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Bringing Down the House
May. 30th, 2006 03:18 pmI've not talked about it much before here on LJ, but I grew up with and still have a great love for, kick-ass Baroque and Classical pipe organ music. In order to play my mother's old spinet organ, I took lessons at a local Wurlitzer from when I was around 5 or 6 until I was 13. At any time I would have been just as likely to be asked by my dad or my sister to turn down a recording of Bach pieces as I would have say a Rush or ELO record.
One of my best friends growing up, A, was also very into pipe organ music. And he had access to an instrument: during our teens we would walk to the Episcopal church his mom attended and tinker on the three-manual one there when nothing else was going on in the church. The priest never minded at all and was amused by our interest. Also nearby was a crummy restaurant/pizza palace (crummy in terms of the quality of food) that held the old, refurbished, mammoth organ that came from the old Paramount Theatre in Oakland, CA, the Paramount Music Palace (that restaurant long having been closed and demolished, the Mighty Wurlitzer now appears to be housed in a similar pizza place in Florida). A and I would go there often just to sit and listen. Once, when we heard that Lyn Larsen was coming, we had to go. It was a moral imperative.
Not long before the Lyn Larsen concert, A and I had checked out from the library a record of French organ pieces, including Widor's Toccata from Symphony No 5 in F, Op 42 No 1 (a RealAudio recording in its entirety is on the linked page). This piece rocks. A and I ended up checking out the sheet music and trying to figure out bits of it. Page after page of black - sixteenth note chords for the left hand, thirty-second note arpeggios for the right, and a busy pedal melody. When we went to see Lyn Larsen at the Paramount, I think we were 14. For the second half of his show, he took requests. A and I marched up to the base of the organ stand and asked him to play "the Widor". He was amazed and impressed that two 14-year olds even knew what that was. And his rendition brought down the place. I would have loved to have gotten a bootleg recording (I have since found a CD him performing it elsewhere).
I even remember going to the church in which Toni and I were going to be married and, having already decided on our music, hearing the organist there playing the Widor and thinking, "D'oh! If I knew she knew how to play that..." Although that church organist did a fabulous job with Pachelbel's Canon in D, which I also find very moving (and now has an extra nice association).
Anyway, this morning, on my way to get my haircut, I had forgotten I had burned a number of classical pieces to one of the MP3 CDs I made for the new car, when the Widor started. I have a tendency, if I am really into a piece of music, to air play. Especially if there is a prominent instrument I know. Let me say that driving and air playing the Widor is dangerous - the pedal part involves both feet. I had to be restrained and avoid the car pedals. :-)
One of my best friends growing up, A, was also very into pipe organ music. And he had access to an instrument: during our teens we would walk to the Episcopal church his mom attended and tinker on the three-manual one there when nothing else was going on in the church. The priest never minded at all and was amused by our interest. Also nearby was a crummy restaurant/pizza palace (crummy in terms of the quality of food) that held the old, refurbished, mammoth organ that came from the old Paramount Theatre in Oakland, CA, the Paramount Music Palace (that restaurant long having been closed and demolished, the Mighty Wurlitzer now appears to be housed in a similar pizza place in Florida). A and I would go there often just to sit and listen. Once, when we heard that Lyn Larsen was coming, we had to go. It was a moral imperative.
Not long before the Lyn Larsen concert, A and I had checked out from the library a record of French organ pieces, including Widor's Toccata from Symphony No 5 in F, Op 42 No 1 (a RealAudio recording in its entirety is on the linked page). This piece rocks. A and I ended up checking out the sheet music and trying to figure out bits of it. Page after page of black - sixteenth note chords for the left hand, thirty-second note arpeggios for the right, and a busy pedal melody. When we went to see Lyn Larsen at the Paramount, I think we were 14. For the second half of his show, he took requests. A and I marched up to the base of the organ stand and asked him to play "the Widor". He was amazed and impressed that two 14-year olds even knew what that was. And his rendition brought down the place. I would have loved to have gotten a bootleg recording (I have since found a CD him performing it elsewhere).
I even remember going to the church in which Toni and I were going to be married and, having already decided on our music, hearing the organist there playing the Widor and thinking, "D'oh! If I knew she knew how to play that..." Although that church organist did a fabulous job with Pachelbel's Canon in D, which I also find very moving (and now has an extra nice association).
Anyway, this morning, on my way to get my haircut, I had forgotten I had burned a number of classical pieces to one of the MP3 CDs I made for the new car, when the Widor started. I have a tendency, if I am really into a piece of music, to air play. Especially if there is a prominent instrument I know. Let me say that driving and air playing the Widor is dangerous - the pedal part involves both feet. I had to be restrained and avoid the car pedals. :-)
