This recording completes my project of recording all 12 published voluntaries by William Goodwin (leaving for later the 24 by his older relative Starling Goodwin, or some of them at least). Every other item in that playlist (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJQG183QhFpBTwxj2h7c6nrXn9IpHhBiS) contains biographical information about the composer, so for once I will omit it here. In fact I uploaded this piece once already at the beginning of the project (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAnRBDSUbtM). I always meant to upload an alternative recording, and this is it. One reason for doing another version was that this is the only voluntary of the set with not one but two suggested registrations for the main movement, marked "Cornet or Flute". My first recording used the oboe stop of the (part-)Georgian organ at Little Waldingfield for the solo part. That left a "Flute" version to be done. Well, what you hear in this recording is not QUITE what Goodwin presumably intended, any more than what you hear in the other one. An oboe is not quite the same as a cornet. Nor does the registration in this recording correspond to 18th-c. English practice: on an English organ of that period the stop labelled "Flute" was always a four-foot rank, and if I understand correctly the solo part of "flute" pieces was indeed played on that stop alone, thus sounding an octave higher than written. English authors of the period point out that the "flute" could "accompany itself", with the left hand bass played on the same manual. I must admit that if this is indeed the historically correct way to perform a "flute" movement I cannot get myself to like it much. So what I use for the solo part here is a Silbermann eight-foot principal drawn together with a quint (twelfth). This combination yields a pleasant flute-like sound at ordinary pitch (the same as written). The other reason for doing a second recording was a degree of unhappiness with the earlier one (beyond, perhaps, the degree of unhappiness with which I upload ALL my organ videos). Concerning the older recording of voluntary #1, it is sufficiently effective, to my mind, to keep me from taking it off the net again. But I used to feel the slow movement is a bit rushed. And the fast movement, performed quite fast on that occasion, contains a wrong note where I accidentally touched the wrong key along with the right one. Normally this would simply mean redoing the piece. But I find this particular allegro extremely difficult to play without mistakes. There are frequent jumps in both hands -- non-adjacent notes, sufficiently far apart to afford plentiful opportunities for alighting on the wrong key. (Once being enough to spoil the recording, the incentive to do so can become overwhelming, especially as the final bars are coming into sight.) Moreover both articulation and ornaments are difficult to get just right every time and all the time. The yearning for perfection might well lead me on a wild goose chase, at least until I get much better at handling semi-virtuosic passages and/or nerves of steel. So I uploaded that earlier version anyway. Of course I was determined that there should be no wrong note in the new version. There is not. Still. The allegro looks straightforward enough (the music as printed in the original edition is in the video) but really is not, to me anyway. Take articulation. Goodwin offers no help here. In fast passages there can be no legato except of course for the semiquavers. But if you do not play legato, exactly HOW LONG should a crotchet or quaver be? On the organ (as opposed to the harpsichord or piano) you can make them quite short, playing almost staccato, or you can make them longer, giving the piece a more lyrical character -- alternatives that are starker with this flutey registration than if you use a cornet or reed stop. Nor, of course, should every crotchet or quaver necessarily have the same length as every other one. Or take tempo. What you get here is a version that is more at the lyrical end of the spectrum, played at moderate speed. If you feel this is really on the slow side for an "allegro" I will agree with you. But not only is there a body of opinion (and some evidence) that 18th-c. performers may well have played and sung more slowly on average than we are used to now. I also actually recorded the allegro twice, registered the same but with the other version considerably faster. This sounds great at the beginning, but becomes less and less convincing as the piece goes on. After this experiment it seems clear to me that really this movement is not meant to be played particularly fast. I am still far from entirely happy with it and wish I could tweak a note here and another there. I catch myself thinking, maybe this WOULD sound best if I could make it sound practically like a MIDI (i.e., computer-generated) performance rather than a live performance. a_osiander(at)gmx.net / www.andreas-osiander.net

• published: 01 Sep 2015
• views: 46