13 October 2017 (gig)
24 October 2017
The Union Chapel, Islington, was the setting for Organ reframed; a celebration of music played on an organ recently restored, having been originally designed and built specifically for the acoustics in the Chapel by ‘master’ organ builder Henry Willis in 1877 – with three keyboards, 39 nobs and over 2000 pipes I have it on good authority that it’s one of the finest examples of its kind in the world.
On Friday evening James McVinnie was the organist who, along with the London Contemporary Orchestra conducted by Hugh Brunt, performed eight works, six of which were being showcased for the first time.
The four first-half pieces, from ‘Passing Through’ by Emily Hall, to Heatwave by Tim Hecker were avant-garde, moody, atmospheric, quite slow and laboured at times, which allowed the organ to move through its range in, at times, an almost macabre manner. Whilst interesting, at points, I found it quite difficult to connect with the performance; perhaps, thinking about what I was hearing a little more than I was feeling it, I went into the break a little unsure of what I’d heard, rather wondering what it all meant.
But then, perhaps, the first half was there to act as an introduction to the four pieces that were performed after the interval as the evening burst into life with DeHFO; a twelve-minute composition written especially by Mira Calix for the festival introducing harmonies that swirled and crescendoed to a wall of sound that, practically, pinned you back into your pew.
Gordon Monahan took to the stage to play an electronic oscillator in the first public performance of his composition, ‘Silhouette Shadows’; picking up the deep bass of the organ, it worked beautifully; almost hypnotic, the sound waves filling the Chapel giving the piece a grime-like quality that fully resonated with me, I had peaked. Who’d have thought the most modern of musical condiments could be such a natural bed fellow for a mechanical organ built over 140 years ago; but work together they do, like a musical strawberries and cream.
As the evening finished things began to make a little more sense; we needed both halves to fully appreciate the whole as we needed the shade to enjoy the light irrespective, perhaps, of how uneasy that darkness made us feel.
