Superb recital by 22 year old Godfrey Leung from the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire playing in the annual Keyboard Trust organ recital at the historic Temple Church .
An oasis of calm between the Inner and Middle temples where the Magna Carta was thrashed out before its sealing at Runnymead in June 1215 .It was the first document to put into writing the principle that the king and his government was not above the law. It sought to prevent the king from exploiting his power, and placed limits of royal authority by establishing law as a power in itself.
Today a full house for a superb young musician with a range of sounds I have never heard before on the organ.
A violinist with the CBSO converted to the King of all instruments with musical discoveries that astonished and surprised us all today in this all too short recital.
It was streamed live and can still be seen and heard here :
http://templechurch.com/music/lunchtime-organ-recitals

  POWER AND DRAMA FROM  TEMPLE ORGAN an appreciation by Angela Ransley

 

 

                                        Bach  Prelude and Fugue in C major, BWV 545
                                        Hindemith  Ruhig bewegt from Organ sonata No.2

                                        Vierne  Toccata from 24 Pièces de fantaisie, Op. 53
                                        Duruflé  Prélude et Fugue sur le nom d’Alain,Op 7

 

I have attended many organ recitals at Temple Church in their celebrated Lunchtime Series but only at the one given by GODFREY LEUNG has spontaneous applause interrupted its usual serenity. This was after a fiery delivery of the Vierne Toccata that had the audience on the edge of their pews.

GODFREY LEUNG is 22 years old and began formal organ studies at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire in October 2022, having previously gained wide musical experience as a violinist in the CBSO Youth Orchestra. The priests in his local church supported him to take up the organ: its power has since captured his heart and soul. The famous Harrison organ at Temple – one of London’s elite instruments – has fire power a-plenty.

The Temple recitals are just 30 minutes in length and I am always amazed at how significant this musical journey can be. Godfrey played first of all an early work by JS Bach: Prelude and Fugue in C Major BWV 545,which exists in several versions. The Prelude offers athletic semiquuaver writing over deep pedal points; the Fugue with a subject on a rising C major scale gives much opportunity for exciting, rhythmically taut cross-rhythms, which led to Debussy describe Bach’s compositional style as adorable Arabesque.In this era there are no tempo or dynamic indications: this is left to the musical imagination of the perfomer. Godfrey chose to emphasise the work’s grandeur with a moderato tempo and deep pedal registration. Effective use of the reed stops heightened the rhythmic drive towards the thrilling final pedal entry of the fugue subject.

 

The next composer, Paul Hindemith (1895-1963) shared Bach’s nationality but almost nothing else: he was at odds with the prevailing adherence to the twelve-tone method of the Second Viennese School, seeking to extend traditional tonality rather than annihilate it. He also fell foul of the Nazi regime who banned his opera about a mediaeval peasant uprising Mathis de Maler (Mathius the Artist), denouncing him as a cultural Bolshevist and spiritual non-Aryan. As a result, most of his professional life was carried out abroad: in Turkey, where he founded a conservatoire along Western lines, then as Professor of Composition at the universities of Yale and Zurich. He composed across all genres including the organ for which he wrote 3 sonatas, a concerto and a piece in the Kammermusik series for organ and 15 strings.

 

Ruhig bewegt is the pastoral slow movement in Organ Sonata no 2 composed in 1937, which gives respite between the fevered toccata-like first movement and a final fugue driven by a tortuous subject. His concept of extended tonality is very apparent in that while independent lines create dissonances that deny any sense of tonality, one still hears the classical phrase shapes and the comfort of a tonic or dominant chord to complete a section. I am reminded of a puppy galloping off on a retractable lead, only too happy to return with muddy paws after sinking into murky terrain. Godfrey judged the tempo of this siciliano well and the distinctive Harrison solo stops added vivid colour. More atmosphere could have been achieved from the piano dynamic indicated by the composer.                                             

 

Louis Vierne (1870-1937) followed the tradition of French organists who, once appointed, remain in post for life: he won the competition to become titular organist at Notre Dame in 1900 and stayed there for 37 years. His Toccata from the suite Pieces de Fantaisie (1926) is one of the glories of the French symphonic tradition inspired by the monolithic organs of Aristide Cavaille-Coll. Out of the flurry of semiquavers emerges an idiomatically French, rising whole-tone scale balanced by a descending series of diminished 5ths which is heard in different registers and registrations as the virtuosity unfolds. Godfrey unleashed the full power and drama of this unique instrument to an astonished audience. When I asked him afterwards what he liked about the organ, he replied its power!

An affectionate family photograph of Jehan Alain with younger sister Marie-Claire

The Prelude et Fugue sur le nom d’Alain by Maurice Durufle (1902-1986)   employs a technique used by numerous composers of taking the letters from a name to create a theme. Jehan Alain came from the distinguished Alain family, and was elder brother to the celebrated organist Marie-Claire Alain and a promising composer. A friend of Durufle, he was killed in action in 1940 and awarded full military honours by the Germans at his funeral to acknowledge his bravery.It was specially poignant to hear this piece in a building that suffered itself in the same year of the Second World War. The intensity of the bombing on 10 May 1940 turned the organ into a river of liquid metal: what remains can still be seen through a door from the nave. The haunting theme generated by these letters is heard against a toccata-like texture of restless quavers. This gives way to a solemn conclusion where Durufle quotes from Jehan’s own work Litanies. The Fugue is virtuosic in concept as well as technique: it has a double subject and many contrapuntal feats which enables the music to blaze in glory –  mirroring Alain’s courageous stand. Godfrey’s spacious, sensitive account was enhanced by daring colour contrast in the Prelude and pleasing linear clarity in the following Fugue.

 

One of the disadvantages of any organ recital is that the performer is either completely invisible or has his back to the audience as at Temple, making   a shared occasion difficult to achieve.  In this short recital of organ masterpieces, Godfrey showed us that a deep conviction for the music along with technical and musical assurance can overcome it. This is what created the sudden hush of drama in the Vierne Toccata and the warmth of reception at the end. Thank you, Godfrey, for a memorable recital and for showing us what talent and hard work can achieve.