In selecting essential organ masterworks by Jehan Alain and Maurice Duruflé, organist William Whitehead points up some interesting connections between the two composers. Not least of these is their shared fascination with asymmetrical or additive rhythms, and Whitehead strongly emphasizes this feature in his vigorous performances on Dances of Life and Death. If organ music ordinarily seems four-square and solemnly hymn-like, then prepare to hear some of the most athletically rhythmic organ music ever written. Alain's ...
Read More
In selecting essential organ masterworks by Jehan Alain and Maurice Duruflé, organist William Whitehead points up some interesting connections between the two composers. Not least of these is their shared fascination with asymmetrical or additive rhythms, and Whitehead strongly emphasizes this feature in his vigorous performances on Dances of Life and Death. If organ music ordinarily seems four-square and solemnly hymn-like, then prepare to hear some of the most athletically rhythmic organ music ever written. Alain's intensely energetic and ecstatic pieces dominate the program, and no work here is more propulsive or powerful than Litanies (1937), Alain's most famous and influential composition. A quotation from Litanies appears in Duruflé's Prélude et Fugue sur le nom d'Alain (1942), and the flexible rhythms and flowing figurations of this tribute indicate his complete sympathy with his late friend's work. But note also Duruflé's Danse lente (1932), which seems to anticipate Alain's style in its...
Read Less