Sunday 11 September 2022 at 8:00 PM
Eccles Organ Festival Recital
Kola Owolabi
The University of Notre Dame, IN (USA)
Eccles Organ Festival Recital
Kola Owolabi
The University of Notre Dame, IN (USA)
Program
C. Hubert H. Parry (1848-1918)
Chorale Fantasia on “O God Our Help” (1912)
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Three Chorale Preludes
Trio super Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend, BWV 655
An Wasserflüssen Babylon, BWV 653
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 688
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
(arranged by Kola Owolabi)
Symphony No. 88 in G Major
II. Largo
IV. Allegro con spirito
Gerald Near (b. 1942)
Sonata No. 1 (2004)
I. Chaconne
II. Lento (Hommage to Leo Sowerby)
III. Fugue: Allegro Moderato
Louis Vierne (1870-1937)
Pièces de fantaisie (1927)
Sicilienne
Impromptu
Brenda Portman (b. 1980)
Aspects of Light (2021)
I. Lux solis
II. Lumen Christi
William Bolcom (b.1938)
Free Fantasia on "O Zion Haste" and "How Firm a Foundation" (1984)
C. Hubert H. Parry (1848-1918)
Chorale Fantasia on “O God Our Help” (1912)
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Three Chorale Preludes
Trio super Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend, BWV 655
An Wasserflüssen Babylon, BWV 653
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 688
Franz Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)
(arranged by Kola Owolabi)
Symphony No. 88 in G Major
II. Largo
IV. Allegro con spirito
Gerald Near (b. 1942)
Sonata No. 1 (2004)
I. Chaconne
II. Lento (Hommage to Leo Sowerby)
III. Fugue: Allegro Moderato
Louis Vierne (1870-1937)
Pièces de fantaisie (1927)
Sicilienne
Impromptu
Brenda Portman (b. 1980)
Aspects of Light (2021)
I. Lux solis
II. Lumen Christi
William Bolcom (b.1938)
Free Fantasia on "O Zion Haste" and "How Firm a Foundation" (1984)
Program Notes
(by Dr. Kola Owolabi)
Sir C. Hubert H. Parry holds a prominent place among 19th-century British composers due to his prolific output of symphonies, chamber music, oratorios, church anthems and canticle settings. His father, Thomas, was a landowner near Gloucester and helped to fund the annual Three Choirs Festival, involving the choirs at Gloucester, Worcester and Hereford Cathedrals. Thomas was skilled in Renaissance painting techniques and completed paintings for the nave roof at Ely Cathedral in 1859, later serving as a consultant for artists who created murals for the Houses of Parliament and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Charles Parry became Professor of Music History at the Royal College of Music in London when it was established in 1883. He wrote numerous articles for George Grove’s New Dictionary for Music and Musicians, a project which began in 1874. The Chorale Fantasia on “O God Our Help” shows Parry’s intimate knowledge of J. S. Bach’s organ works. Each phrase of the hymn is introduced with fore-imitation in eighth-notes before appearing in the soprano in long notes. In addition, aspects of 19th-century style include chromaticism, the pervasive presence of triplets creating cross-rhythms with duplet eighth-notes, and the use of the swell pedal.
Johann Sebastian Bach’s settings of Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend, BWV 655 and An Wasserflüssen Babylon, BWV 653, belong to his collection of chorales preludes that is typically called the Leipzig Chorales. In fact, all of these pieces were composed during Bach’s time as court organist and concert master in Weimar (1708-1717) but revised during his years in Leipzig (1723-1750) and copied into Bach’s autograph manuscript during the last six years of his life. The text of Herr Jesu Christ dich zu uns wend was written by the grandfather of Bach’s employer in Weimar, Duke Wilhelm Ernst. This chorale was sung each week in Weimar as a prayer immediately before the sermon. Bach’s setting is cast as an elegant Italianate instrumental trio sonata movement. The main theme is derived from a decorated form of the first four notes of the chorale. The complete chorale is not heard until the end of the piece, where it appears in quarter-notes in the pedal. An Wasserflüssen Babylon is a setting of Psalm 137, which deals with the Jewish captivity in Babylon in the 6th century BCE. Bach’s plaintive setting is modelled after the French baroque tierce en taille pieces, in which the melody appears in the tenor range, decorated with French trills and other ornaments. Unlike the French models which feature simple chordal accompaniment in outer voices, Bach’s setting makes use of non-imitative counterpoint.
