RCO choral conducting workshop with Patrick Russill
Temple Church, which serves two of the Inns of Court in London, was a location for the Da Vinci Code film, and is often full of Dan Brown enthusiasts. We had it to ourselves for a day in May, while…
Two organs from Grant, Degens and Bradbeer
It’s not often you sit down at an organ, in an unprepossessing church, in an unlikely part of town, and start playing…and suddenly you’re covered in goosebumps. Officially we were at St Mary’s Woodford, in East London, for a RCO…
Copyright made simple
Want to know if music is public domain? Here’s a useful guide from the IMSLP Petrucci Library which defines what exactly qualifies as public domain* music in Canada, the US, the EU, and China, Korea, Japan and South Africa. *…
More on the Moor double keyboard piano
Apologies to Klavier-Moor fans who have been waiting for me to post more. I’ve added two pages – one with some downloadable pdfs taken from Herbert Shead’s book, The History of the Emanuel Moor Double Keyboard Piano which is the…
Archangels from Frederick Stocken
Frederick Stocken’s Archangels has just been published by Banks and I’ve already got my copy. I’ve wanted to play these pieces ever since I found them on YouTube – to be honest the two outer movements are a little beyond…
Something more dramatic for the feet
I’ve been following Michael Johnston of @michaelsmusic on Twitter for a while, and I had to share a recent tweet about his reprint of Dramatic Pedal Studies by Hamilton Crawford Macdougall (1858-1945) in which the parts given to the…
Hummingbird – a fresh take on music notation
It’s hard enough learning a new instrument, but mastering notation at the same time can make music just too much of a struggle for youngsters. Blake West and Mike Sall in Austin Texas have come up with an alternative notation,…
Five questions for…Anne Page
Born in Perth, Australia, Anne Page studied with Marie Claire-Alain in France, and with Peter Hurford in Cambridge – teaching as his deputy at the Royal Academy of Music for several years. She made her London debut at the Royal…
Sight read the pedals
Following my recent moan about sight-reading resources, Mark Ellis of atticbooks drew my attention to Sight-Read the Pedals! by Richard Ellis. Eighty short pieces for organ sight reading: the pedal line starts with just two notes (C and F) and…
The low-down on temperaments from Carey Beebe
Carey Beebe is a globe-trotting harpsichord maker, based in Sydney Australia, and I recommend his website to organists if they really, really want to get to grips with tuning and temperaments. He explains the Pythagorean comma before launching into a…
The Bulletproof Musician
I have Ruth Brons (@things4strings on Twitter) to thank for a link to The Bulletproof Musician, a blog solely about sports psychology for musicians, from Dr Noa Kageyama. He suggests ways to develop courage and confidence, discusses mental practice, slow…
Cherry Wainer with Don Storer
Every time I visit YouTube for worthy exponents of the classical organ repertoire, I get sidetracked. Here’s the best organist with a poodle on the bench ever – Cherry Wainer. Cherry was very busy in the 50s and 60s, and…
Everything Else An Organist Should Know
The authors of this book, Robert Leach and Barry Williams, cheerfully describe it as a dog’s breakfast of law, accounts, science, theology, regulation and received wisdom. They are being modest – it’s an essential guide to all those aspects of…
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