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<<  -- 3 --  Robert Anderson    INCONTROVERTIBLE LOGIC

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Gillian Weir ends with a towering masterpiece, the Toccata and Fugue in F, which tests player and instrument to the limit. Both emerge triumphant, and Priory is to be congratulated on capturing so magnificent a volume of sound so faithfully. It is not long before C P E's main point about his father's organ music is superbly illustrated, even if the sluggish English have since caught up: 'The pedal has at times much brilliant and quick material, which, however, only practised masters can play, and the like of which may never have been heard in England' [listen -- CD 2 track 12, 0:00-1:27]. C P E said of Handel's fugues that they were good enough, 'but he often abandons a voice'. Bach by contrast has the incontrovertible logic of a mighty philosopher in music, and the F major fugue heads for an emphatic Q E D that could not be more grandly or eloquently expressed [listen -- CD 2 track 13, 0:00-1:35].

Copyright © 20 April 2005 Robert Anderson, London UK

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Organ Master Series Volume Four - Gillian Weir - Organ works of J S Bach - The Gerald Woehl Bach Organ of the Thomaskirche, Leipzig

PRCD 800 AB DDD Stereo FIRST RELEASE (2 CDs) 134'42" 2004 Priory Records Ltd

Gillian Weir, organ

J S Bach: The Eighteen Chorales (Leipzig Chorale Preludes) BWV651-668; Fantasia in G BWV572; Trio Sonata No 4 in E minor BWV528; Prelude and Fugue in B minor BWV544; Toccata and Fugue in F BWV540

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'ASPECTS OF VISION' BY GILLIAN WEIR

GILLIAN WEIR PLAYS MESSIAEN

ORGAN MASTER SERIES - GILLIAN WEIR

DAME GILLIAN WEIR

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