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 688 belongs to his monumental Clavierübung III, published in 1739, comprising twenty-one chorale preludes and four duets, framed by a Prelude and Fugue in E-flat major. Bach chose hymns which deal with the most central tenets of the Lutheran faith: Baptism, Communion, Penance, the Creed, and the Lord’s Prayer. Bach’s collection features a remarkable diversity of musical styles. Although it is a Communion hymn, this setting of Jesus Christus, unser Heiland is written as a virtuosic two-part invention, to which the choral melody is added in long notes in the tenor register (played by the pedals). The opening theme is presented throughout the piece in its original form, inversion, retrograde and retrograde-inversion.
Franz Joseph Haydn was the Music Director for the Esterhazy's, a Hungarian aristocratic family, serving four successive princes from 1766 until 1809. Princes Paul Anton and Nicolaus Esterhazy were very interested in music, and Haydn wrote numerous symphonies, chamber works and operas for performances at their palaces in Eisenstadt, Vienna and Süttör. The third prince, Anton, who assumed the title in 1790, was disinterested in music and fired many members of his musical establishment. Yet by this time, Haydn had assumed a significant reputation abroad, and had been commissioned by the Concert de la Société Olympique in Paris to write six symphonies, Nos. 82-87 (Paris Symphonies). His last twelve symphonies, Nos. 93-104, were written for two rival concert series in London, The Professional Concerts and Johann Peter Salomon’s Concert Series. Symphony No. 88 was probably composed in 1787. The lyrical second movement, “Largo”, features expressive sforzandos, sudden changes in dynamics, and subtly colorful orchestration, including pizzicato strings. The sustained melodic lines lend themselves to performance on organ and provided the inspiration for me to arrange two movements from this work. The playful “Finale” is characterized by its unrelenting repetition of the melody and rhythm heard in the bassoon part in the first two measures. Cast in sonata-rondo form, Haydn includes a formidable passage of counterpoint in the development section where the main theme is treated in stretto, one beat apart. This learned display balances Haydn’s great sense of humor, evident at the start of the recapitulation, where the strings are playing pianissimo and the bassoon makes three attempts to reintroduce the opening theme before finally moving past its first two notes.
Gerald Near has had an active career as a composer of sacred choral music. He studied composition with Leo Sowerby at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago and holds degrees in organ performance and orchestral conducting from the University of Michigan, where he was an organ student of Robert Glasgow, and from the University of Minnesota where he was a composition student of Dominick Argento. He was commissioned to write new pieces for conventions of the American Guild of Organists in Washington, DC in 1982 and Denver in 1998. His Organ Sonata No. 1, written in 2004, was commissioned by the Church of the Holy Faith, the oldest Episcopal parish in Sante Fe, New Mexico. The piece uses a lush neo-romantic harmonic language and exploits the color possibilities of an American classic style organ. The first movement is a Passacaglia with a three-measure theme that is based on descending fourths. The second movement, cast in ternary form, is an homage to his former teacher, Leo Sowerby. The concluding fugue makes considerable use of stretto, and builds to a thrilling conclusion on the full organ.
Blind from birth, Louis Vierne followed the path taken by many other blind French musicians of his day, beginning his musical training at the National Institute for the Blind in Paris, before perfecting his skills at the Paris Conservatory. Vierne was appointed organist at Notre-Dame Cathedral in 1900 and held this post until his death in 1937. His 24 Pièces de fantaisie were written in 1926-27, around the time of his only concert tour of the United States and Canada. Vierne performed 64 concerts in three months, including appearances at the Wanamaker department stores in New York and Philadelphia, Eastman School of Music in Rochester, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and performances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and New England Conservatory Orchestra. Several of the Pièces de fantaisie were premiered on this tour and dedicated to Vierne’s American hosts. Sicilienne was dedicated to the Boston-based organist William Zeuch. It is a charming piece, cast in a simple rondo (ABABA) form, featuring the Swell oboe as a solo stop. Impromptu, also set as a rondo, is an impish scherzo which makes striking use of chromaticism and whole tone sonorities.
