Keith John plays 1 of 3

Keith John plays the wonderful & extraordinary Detlef Kleuker organ in the l'Eglise du Chant d'Oiseau, brussels. keith John was a chorister in Gloucester Cathedral under Herbert Sumsion and started to play the organ aged 13. He later studied with Ralph Downes and won a scholariship to study with Jean Guillou, whose influence can be heard in his approach to transcriptions and his own work. He has made a number of acclaimed recordings for Priory Records and Hyperion labels, recording on several Guillou inspired instruments including the Tonhalle, Zurich and l'Alpe d'Huez (the one with the case shaped like a hand). This is without doubt one of my favourite organs, conceived by Jean Guillou following his principles and aesthetic, creating an instrument capable of playing almost anything. The organ has 4 manuals and 46 speaking stops. The specification is very interesting and utilises Guillou's ideas for sythesising new and original sounds, the positif and Pedale contain mixtures with unusual compositions. I think that this along with the Tonhalle organ are two of the finest contemporary instruments, both have great beauty and power IMHO. That said, I think the van den Heuvel organ in St Eustache is a shrieking monster - way too loud and raucus, it has some nice solo registers, but the reeds are not pretty and the mixtures are painful. But the tutti is strangely compelling :-) Stravinky wrote his Circus Polka in 1942 as a commission from Barnum & Bailey Circus and carries the subtitle of 'composed for a young elephant'. The music was used in a ballet featuring elephants and dancing girls, Stravinsky never saw the work, but met the 'Prima elefante' Bessie and shook her foot! This recording was taken from a CD from Priory Records PRCD 174 Great European Organs No.2. It was deleted many years ago, but Priory provide a reproduction service.