Sep 2011
VARIOUS - Organ Spectacular (Triple CD)
September 2011 Review (Available from ORGANS.co.uk)
This release is a bit of a whopper as it's a triple CD set and the second organ release from a company called 'Yesteryear', who specialise in nostalgic recordings. Their first organ release (that I am aware of anyway) was a Reginald Dixon triple CD released in 2009. Dates of the recordings aren't mentioned, but they seem to mainly date from the 1930s-1950s (with the odd exception such as the single Klaus Wunderlich track which is much later). As with a lot of these compilations there doesn't seem to have been much research into what tracks have been released on CD before, so many aren't new to the digital domain. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
Phil Kelsall - Waltzing In The Clouds
September 2011 Review (Available from ORGANS.co.uk)
Now from a sampled theatre organ, to the real thing in a real venue, the Blackpool Tower to be precise. This is Phil Kelsall's follow up to last years "Welcome To My World" CD which was released to celebrate seventy-five years of the Blackpool Wurlitzer.
Phil was first appointed to the Tower Circus band in 1975, before becoming principal resident organist when Ernest Broadbent retired in 1977. He received his M.B.E. for services to music last year, so he therefor knows his market very well and always aims to please with his usual relaxed playing and good tune list. This release is also for all you dancers out there as it's another strict-tempo one. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
Phil was first appointed to the Tower Circus band in 1975, before becoming principal resident organist when Ernest Broadbent retired in 1977. He received his M.B.E. for services to music last year, so he therefor knows his market very well and always aims to please with his usual relaxed playing and good tune list. This release is also for all you dancers out there as it's another strict-tempo one. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
Michael Wooldridge - Virtualoso
September 2011 Review (Available from ORGANS.co.uk)
From thirty-year old technology we move to the Twenty-first Century and the new release from Michael Wooldridge, which is his first CD for two years and his first theatre organ one since 2003. Now, I don't know if I should describe this as electronic or theatre, in fact I didn't know what section to list it on the website either, so I used my old motto, "If in doubt, list it in both".
The keyboards 'played' are a Roland Atelier AT-15 and Yamaha PSR-S900, but these aren't ever heard on the CD as they're just silent master keyboards linked to the computer and it's samples. The Atelier controls the pedals, accompaniment and great manuals and the Yamaha controls the solo manual. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
The keyboards 'played' are a Roland Atelier AT-15 and Yamaha PSR-S900, but these aren't ever heard on the CD as they're just silent master keyboards linked to the computer and it's samples. The Atelier controls the pedals, accompaniment and great manuals and the Yamaha controls the solo manual. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
Klaus Wunderlich - Sound Explosion! (Double CD)
September 2011 Review (Available from ORGANS.co.uk)
June 18th 2011 would have been Klaus Wunderlich's 80th birthday and to mark this special event Werner Kohlhammer and Bell Musik have produced this double CD set (their twenty-fourth Klaus release so far). This is another two-disc set and contains material from four LPs that were never intended for sale in High Street shops, only from Wersi dealerships & outlets, so they are in effect 'demonstration' recordings for the Wersi W248S & Helios W2S organs. The LPs which have been used are: "Wersitime vol.1", "Sound Explosion" & "Fascination vol.1 & 2". Because of the rarity of this material I think it will be new to many people, even Klaus' fans may not have all of these LPs in their collection. READ THE FULL REVIEW...