Brenda Portman is Organist at Hyde Park Community United Methodist Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. In addition to a growing number of organ compositions, she has written numerous concert settings of hymns for solo voice and piano. Aspects of Light was commissioned for the inauguration of the new Martin Pasi organ, Opus 28 (II/33) at St. George’s Episcopal Church in Arlington, Virginia and premiered by me in February 2022. The two-movement work was inspired by the stained-glass windows at this church. The first movement, entitled “Lux solis” (Light of the sun), explores the concept of sunlight and its effect when shining through the windows. The piece opens with the organist’s fingers dancing through a kaleidoscope of the organ’s tone colors, and then gradually introduces the Gregorian chant, Conditor alme siderum (Creator of the stars of night). The second movement, “Lumen Christi” (Light of Christ), is based on the chant Visionem quam vidistis, for the Feast of the Transfiguration.
William Bolcom was named 2007 Composer of the Year by Musical America and was honored with multiple Grammy Awards for his groundbreaking setting of Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience. He also received the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Twelve New Etudes for Piano. He was professor of Composition at the University of Michigan from 1973 to 2008. His four books of Gospel Preludes for organ collectively consist of twelve pieces based on American hymn tunes, which Bolcom elaborates using a wide range of avant-garde compositional techniques combined with the influence of jazz and gospel music. Free Fantasia on “O Zion, Haste” and “How Firm a Foundation” has two parts. The first part is improvisatory, based on melodic fragments of “O Zion, Haste.” Bolcom’s eclectic musical language includes quartal harmonies, polytonality, interesting cross rhythms and fragments of the hymn tune presented in canon. The second section, based on “How Firm a Foundation” is a jazzy arrangement in Black Gospel style, set in 5/4 meter, instead of the 4/4 meter of the original hymn tune.
(by Dr. Kola Owolabi)
Sir C. Hubert H. Parry holds a prominent place among 19th-century British composers due to his prolific output of symphonies, chamber music, oratorios, church anthems and canticle settings. His father, Thomas, was a landowner near Gloucester and helped to fund the annual Three Choirs Festival, involving the choirs at Gloucester, Worcester and Hereford Cathedrals. Thomas was skilled in Renaissance painting techniques and completed paintings for the nave roof at Ely Cathedral in 1859, later serving as a consultant for artists who created murals for the Houses of Parliament and St. Paul’s Cathedral. Charles Parry became Professor of Music History at the Royal College of Music in London when it was established in 1883. He wrote numerous articles for George Grove’s New Dictionary for Music and Musicians, a project which began in 1874. The Chorale Fantasia on “O God Our Help” shows Parry’s intimate knowledge of J. S. Bach’s organ works. Each phrase of the hymn is introduced with fore-imitation in eighth-notes before appearing in the soprano in long notes. In addition, aspects of 19th-century style include chromaticism, the pervasive presence of triplets creating cross-rhythms with duplet eighth-notes, and the use of the swell pedal.
Johann Sebastian Bach’s settings of Herr Jesu Christ, dich zu uns wend, BWV 655 and An Wasserflüssen Babylon, BWV 653, belong to his collection of chorales preludes that is typically called the Leipzig Chorales. In fact, all of these pieces were composed during Bach’s time as court organist and concert master in Weimar (1708-1717) but revised during his years in Leipzig (1723-1750) and copied into Bach’s autograph manuscript during the last six years of his life. The text of Herr Jesu Christ dich zu uns wend was written by the grandfather of Bach’s employer in Weimar, Duke Wilhelm Ernst. This chorale was sung each week in Weimar as a prayer immediately before the sermon. Bach’s setting is cast as an elegant Italianate instrumental trio sonata movement. The main theme is derived from a decorated form of the first four notes of the chorale. The complete chorale is not heard until the end of the piece, where it appears in quarter-notes in the pedal. An Wasserflüssen Babylon is a setting of Psalm 137, which deals with the Jewish captivity in Babylon in the 6th century BCE. Bach’s plaintive setting is modelled after the French baroque tierce en taille pieces, in which the melody appears in the tenor range, decorated with French trills and other ornaments. Unlike the French models which feature simple chordal accompaniment in outer voices, Bach’s setting makes use of non-imitative counterpoint.
