Tag Archives: Wanamaker Organ

Mass for Philadelphia at AAM Conference

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Parts of my Mass for Philadelphia will be sung at the Closing Eucharist for the Association of Anglican Musicians National Conference today, 3:30 pm Thursday, 21 Jun 2012, at St. Luke and The Epiphany, Philadelphia. Assisting in the congregational singing will be a children’s choir and the Conference Choir. The Mass is for unison congregation, organ, and optional cantor and descant.

I’ve been having a great time at the conference all week, meeting music directors and organists from around the country. I also had the pleasure of meeting British composer Francis Pott at The Crossing concert Sunday night. The Crossing sang two of his luscious, dark works, and they never cease to amaze how good they are, in whatever music they perform: true as truth, warm, vibrant, athletic, always exciting. Peter Richard Conte played a program of his own exquisite transcriptions on the Wanamaker Organ at Macy’s last night.

Being an exhibitor at the Conference, and bringing along lots of my choral music, I wasn’t able to attend nearly all of the events I would’ve liked, but it’s been an enjoyable time of meeting church music folks, other exhibitors, and making new friends. I’ve made a re-acquaintance with Charles Kegg of Kegg Pipe Organs. We had met a year ago at First Presbyterian of Phoenixville, when an anthem of mine was premiered at the dedication of an organ he had just installed. It’s a beautiful instrument.

Thanks to Phillip and Heather Shade and the AAM for commissioning this Mass.

The Wanamaker Organ, my first podcast

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On the WRTI homepage is my first-ever podcast for them. It’s the mini-review I wrote last year of A Grand Celebration, the Philadelphia Orchestra, conducted by Rossen Milanov, accompanying Peter Richard Conte on the Wanamaker Organ at Macy’s. You can listen here. It focuses on the main piece of the CD, the Joseph Jongen Sinfonia Concertante, composed for this organ and this orchestra.

Wanamaker Organ Day is tomorrow, Saturday, June 25th, the center of a bustle of activity around the world’s largest functional musical instrument. Check out the Friends of the Wanamaker Organ website for information on this and my friend Rick Seifert’s sound-and-image tribute to the Wanamaker Organ in Greek Hall on Sunday, June 26th.

I “voiced” the review (which jargon I’m now picking up means that I spoke the review into a microphone), and grabbed audio from the CD for a bed under the voice. Tricky, to get the right music to match what I’m talking about, leaving time for the music, and time for the words, fading in and out to (I hope) make it interesting.

Actually, I edit the copy somewhat, because hearing spoken words is a different experience from reading them on the page, so there’s some little changes from the original copy to the podcast. Those who do this all the time know this, of course, whereas I’m just learning. But anyway, take a listen, and by all means check out the CD, and the celebrations at Macy’s if you can.

The Wanamaker Organ

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My latest CD mini-review for the WRTI E-newsletter. You can read all my CD reviews here.

A Grand Celebration
The Philadelphia Orchestra live with the Wanamaker Organ
The Historic Grand Court Concert for Macy’s 150th Anniversary
Peter Richard Conte, organist, Rossen Milanov, conductor
Marcel Dupré Cortege and Litany, Joseph Jongen Sinfonia Concertante, Edward Elgar Pomp and Circumstance No. 1
Gothic G-49270

You’re careful—Indiana-Jones-careful—not to touch anything. You tip-toe over wires and ducts and around wooden stairways and you see them everywhere. The pipes. Pipes thick as elms that rise two storeys, pipes small as pencils, tin pipes, wood pipes, round and square pipes, growing, it seems, out of the fractals of corners, advancing on you… but the astonishing realization is that there are people here who know exactly where every pipe is.

This is the Wanamaker Organ. It has patio-sized bellows that could crush a lawn tractor. It is the largest functional musical instrument on the planet. The entire Grand Court of the store (now Macy’s), surrounded by condominiums of ranks and choirs and chests and louvers, is really the instrument, and it is for this instrument, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, that Joseph Jongen wrote his Sinfonia Concertante. The deaths of the composer’s father and the store owner postponed, and then cancelled, the scheduled 1928 premiere. The music has been heard around the world, but not until 2008 did it finally erupt in this place, as if it had been waiting all this time. The CD of this live performance is worth the wait.

Facing all this power, you might expect to be pummelled, but the surprise is how lightly Peter Richard Conte makes this dance. He and Rossen Milanov coordinate these two behemoths—this great orchestra and organ—with precision. They delight in the illumined edges of sound, where harmonies brush by each other and decays ruffle the silence. You can almost feel the space. Just don’t touch anything.