<<  -- 2 --  Robert Anderson    IDEAS IN ABUNDANCE

The splendid music on this CD is a fine vindication of Bach's teaching, with its emphasis on thorough bass and chorales. His son Carl Philipp Emanuel, though, made another important point : 'As for the invention of ideas, he required this from the very beginning, and anyone who had none he advised to stay away from composition altogether. Krebs had ideas in abundance, as is clear from the second of the four preludes that begin this recital [listen -- track 2, 0:00-1:13]. Krebs belonged to the next generation after Bach, and though he followed the example of his teacher to the extent that it is uncertain whether a handful of Bach works are not by Krebs, he was receptive of more recent trends. This is apparent from the well-judged sequences and suspensions of the Fantasia in F [listen -- track 6, 0:00-1:12]. The Ahrend organ in the Reid concert hall is the only instrument by the firm in Britain. It is elegant in appearance, and exactly designed after early eighteenth-century German models. It has the clarity of speech and slight roughness of accent appropriate to the music, and John Kitchen's musicianship ensures a performance at once robust and sensitive.

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