With the approach of
Christmas, multiple recordings of Christmas
Carols from King’s et al have
started to appear in the shops and no
doubt this CD will find its place there.
The cover isn’t particularly festive,
depicting a cherub blowing his horn
– from the casework of the organ featured
here – but the magic words Christmas
Carols are there in the sub-title.
I’m afraid, however,
that many impulse purchasers of this
CD will be misled by this subtitle and
disappointed when they find that there
is not one single Carol as the word
is generally understood in English,
apart perhaps from the Buxtehude and
Bach preludes on In dulci jubilo.
The one piece labelled ‘Carol’, by John
Bull, is actually an arrangement of
a Netherlandish Christmas hymn.
Anyone who has followed
my advice to buy the Hyperion Helios
reissue of Daquin, performed by Christopher
Herrick (CDH55319)
will recognise the first three tracks
on this CD as three of the Nouveau
Livre de Noëls pour l’orgue et
le clavecin, Op. 2, performed in
full on that disc. Koopman’s performances,
however, are very different from those
offered by Herrick: whereas Herrick
performs them in a straightforward manner
– though by no means without expression
– Koopman cannot resist the distortions
which are regretfully typical of his
organ playing.
Koopman polishes off
the opening Noël Suisse
in 3:37. Marie-Claire Alain on a deleted
Erato CD of Noëls pour orgue
takes 4:28 and Christopher Herrick takes
4:10. Neither could be accused of dawdling
but Koopman is in serious danger of
getting a speeding ticket. I hardly
recognised this as the same piece that
Herrick and Alain were performing. Herrick
is particularly effective because he
starts at a slower tempo and with a
lighter touch and gradually builds up
the speed and registration, though in
neither respect does he approach the
Technicolor excess of Koopman.
In the other Daquin
pieces Koopman’s No.X at 5:56 is significantly
slower than Herrick at 5:22 and Alain
at 5:40; his No.VI at 6:09 is also slower
than Herrick (5:40) and Alain (4:33).
But it isn’t tempo that is the problem
so much as Koopman’s tendency to play
around with the music – fussy ornamentation
and registration and extreme contrasts
of tempo and volume from second to second
– to make it more ‘exciting’. I imagine
that many listeners will find
it all very lively and ear-catching
but I much prefer the Herrick performances
of all twelve Daquin Noëls.
The organ of St Rémy, Dieppe
(1736-9, rebuilt 1992) is much better
suited to Daquin than the Haringe instrument
which Koopman plays. Remember, too,
that the Herrick comes at less than
half the price of this Koopman CD –
which makes it faintly ridiculous that
bidders on EBay seem prepared to offer
£11 for a second-hand copy of the original
Hyperion issue: don’t they know it’s
been reissued at half that price?
Why a musician of Koopman’s
stature, one whose direction of Baroque
choral music is so excellent, has to
resort to this type of exaggeration
I cannot understand. Reviewing this
CD two days after hearing the Radio
3 broadcast of the concert of Cantatas
by Buxtehude and Bach which he gave
in Lübeck in May, a wonderful concert,
I wonder if I am really listening to
the work of the same person. Can this
also be the same Ton Koopman whose recording
of the Handel Organ Concertos, apart
from the hideous cover, is the best
thing since sliced bread? (Warner Apex
2564 62760-2, 2 CDs at super-bargain
price, around £7.50 in the UK.)
The Bull and Sweelinck
pieces are settings of Flemish translations
of Puer nobis nascitur, the hymn
which provides the title of the CD.
John Bull, having got into trouble in
his native England, was Cathedral organist
at Antwerp; his contemporary Sweelinck
was the most famous Netherlandish composer
of organ music of his day. Those who
find themselves attracted to his one
short piece here may wish to explore
his music further on Naxos 8.550904.
Chris Bragg found the performances by
Siegbert Rampe on a Dabringhaus und
Grimm CD of Sweelinck (MDG341
1256-2) too fast and funky – unsurprisingly,
he is a former Koopman student – so
the Naxos is the recording to go for.
Actually, Koopman plays
the Sweelinck and the Bull sensitively
and the organ is particularly well suited
to these pieces. Built in 1778, it is
strictly Rococo rather than Baroque,
post-dating all the music on this CD,
especially the Bull and Sweelinck, but
it sounds well in the German and Netherlandish
music.
The Zipoli Pastorale
receives a bright rather than a pastoral
performance: the registration chosen
is not inappropriate because in Italy
such pieces were associated with shepherds
playing bagpipes. The notes describe
the piece as "the very impersonation
of charm and affability", then
prepare us for the fact that Koopman
destroys some of those qualities: "Koopman
adds ornaments freely."
Pablo Bruna’s Tiento
on the Litany of the Virgin Mary is
not strictly a Christmas piece, though
the tune is not unlike that of the carol
Sweet was the song the Virgin
sang. It is something of a virtuoso
piece and it receives a virtuoso performance.
The booklet does not really explain
what is meant by a tiento. The
term is analogous to the Italian toccata
and originally referred to a style in
which the player was, as it were, trying
out the instrument in the manner of
a fantasia. In this piece by
the little-known Bruna it virtually
amounts to a set of variations, especially
as performed by Koopman.
