From the Introduction to the hymnal... One Lord, One Faith, One Baptism contains selections of diverse styles and genres, including traditional ecumenical hymns, contemporary texts written for the twenty-first-century church, praise and worship selections, music from Taizé, The Iona Community, choral responses, responsorial psalmody, traditional and contemporary gospel music, and Negro spirituals.

Westminster Choir 100th Anniversary Recording

Music has the ability to illuminate aspects of the human condition in ways that only sound married to texts can achieve. One of the greatest preachers of the twentieth century, William Sloan Coffin, often remarked that music in most cases was more powerful than the spoken word. This recording represents just that. All the music on this recording reflects, in sound, that serenity (and, yes, beauty) is within all of us if we choose to go there. This recording celebrates the 100th Anniversary of the founding of the Westminster Choir in 1920 by John Finley Williamson, albeit a bit later.

Both organs recorded on this album resound optimally within their respective church interiors thanks to the outstanding acoustics there. The very different sizes of these interiors are ultimatley responsible for the diverging interpretations on the two instruments. The recurring long note values of the Gregorian chant in the Mass awaken the feeling of timelessness - here, the tremendous monumentality of the performances can make a maximum effect within the large space of Klosterneuburg Monastery Church. The smaller Gabelbacher organ evokes a nimble, chamber-music orientated manner of playing which conveys to the listener a certain closeness to the events within the much smaller space. Hassler's keyboard music assumes that the player will use a single manual, and this consideration was observed on the present recording; solo registrations were as yet unknown in Hassler's time. Of course, "sparing" registrations were occasionally used on the large organ of Klosterneuburg.

This series marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Anton Bruckner, which falls in 2024. It’s dedicated to Bruckner’s symphonies, most of them recorded in new transcriptions for organ by Hansjörg Albrecht. The 7th recording was made on the church organ of Hofkirche in Luzern with the transcription of Bruckner’s 6th Symphony by Eberhard Klotz. The bonus track on this volume is the composition “Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini” for organ by the Italian composer Andrea Lorenzo Scartazzini.

The present recording especially concentrates on works by Johann Sebastian Bach in minor keys; these are contrasted by four works in major keys. The general perception is that minor key works frequently emanate a certain sadness as their fundamental emotion. Bach, on the other hand, repeatedly develops in his minor key compositions-particularly in the organ works- an unsurpassed elegance out of the melancholy depths, as Joseph Kelemen impressively proves at the Treutmann Organ of the Grauhof Monastery Church. Joseph Klemen completed his studies in organ, harpsichord, and choral conducting at the Academy of Music in his native city of Budapest, the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis and the Academy of the Arts in Bremen. He has been active as a church musician in Southern Germany since 1986. With a strong commitment to historical performance practice, he is considered by specialists to be an authority on German organ music of the 17th century and the organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach.

During his unprecedented 64 years as organist at Saint-Sulpice in Paris, Charles-Marie Widor developed a powerfully symphonic approach to music for the organ, finding new combinations of color, sonority and texture. The ten symphonies for organ are central to his repertory for the instrument. Featured on this first volume are the Symphony No. 1 in C minor, with its homage to Bach, luminous and ceremonial and with virtuoso flourishes; and the Symphony No. 2 in D major offering a fascinating series of contrasts with some spectacular effects. Wolfgang Rubsam plays at the restored E.M. Skinner instrument at The University of Chicago, the largest pipe organ in Midwest America.

Celebrated as one of the finest Tudor composers, Thomas Weelkes served as organist and choirmaster at Winchester College and Chichester Cathedral and although famed for his madrigals, wrote more Anglican services than any other major composer of the time. Performed by the professional Irish vocal ensemble Resurgam with The English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble, this album celebrates the sacred music from this prolific composer in Weelkes’ 400th anniversary year.

“The reason for this transcription was simply that – once again – I had been busy with the Ninth, this time with the intention of arriving at the essence of the work: I wanted to understand Bruckner even better, come to grips with the architecture of his symphonic thought. And that led automatically to the idea of making an arrangement for a keyboard instrument, because when you tackle that, you are practically compelled to limit yourself to the essence of a work. And: The organ is Bruckner’s instrument, which stayed with him all his life. Even as a boy, Bruckner was fascinated by his father’s organ playing. Later, during his teacher training, he played the organ himself in small rural churches. After his return to the Augustine abbey of St. Florian he became its organist, then cathedral organist in Linz and finally the Emperor’s organist at the Hofburgkapelle in Vienna — of which he was very proud. The organ kept Bruckner company, then, right up to his death.” (Gerd Schaller) Hailed as one of the most significant Bruckner exponents of our time, Gerd Schaller is a freelance conductor in constant demand from leading ensembles, concert halls and opera houses at home and abroad as guest conductor. Along the way, in 2008, he founded Philharmonie Festiva, a symphony orchestra with which he pursues his own ambitious projects. For many years now, Schaller’s activities have centered on the music of Anton Bruckner, by whose combination of deep emotion and extreme complexity the conductor has been fascinated since he was a boy. This fascination has resulted in his large-scale project BRUCKNER2024, in which he aims to record all Bruckner’s significant works to album from his personal perspective by the composer’s bicentenary in 2024.

The fifth volume of Masaaki Suzuki’s series of Bach’s works for organ features one of the most important surviving instruments from Bach’s time, made by the German organ builder Christoph Treutmann the Elder. Widely known for its extraordinary tonal quality, the instrument was built between 1734 and 1737. A recent general restoration preserved all essential structural elements or renewed them while remaining faithful to the originals, making this an ideal instrument for Bach interpreters who wish to come close to the sound world of the Leipzig Thomaskantor.

Suzuki now takes up the Orgel-Büchlein (literally, “little organ book”), a collection of 45 short chorale preludes on melodies from the Lutheran hymn book, a project that came into being in connection with Bach’s appointment as organist and chamber musician at the Duke’s court in Weimar in 1708. Presenting chorales for different periods of the church year, this collection serves as a general guide to text-based composition focusing on word- sound relationships and content-specific musical expression. Three Preludes and Fugues complete the second volume dedicated to the Orgel-Büchlein, illustrating the principle of variety and structure historically practised by concert organists in order to demonstrate the tone colours and expressive possibilities of their instrument.

Sweelinck composed his keyboard music (as much as we know of it today) only after 1605, rather late in his career. The works that have been handed down to us have the eff ect of a summing-up, a written resume of his improvisatory and pedagogical activity. These works, about 60 in number, were widely distributed during his time and much appreciated by colleagues. This recording presents a representative cross-section of his oeuvre for keyboard music played on the organ.