute melody

and countermelody in the right foot of the pedal, while the left foot of the pedal plays a

long-held "pedal point." Mr. Morrison created an atmosphere of such rapt attention that

no one broke the mood for applause at the end of the Widor movement, and Mr. Morrison

proceeded directly to the next work, César Franck's Fantasy in A Major.

The Fantasy is unjustifiably one of Franck's lesser-known works, which is unfortunate,

because it is full of melodic invention, harmonic adventure and exploration of some of

the more exotic sounds of the organ, including extensive use of the vox humana stop,

which, in combination with the tremolo effect of the organ was thought to mimic the

human singing voice. The work has several themes that are presented in various guises

and then combined at the climax of the piece, which then ends quietly, on the gurgling

vox humana. Franck composed pieces such as this with the aim of showing off the

capabilities of the new organs designed and constructed by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, who

came to fame in the last quarter of the nineteenth century by building most of the

important organs in Paris and elsewhere in France. In the context of its musical era,

Franck’s Fantasy was an adventurous, almost shocking use of sound and harmony. The

work is highly sectional, which makes it very hard to hold together musically. Mr.

Morrison played it with great skill and technical perfection, with each section phrased

beautifully. 

Mr. Morrison closed the first half of the program with Henri Mulet's great toccata Tu es

petra, from his organ suite Byzantine Sketches. Henri Mulet, who was born in 1878 but

did not die until 1967, was the last gasp of the great nineteenth-century

organist/composer tradition, composing in an old-fashioned style at the same time that

Messiaen, Langlais and other composers had moved into more advanced musical

territory. The complete title of this movement is Tu es petra et portæ inferi non

prævalebunt adversus te ("You are Peter and the Gates of Hell shall not prevail against

you") a quotation from the Gospel when Jesus renames the disciple Simon to be Peter,

who, according to tradition, became the Bishop of Rome and founder of what is now the

Roman Catholic Church. Mulet's Byzantine Sketches are tone poems depicting the

architecture of the Basilica of Sacre-Coeur de Montmartre in Paris. The Toccata has the

standard format of a French organ toccata: rapidly alternating chords in the hands and a

broad melody in the pedal; the thematic material is developed, with a grand return of the

pedal melody for a big climax. Warhorse it may be, but it was thrilling in Mr. Morrison's

peformance.

After intermission, Mr. Morrison played Anne Wilson's Toccata, which was premiered in

Cleveland in 2003 at the American Guild of Organists regional convention by Tom

Trenney, a northeast Ohio local who has gone on to big things in the organ world. The

toccata is very difficult, with rapid changes from manual to manual, and massive chords

featuring big changes in dynamics. It is a tour de force, but because of its difficulty will

probably never get the performances it deserves.

Two delightful short movements from Harold Stover's Mountain Music were sonic relief

after all the huge pieces on the program. Both are based on Shaker tunes; the first, "At

Evening", quiet; the second, "Quick Dance", a barn dance hoedown in which you can

hear the fiddles, and which eventually fades off into the distance on very high, quiet flute

stops. The style is "Copland-esque" in the elder composer's "Americana" phase, although

perhaps not as diatonic as Copland's music, but with a more free-floating tonality that one

might associate with Roy Harris.

Mr. Morrison completed his recital with Leo Sowerby's pedaling showpiece, Pageant.

Sowerby pulls out all the tricks in the organist's bag to show off the technical skill of the

performer, including scales, arpeggios and chords, all done by the performer's two feet.

There are parts for the hands, but they pale in comparison to what's going on in the

pedals. Musically, it's not much of a piece; it is all about displaying technique. One can

only have slack-jawed admiration for Mr. Morrison's performance. It is hard to imagine

very many organists with the musical skills and showmanship to carry it off the way he

did, making it sound easy with each more astonishingly difficult feat (or would that be

feet?). He earned the standing ovation he received at the end of the concert.

AL.com

Alan Morrison: A riveting organ recital, a fond farewell

Independent Presbyterian Church could not have chosen a better organist  than Alan Morrison to pay a final tribute to its Aeolian-Skinner organ.

Closing out this year's November Organ Recital Series, Morrison explored  the nooks and crannies of the aging instrument in ways that likely have  never been discovered. As well as an exacting technical player, the  professor from Curtis Institute in Philadelphia was visionary in his  choice of colors and ability to shape music into lucid forms, and  provided plenty of bravura when called for.

Henri  Mulet's "Tue es petra," from "Byzantine Sketches," was the revealing  opener. Fraught with intrigue, the work sails on waves of warbling  arpeggios, while much of the buildup takes shape in low pedal notes.  Morrison captured its crescendo with engaging insight, calculating each  surge and nuance to its final measures.

Next  up was "Aria and Variations" by Johann Christoph Bach (1642-1703), an  older relative of Johann Sebastian and one of eight Bach family  musicians with the same name. Morrison gave this mid-Baroque work charm  and lightness. Allowing distinct textures and colors for each of its  variations, he defined them with flutes, trumpets, woodwinds, even high  bells. Among the fluid scales and arpeggios, the ever-present theme was  never out of earshot, even in Morrison's dramatic elaboration of the  final variation.

Harold Stover's picturesque "Mountain Music" evoked the serenity of  night in "At Evening" and foot-stomping rhythms on a barn dance in  "Quick Dance". The pedal repitition in its finale, "Pilgrimage," formed  the foundation for a multi-layered sonic journey.

Morrison  closed with two contrasting movements from Louis Vierne's Symphony No.  4. The dark themes of "Romance" unfolded with searching reverence, only  to explode into a dizzying display of virtuosity in "Final." It made you  want to hold onto the pews to keep your balance.

IPC  will undergo extensive renovations before installation of a new Dobson  organ is completed in 2012, but Music Director Jeff McLelland has  already booked next year's artists, who will play in alternate  locations. As for the Aeolian-Skinner, Morrison gave a fitting,  memorable sendoff to an old friend that served the church for 85 years.