Saint Saens, Beethoven, Durufle, Bach: Organ

Catalogue # MCD452

Few Australian musicians come close to matching Anthony Halliday’s versatile splendour. This latest of Halliday’s all-too-few organ CDs emphasises his gifts in transcribing orchestral works. Featuring the organ of St Francis' Church Melbourne.

From Bach's time through to the middle of the 20th century, transcriptions of orchestral works were common. But more recently they lost favour with organists being considered beneath the organ’s dignity. Such puritanism has now finally died unlamented, as ever more performers rediscover genuinely ingenious adaptations of symphonic – or operatic – music in organ terms. But no-one now alive makes such adaptations better than Halliday.

Track Listing

1. Symphony No. 3 in C minor, Op.78 'Organ' Finale Camille Saint-Saëns
2. Passacaglia and Fugue in C minor BWV 582 Johann Sebastian Bach
   Suite Op.5 Maurice Durufle
3. Prelude
4. Sicilienne
5. Toccata
6. Minute in C for a musical clock Ludwig van Beethoven
7. Piano Concerto in E flat Op.73 'Emperor' Adagio un poco mosso Ludwig van Beethoven