Jesus Christus, unser Heiland, BWV 688 belongs to his monumental Clavierübung III, published in 1739, comprising twenty-one chorale preludes and four duets, framed by a Prelude and Fugue in E-flat major. Bach chose hymns which deal with the most central tenets of the Lutheran faith: Baptism, Communion, Penance, the Creed, and the Lord’s Prayer. Bach’s collection features a remarkable diversity of musical styles. Although it is a Communion hymn, this setting of Jesus Christus, unser Heiland is written as a virtuosic two-part invention, to which the choral melody is added in long notes in the tenor register (played by the pedals). The opening theme is presented throughout the piece in its original form, inversion, retrograde and retrograde-inversion.
Franz Joseph Haydn was the Music Director for the Esterhazy's, a Hungarian aristocratic family, serving four successive princes from 1766 until 1809. Princes Paul Anton and Nicolaus Esterhazy were very interested in music, and Haydn wrote numerous symphonies, chamber works and operas for performances at their palaces in Eisenstadt, Vienna and Süttör. The third prince, Anton, who assumed the title in 1790, was disinterested in music and fired many members of his musical establishment. Yet by this time, Haydn had assumed a significant reputation abroad, and had been commissioned by the Concert de la Société Olympique in Paris to write six symphonies, Nos. 82-87 (Paris Symphonies). His last twelve symphonies, Nos. 93-104, were written for two rival concert series in London, The Professional Concerts and Johann Peter Salomon’s Concert Series. Symphony No. 88 was probably composed in 1787. The lyrical second movement, “Largo”, features expressive sforzandos, sudden changes in dynamics, and subtly colorful orchestration, including pizzicato strings. The sustained melodic lines lend themselves to performance on organ and provided the inspiration for me to arrange two movements from this work. The playful “Finale” is characterized by its unrelenting repetition of the melody and rhythm heard in the bassoon part in the first two measures. Cast in sonata-rondo form, Haydn includes a formidable passage of counterpoint in the development section where the main theme is treated in stretto, one beat apart. This learned display balances Haydn’s great sense of humor, evident at the start of the recapitulation, where the strings are playing pianissimo and the bassoon makes three attempts to reintroduce the opening theme before finally moving past its first two notes.
Gerald Near has had an active career as a composer of sacred choral music. He studied composition with Leo Sowerby at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago and holds degrees in organ performance and orchestral conducting from the University of Michigan, where he was an organ student of Robert Glasgow, and from the University of Minnesota where he was a composition student of Dominick Argento. He was commissioned to write new pieces for conventions of the American Guild of Organists in Washington, DC in 1982 and Denver in 1998. His Organ Sonata No. 1, written in 2004, was commissioned by the Church of the Holy Faith, the oldest Episcopal parish in Sante Fe, New Mexico. The piece uses a lush neo-romantic harmonic language and exploits the color possibilities of an American classic style organ. The first movement is a Passacaglia with a three-measure theme that is based on descending fourths. The second movement, cast in ternary form, is an homage to his former teacher, Leo Sowerby. The concluding fugue makes considerable use of stretto, and builds to a thrilling conclusion on the full organ.
Blind from birth, Louis Vierne followed the path taken by many other blind French musicians of his day, beginning his musical training at the National Institute for the Blind in Paris, before perfecting his skills at the Paris Conservatory. Vierne was appointed organist at Notre-Dame Cathedral in 1900 and held this post until his death in 1937. His 24 Pièces de fantaisie were written in 1926-27, around the time of his only concert tour of the United States and Canada. Vierne performed 64 concerts in three months, including appearances at the Wanamaker department stores in New York and Philadelphia, Eastman School of Music in Rochester, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and performances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and New England Conservatory Orchestra. Several of the Pièces de fantaisie were premiered on this tour and dedicated to Vierne’s American hosts. Sicilienne was dedicated to the Boston-based organist William Zeuch. It is a charming piece, cast in a simple rondo (ABABA) form, featuring the Swell oboe as a solo stop. Impromptu, also set as a rondo, is an impish scherzo which makes striking use of chromaticism and whole tone sonorities.
