This is a delightful recital, juxtaposing familiar and unfamiliar
in a sequence which does more than merely juxtapose; there
are intriguing continuities and patterns at every turn and Paul
Ayres deserves warm congratulations botswh for the skill and vivacity
of his playing and for the adroitness with which he has put this
programme together.
In 1998 organ makers
Martin Goetze and Dominic Gwynne built a chamber organ for the
Handel House Trust - who opened their fascinating Handel House
Museum in 2001). The organ is kept in St. George’s Church, Hanover
Square (Handel’s parish church) and is modelled on chamber organs
by Richard Bridge (d.1758) and Thomas Parker who may have been
apprenticed to Bridge. A one-manual instrument with a key compass
of 54 notes (GG AA CD – e3) it is very well recorded
here and makes a gorgeous and thoroughly appropriate sound.
The CD booklet provides a specification.
The music Paul Ayres
plays can be divided into three categories. First, compositions
by Handel himself, sometimes heard in new arrangements; nineteenth
century works written in stylistic homage to Handel; recent
compositions similarly inspired by the example of Handel and,
in most cases, written for a composition competition for ‘Handel-Inspired’
music.
The programme begins
with Paul Ayres’ own transcription of the Sinfonia from Act
III of Solomon - popularly known as ‘The Arrival of the
Queen of Sheba’. The results are a joy, tutti and solo sections
contrasted by use of the shifting mechanism, so that only the
wooden pipes can be heard at times. With nicely balanced wit,
the programme ends with a piece by Paul Ayres ‘The Departure
of the Queen of Sheba’ which inverts/reverses elements from
her ‘Arrival’ as imagined by Handel. Ayres observes ‘I had in
mind the Queen’s gift-laden procession, dancing off into the
desert’ – an image given splendid and idiosyncratic form in
this enjoyable little piece.
In between the Queen
of Sheba’s entrance and exit we are treated to a great many
other sweetmeats - which the Queen surely ate during her time
with Solomon. John Hawkins studied with Malcolm Williamson and Elisabeth Lutyens. His choral work This
World, the fruit of collaboration with the poet and scholar
Kathleen Raine, I remember fondly from a broadcast on Radio
3, responds to a rather pompous footnote in a nineteenth-century
edition of Handel’s keyboard suites with some striking harmonic
writing. Eighteenth-century keyboard arrangements of the Air
and Bourrée from the Water Music, are followed by a splendidly
inventive piece by the Japanese composer Satoru Ikeda (a new
name to me) in his ‘Water Bubbling’. This is, as Paul Ayres
notes, full of watery ‘effects’ – “not just bubbling, but flowing,
cascading, freezing, evaporating, drenching”. It well deserves
to find a place in recital programmes – at least for organists
who have the technique to handle it - no pun intended. Alan
Smith’s ‘Scherzo on Gopsal’ is another delight, playing a variety
of musical games with one of Handel’s hymn tunes, full of engaging
cross-rhythms and playful invention. Gopsal Hall, incidentally,
was the name of the country house of Charles Jennens, Handelian
librettist and patron of the arts, in Leicestershire. The organ
he had built, to Handel’s specifications (see the fascinating
essay by William D. Gudger) is one of the models studied
by Goetze and Gwynne in the production of this Handel House
organ.
The
Polish composer Krzysztof Aleksander Janczak offers a beautiful
meditative tribute to the great composer in his ‘Le Tombeau
d’Handel’ and both Jos Martens (‘Little Prelude’) and Akmal
Parwez (‘In Handel’s Name’) build their pieces on Handel’s initials
G F H (i.e. G F B-natural). The charming variations on a gavotte
from Handel’s Ottone are perhaps the most attractive
of the nineteenth century pieces. They are here attributed to
Samuel Wesley; elsewhere I have seen them attributed to Charles
Wesley, but Samuel seems the likelier candidate as author of
this amiable set of five variations.
In
truth, there isn’t a dud track here and Paul Ayres’ playing is
consistently well judged. This is a recital which has lifted my
spirits each time I have listened to it! My only very slight
reservation is that for all the excellence of Paul Ayres’ booklet
notes, they are a bit short on dates and in this regard I have
supplemented them where I can.
Glyn
Pursglove
Paul Ayres
(organ: Chamber Organ for the Handel House Museum (1998) by Goetze
and Gwynn) 
