Winpenny Plays Complete Elgar Organ Works

courtesy of Naxos of America

Towards the end of last month, Naxos released a Complete Organ Works album for the composer Edward Elgar. Elgar’s father had served as organist of St. George's Roman Catholic Church in Worcester from 1846 to 1885, but his own knowledge of the organ and performance technique was the result of reading books on the subject. The organist on this new album is Tom Winpenny, whose credentials include serving as sub-organist at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London.

The works that Elgar composed explicitly for the organ are very limited. In fact, there are only two of them: the Opus 14 Vesper Voluntaries collection and the Opus 28 sonata in G major. The rest of the album consists of arrangements for the instrument. Only three of these are by Elgar himself: the Opus 3 “Cantique,” the “Loughborough Memorial Chime,” and the “Solemn March” movement from his Opus 25 cantata The Black Night. The remaining seven tracks all involve arrangements by others, but all made during Elgar’s lifetime.

Given that Elgar was self-taught where the organ was concerned, the fact that he composed for the instrument at all represents a significant accomplishment. However, his most compelling offerings are the shortest, the eight voluntaries of Opus 14 framed with both an introduction and an intermezzo. That said, I would probably prefer encountering those selections over the course of a vespers service; but I appreciate the extent to which this recording would prepare me for encountering them in that setting.

The arrangements by others are less compelling. The objective seems to have been to provide organ versions of “listener favorites” from the Elgar catalog. Thus, we have William Henry Harris’ arrangement of the “Nimrod” variation from the Opus 36 “Enigma” variations and an arrangement by George Robertson Sinclair (the organist at Hereford Cathedral, who appears in the ninth of the Opus 36 variations) of the fourth (in G major) of the “Pomp and Circumstance” marches. The results are at least moderately engaging, but more effective at triggering memories of Elgar’s original orchestrations.

Nevertheless, I am very much an “all things Elgar” listener; and those that sail under my flag will probably be as gratified to encounter this new release as I am!