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MASTERPIECES FROM THE CHURCH OF SAINT MARY THE VIRGIN, NEW YORK CITY.
Kyler Brown, organ. GOTHIC G 49085 [DDD]; 60:06. Produced by William Greenwood. (Distributed by Koch International.)
This is, quite simply, one of the most successful organ recital discs to come my way for a long time. Program, playing, recording, notes -- all of extremely high quality. The fare is astutely chosen. Kyler Brown, organist of the Church of Saint Mary the Virgin in New York, since 1988, mixes some classics of the repertoire (not least the toccatas of Gigout and the inescapable Widor) with less familiar pieces, and the nineteenth century with the twentieth. The modern works have been selected to appeal as much to the hardened professional as to the nonspecialist: Jean Guillou's dramatic, colorful music isn't heard as often as its quality might suggest, and the muscular Fugue from the 1960 Sonata of the Pennsylvanian Thomas Canning (1911-89) sent me to my dictionaries to find out more about such an energetic, gloriously up-front composer (he wasn't there). Brown's performance of the Dupré G-Minor Prelude and Fugue, Op. 7, No. 3, was one of the highlights of the Bischof and Vitacco four-disc survey of New York organs that you'll find reviewed elsewhere in this issue, and he repeats it here -- even the war-horses come out sparkling and new. Brown is obviously a musician of high caliber: Gothic should be pushing more recordings his way. William Greenwood's recorded sound has both depth and brightness, and Jesse Rosenberg's notes mirror Brown's program in helping in the outsider as well as providing information that the initiate will want. From all points of view, this disc deserves a vigorous recommendation.
Martin Anderson
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