Canticle of the Sun (St. Francis Suite) Richard Purvis 1913-1994
Mozart Changes Zsolt Gardonyi born 1946
Fantasia and Fugue in D Minor, Op. 19 Henry M. Dunham 1853-1929
Meditation Gustin Wright 1875-1954
2eme Symphonie (1-Allegro) Louis Vierne 1870-1937
Pavane Morton Gould 1913-1996
A Song of the Sea H. Alexander Matthews 1879-1973
from “Five Wayside Impressions in New England”
Program Notes
Richard Purvis, California organist and composer, bases his four-movement St. Francis Suite on a poem, ‘Laudes Creaturarum’ by St. Francis of Assisi, with sun, moon, wind, clouds, stars, water, fire, and earth praising the Lord. Canticle of the Sun begins with a fanfare, leading to a toccata with a broad melody in the pedal and arpeggios in the hands. The piece concludes with cadential chords typical of the chromatic harmonic language of Purvis.
Zsolt Gárdonyi, Hungarian composer, is a professor at the Würzburg Music School in Germany. His Mozart Changes, commissioned for the Oklahoma Mozart Festival in 1995, is a set of jazz variations on two themes of Mozart, taken from the last movement of the Sonata for Piano, KV 576. The composition moves smoothly from the Mozartean themes into the jazz-influenced harmonies.
Following these two lighter pieces of repertoire, we now hear three serious works for the organ.
Henry Dunham, New England composer and organist, was Professor of Organ and Director of the New England Conservatory in Boston. His Fantasia and Fugue in D Minor has a Brahmsian character in its harmonies and expressiveness. The Fantasia alternates unison arpeggios, from low to high, with dramatic chordal sections, and includes a cadenza for pedal solo, from single line to three-note chords. The lengthy Fugue is both lyrical and rhythmical, and concludes with a virtuosic two-page cadenza, connecting stylistically with the Fantasia.
Gustin Wright, about whom little is known, was from New Orleans. He spent time in France, where he was Honorary Organist of Beauvais Cathedral, President, Founder and Head of Orchestra of the ‘Societé César Franck,’ and Commander in the Pontifical Order of St. Gregory the Great. He returned to New Orleans. His only composition for the organ, published in 1910 by Orphée, shows the influence of French Romantic composers and is dedicated to Her Majesty Queen Elisabeth of Romania.
Louis Vierne, well-known composer and organist of the Cathedral of Notre-Dame in Paris, composed six symphonies for the organ, taking chromatic harmonic language and virtuosity to their limits. Symphonies for solo organ were written in a style similar to orchestral compositions of the time, with large scale, expressiveness, and drama. This was possible because of the French Romantic organ developed and built by the eminent builder, Aristide Cavaillé-Coll, with its reed choruses, the buildup of sound possible by coupling divisions of the organ together, and the mechanical controls. Imagine yourself in a French Gothic Cathedral while listening to the first movement of the five-movement symphony.
And again, we hear two lighter works to conclude the program.
Morton Gould was hired as staff pianist at Radio City Music Hall at the age of nineteen, led all the major American orchestras, served as President of ASCAP from 1986-1994, and received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005. The transcription of Pavanne from Symphonette No. 2 is a lyrical and lively gem.
H. Alexander Matthews moved from Cheltenham, England to the USA in 1900. His Five Wayside Impressions in New England were published in 1962. A Song of the Sea portrays both mild and stormy seas, includes a sea chanty, and is preceded by a brief poem-
“White fleecy clouds against a canopy of blue,
And wind-washed breakers leaping to reach the shore
In unbroken, rolling rhythm, Joyous, unrestrained.”
Biography of Rosalind Mohnsen
Rosalind Mohnsen, a native of Nebraska, was raised on a farm, attended one-room country schools, started piano with her mother at age five, sang duet performances with her sister, played French horn in the band, and filled in as church organist for her mother at the Lutheran Church. At the University of Nebraska, she received a Bachelor of Music in Education degree in piano, played bass in orchestra, and studied organ with Myron J. Roberts and Conrad Morgan. She enjoyed the State Capitol, as her grandfather was in the Nebraska Unicameral Legislature. At Indiana University, she earned a Master of Music degree and Performer’s Certificate in organ, studying with Robert Rayfield, and served as organist at the Congregational Church.
She was on the faculty of Westmar College in LeMars, Iowa, teaching organ and music history, serving as organist at the Methodist Church, and playing bass in the Sioux City Iowa Symphony. One year was spent studying with Jean Langlais in Paris. Now in the Boston, MA area, she has completed fifty years in Catholic church music, concertized for twenty-three national conventions of the Organ Historical Society, for the East Texas Pipe Organ Festival, and a national convention of the American Guild of Organists. She served as interim at the Cathedral of the Holy Cross in Boston and is a pianist in the Café of the Boston Symphony Orchestra. This is her first performance in South Carolina.