Brenda Portman is Organist at Hyde Park Community United Methodist Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. In addition to a growing number of organ compositions, she has written numerous concert settings of hymns for solo voice and piano. Aspects of Light was commissioned for the inauguration of the new Martin Pasi organ, Opus 28 (II/33) at St. George’s Episcopal Church in Arlington, Virginia and premiered by me in February 2022. The two-movement work was inspired by the stained-glass windows at this church. The first movement, entitled “Lux solis” (Light of the sun), explores the concept of sunlight and its effect when shining through the windows. The piece opens with the organist’s fingers dancing through a kaleidoscope of the organ’s tone colors, and then gradually introduces the Gregorian chant, Conditor alme siderum (Creator of the stars of night). The second movement, “Lumen Christi” (Light of Christ), is based on the chant Visionem quam vidistis, for the Feast of the Transfiguration.
William Bolcom was named 2007 Composer of the Year by Musical America and was honored with multiple Grammy Awards for his groundbreaking setting of Blake’s Songs of Innocence and of Experience. He also received the 1988 Pulitzer Prize in Music for his Twelve New Etudes for Piano. He was professor of Composition at the University of Michigan from 1973 to 2008. His four books of Gospel Preludes for organ collectively consist of twelve pieces based on American hymn tunes, which Bolcom elaborates using a wide range of avant-garde compositional techniques combined with the influence of jazz and gospel music. Free Fantasia on “O Zion, Haste” and “How Firm a Foundation” has two parts. The first part is improvisatory, based on melodic fragments of “O Zion, Haste.” Bolcom’s eclectic musical language includes quartal harmonies, polytonality, interesting cross rhythms and fragments of the hymn tune presented in canon. The second section, based on “How Firm a Foundation” is a jazzy arrangement in Black Gospel style, set in 5/4 meter, instead of the 4/4 meter of the original hymn tune.
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Kola Owolabi is Professor of Organ at the University of Notre Dame. There he teaches the graduate organ performance majors in the sacred music program, as well as courses in hymn playing and improvisation. He previously held faculty appointments at the University of Michigan from 2014 to 2020, and at Syracuse University from 2006 to 2014.
Dr. Owolabi has had an active career as a solo recitalist, including performances at St. Thomas Church Fifth Avenue in New York, St. James Episcopal Church in Los Angeles, The Memorial Art Gallery in Rochester, NY, St. Paul’s Anglican Church in Toronto, Cornell University, Pacific Lutheran University and Yale University. International venues include Klosterneuburg Abbey, Austria, Église du Bouclier in Strasbourg, France and the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica. He was a featured performer at the American Guild of Organists National Convention in Boston in June 2014, performing three recitals at Methuen Memorial Music Hall. He also performed a concert for the Organ Historical Society Convention in Syracuse in August 2014. He has performed numerous concerts as organist and harpsichordist with the Grammy-nominated vocal ensemble Seraphic Fire and Firebird Chamber Orchestra, based in Miami, Florida. He has released two solo CD recordings on the Raven label: Sacred Expressions: Twentieth-Century Music for Organ featuring works by Olivier Messiaen, Petr Eben and Calvin Hampton performed on the historic Holtkamp organ at Syracuse University; and Jacques Boyvin: Four Suites from the Second Livre d’Orgue (1700), performed on the 1732 Andreas Silbermann organ in Saint-Maurice Abbey, Ebersmunster, France. Dr. Owolabi is a published composer and has received commissions from the Royal Canadian College of Organists and the Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto. His solo organ composition Dance was selected for the Royal Canadian College of Organists National Competition in August 2013, where all of the finalists performed this composition. His choral works have been performed internationally by ensembles such as the Santa Cruz Chorale in California, Nashville Chamber Singers, Illinois Wesleyan University Choir and the Elmer Isler Singers in Toronto. In 2002, Dr. Owolabi was awarded second prize and audience prize at the American Guild of Organists National Young Artists Competition in Organ Performance. He holds degrees in organ performance and choral conducting from McGill University, Montreal, Yale University and Eastman School of Music. His former teachers include Bruce Wheatcroft, John Grew, Martin Jean, Thomas Murray, Hans Davidsson and William Porter. |
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