Pipe Organ Recommendations

opusarlo

Active Member
I am asking all the pipe organ fans for recommendations. I just got into hi-fi a couple of weeks ago, and I love the expansive and authoritative sound of a loud pipe or theater organ that uses the infrasonic tones. I am not interested in the Wurlitzer sound at all - Just the massive sounds of a powerful pipe organ.
 
Im a sucker for the Telarc label organ recordings. If there was bottom end to be found, Telarc would find it.

My personal organ builder is Casavant Frères. A great modernist French style organ.


Your choice of organist may very, but Michael Murray did a lot of work with Telarc.
 
Im a sucker for the Telarc label organ recordings. If there was bottom end to be found, Telarc would find it.

My personal organ builder is Casavant Frères. A great modernist French style organ.


Your choice of organist may very, but Michael Murray did a lot of work with Telarc.
I guess I am not that deep into the pipe organ to have a favorite builder. I will say, the German one put in our church sounds fantastic, but I don't know the brand. There is an antiphonal organ as well as a trompette en chamade.
 
Im a sucker for the Telarc label organ recordings. If there was bottom end to be found, Telarc would find it.

My personal organ builder is Casavant Frères. A great modernist French style organ.


Your choice of organist may very, but Michael Murray did a lot of work with Telarc.
M.P. Moller - that is the standard by which I judge pipe organ music only because the best organ music I ever heard was from one of his creations.
 
The Michael Murray stuff on Telarc is pretty spectacular - I have a half dozen titles. I also have a few on Dorian CDs.

Bachbusters (Don Dorsey), also on Telarc, was quite a popular demo disc in the late '80s and early '90s in car audio - albeit its synthesized. My Mustang GT had 27 speakers, including a pair of Kicker C18s, and 2kW then and this disc was in heavy rotation. Tracks 3, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, and 16 all require some getting accustomed to before playing loud as the dynamics are off the chart,

My favorite work remains Switched on Bach by Wendy Carlos. I have a really nice copy on vinyl and its a CBS Half Speed Master. This is also synthesized and is obviously the work that inspired Don Dorsey. Side two on the system in my sig is an experience.
 
One album springs to mind

The four antiphonal organs of the cathedral of Freiburg played simultaneously by E Power Biggs
Bach - The Four Great Toccatas and Fugues

Columbia M32933
 
I am asking all the pipe organ fans for recommendations. I just got into hi-fi a couple of weeks ago, and I love the expansive and authoritative sound of a loud pipe or theater organ that uses the infrasonic tones. I am not interested in the Wurlitzer sound at all - Just the massive sounds of a powerful pipe organ.
The Pipe organ on Track#2 Will give even the best of the systems a run for their money....
1984 - Telarc - Sampler Volume 1 - (Telarc CD-80101)
1984 - Telarc - Sampler Volume 1 - (Telarc CD-80101).gif
-Blitz
 
Telarc- Michael Murray on the San Francisco Ruffatti organ. If you have sufficient subwoofage, then play the Messian track at 115db levels. Been my reference demo track for years. I worked building pipe organs for 7 years.
 
Telarc- Michael Murray on the San Francisco Ruffatti organ. If you have sufficient subwoofage, then play the Messian track at 115db levels. Been my reference demo track for years. I worked building pipe organs for 7 years.
ordered CD
 
I had some time ot kill waiting for a MD appointment last week, so I wandered into Trinity Church at Broadway & Wall Street. I was lucky in that the Organist was performing on the church's magnificent (7000+) pipe organ. Nothing quite like hearing a pipe organ getting a workout, an impressive instrument to hear live.
 
Pipes Rhode Island (CD, Riago 101). [Currently out of print - but keep an eye out for it!] http://www.arkivmusic.com/classical/album.jsp?album_id=175111

"That recording of James Busby playing Herbert Howells' "Master Tallis's Testament" on the 1917/1955 Austin organ at S. Stephen in Providence has a 32 Hz Low 'C' backed by a 16 Hz suboctave pipe (and three 64 Hz harmonic pipes)."
Thats track 10 on the CD - trust me - its a killer!

And that Back album by E.Power Biggs?
It was available on SACD - (again, keep an eye out)
Bach: The Four Great Toccatas and Fugues [SACD] Johann Sebastian Bach, Edward Power Biggs
it is released on this SACD in true 5.1 surround sound, meaning there is a central front speaker and the subwoofer.

Here's the album I mentioned above. Hopefully the notes are readable. The technical aspects of the recording are quite interesting.
 
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Some other great organists: Albert Schweitzer, Fritz Heitmann, Carl Weinrich, Marcel Dupre, and Ernest White to name a few...
 
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