In Dandrieu’s Noël
de Saintogne Koopman (2:51) is a
little slower than Alain (2:30) but
the problems which I noted in the Daquin
resurface here – in a slightly less
extreme form, but the contrast with
the sensitive performances of the Bull
and Sweelinck is noticeable. The other
three Dandrieu pieces go much better.
Maybe that is because I didn’t have
versions by Alain to compare – the ‘Building
a Library’ comparison method often exaggerates
differences which one would not otherwise
have noticed.
Chris Bragg complained
of Koopman’s dissident, macho eccentricity
in his review of Volumes I and II of
the complete organ works of Buxtehude
(CC72242
and CC72243). Specifically, CB complained
of fast tempi and violently over-active
touch, leading to a lack of Affekt
in the music. As it happens, the three
Buxtehude pieces on Puer nobis nascitur
are included on the two discs which
he was reviewing. The versions here
are mostly even faster. Wie schön
leuchtet der Morgenstern is here
polished off in 6:17 as against 6:52;
though I must admit that the actual
statement of the chorale theme is beautifully
played, much of the rest is rushed and
lacking in Affekt. Nun komm
der Heiden Heiland is performed
in 2:09 against 2:00 – a fraction slower
here this time – and In dulci jubilo
in 2:02 against 2:08. These two pieces
to some extent restored my faith in
Koopman’s musicality – fast, but with
a delicacy of touch and real feeling
for the music.
The transition from
the music of Buxtehude to that of Lebègue
is somewhat abrupt: surely it would
have been better to have kept the French
Noëls together and to have
led from Buxtehude to Bach, a more natural
transition. Moreover, as Lebègue
is generally regarded as the ‘father’
of French organ music, it would have
been logical to have placed him first.
The abrupt nature of
the transition is sharpened by the fact
that, for Lebègue, Koopman reverts
to the style in which he performed the
Daquin. In Noël pour l’amour
de Marie his 3:29 is very close
to Alain’s 3:20 but the stylistic differences
and the fact that the Albi organ (1736,
rebuilt 1981) is much more suited to
this music make Alain much more recommendable.
The last two pieces,
by Bach, receive sympathetic performances
without any attempt to make them artificially
exciting. The Pastorale is a
reflective piece in the manner of the
Pastoral Symphony in Handel’s Messiah,
designed to be performed at the Christmas
Midnight Eucharist. It is taken a little
fast for my liking in places but there
is real feeling in the playing. The
notes in the booklet prepare us for
a breakneck performance of the final
piece, Bach’s prelude on In dulci
jubilo. As this is the final piece
on the disc it is not inappropriate
to treat it in a manner suitable for
a recessional and, as such, I did not
find Koopman’s grand manner of playing
it inappropriate. One almost expects
to hear the Radio 3 announcer’s voice
at the end of Choral Evensong or the
Nine Lessons and Carols from King’s
on Christmas Eve. Not a bad note on
which to end what is, for me, a very
mixed blessing of a recording.
The notes are, as usual
with this label, informative and full
– so full that the booklet was very
difficult to fit back in the case and
one corner tore easily. Those who know
little of Iberian organ music would
probably have welcomed a fuller explanation
of a tiento in the notes on the
Bruna piece.
The specification of
the organ is given in the booklet but
the registration employed for individual
pieces is not specified. The names of
the manuals in Flemish may be rather
unfamiliar to English and French organists.
The Hoofdwerk is the German Hauptwerk
or Grand Orgue, the Rugpositief
the Positif, Echo speaks
for itself, the Aanhangen pedaal
the pull-down pedal-board, Toetsen
the pedal notes and Schuifkoppel
is conveniently translated as ‘coupler’.
A photograph of some of the stops reveals
that some of these have Flemish names
such as Holpyp, a reed stop,
but these are all given their more familiar,
mostly French, equivalents in the specification.
In the Buxtehude and
Bach the registration does not draw
attention to itself but in the French
pieces I did not always find it appropriate.
Baroque French organ composers often
specify registration which draws attention
to the reed stops but Koopman’s registration
sometimes makes the instrument sound
wheezy rather than reedy.
The action of the organ
is unavoidably noisy in quiet passages,
yet there is little sense of building
ambience. Otherwise the recording is
excellent – less reverberant than the
Erato/Alain. I can imagine, feeling
gemütlich on Christmas Day,
laying all critical faculties aside
and enjoying this Koopman CD. Were Warner
Classics to reissue the Marie-Claire
Alain CD on Apex, however, that would
be worthy of a much stronger recommendation.
If you are looking
to escape from the usual fare of Good
King Wenceslas, etc, this Christmas
buy the Helios reissue of Daquin. If
you want a Christmas CD that really
knocks your socks off, go for one of
Paul McCreesh’s liturgical reconstructions
– A Venetian Christmas on DG
471 333-2 (music by Giovanni Gabrieli
and others), Christmas Vespers 1664
by Schütz (463 046-2) or, even
better, Lutheran Mass for Christmas
Morning (1620), featuring the music
of Prætorius and his contemporaries
(439 250-2).
Brian Wilson
for details
Ton Koopman (Organ by Van Peteghem, 1778)
