Louis Vierne Organ Symphonies op. 28 & op. 32 Complete Organ Symphonies • Vol. 2

Excellent interpretation and performance by organist Hans-Eberhard Roß. The super-audio sound is riveting and filled with clarity. The Goll Organ (1998) of St. Martin, Memmingen, Germany, although not of the French romantic symphonic Cavailla-Coll organ pedigree, is well suited for this music: the tone coloring and power, and the venue are just right. I have other recordings of these organ symphonies, but this set is my favorite. Highly recommended.

This is the second volume in a three-disc project to record the six organ symphonies of Louis Vierne (1870-1937). Hans-Eberhard Ross, since 1991 choirmaster of the deanery of St Martin in Memmingen (Bavaria), plays the four-manual 1998 Goll organ there.

At the beginning of his interpreter’s notes in the booklet Ross quotes Vierne to the effect that he had in mind the instrument and ambience of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris for his organ compositions. Vierne was organist there from 1900 until he died. A few lines later, Ross is highly critical of recordings of Vierne on opulent Cavaille-Coll instruments in cathedrals with too much reverberation. Even if this contradicts the composer’s stated ideal, Ross does have a point. In Marie-Claire Alain’s 1989 recording of the first four Vierne symphonies at the Cavaille-Coll organ at St Stephen’s Abbey in Caen (Erato), to name but one example, a good deal of contrapuntal detail is inaudible in the overwhelming cloud of reverberation. What good is compositional detail if the listener can’t hear it? Ross’s mission is to rectify this in the present series of recordings, and not everyone will agree on whether he has managed that.

Donald Metz reviewed the first volume of this series (Audite 92674; March/April 2013) and remarked on Ross’s more clinical approach to the music in comparison with other recordings. Describing the present performances as clinical would be too severe. Ross achieves his aim of making nearly every detail of the music audible, and while his performances may not be quite heart-on-sleeve, I find them far from dispassionate or insensitive. The organ itself combines darkness with clarity in a room with a four-second reverberation that imparts warmth without obscuring the part writing. The instrument may not have the passionate character of Cavaille-Coll at his best, but it is not worlds removed from it. Ross also takes a somewhat free approach to registration in the interest of clarity, but generally reproduces the composer’s intended tone colors.

Un Vieme cuisiné comme on nous rôtirait magnifiquement une poularde pour l'enduire ensuite de marshmallow: le sublime y jouxte le débile. Quoique plastronnant sur l'usage de l'Urtext, Hans-Eberhard Ross adapte allègrement les registrations de l'auteur. Soit. Vieme lui-même l'autorise et l'orgue de Memmingen sonne merveilleusement ainsi. Non moins allègrement, il jette aux orties le legato auquel Vierne était tant attaché. Au nom de l'acoustique. Soit. Mais quid lorsque, de l'acoustique, on n'entend pas grand-chose?

Quid? Une Cantilène (de la Symphonie n° 3) et une Romance (de la n° 4) extatiques, parmi les plus belles de la discographie; des mouvements centraux (Scherzo et Menuet) jamais caricaturaux ni récréatifs, clefs de voûte d'une grande forme irréprochablement tenue. Un finale de l'Opus 28 pétaradant et caracolé, un peu vulgos façon O.K. Corral. Un Allegro de l'Opus 32 dont l'articulation implacable rend, pour une fois, l'écriture très convaincante. Ces beautés nous rapprocheraient de l'or ... Mais voilà: il y a aussi le finale de la Symphonie n° 4, haché menu comme chair à pâté, et surtout le Maestoso initial de la n° 3. Là, l'interprète s'est trompé de programme et nous balance, à la décrochez-moi-ça, une espèce de boléro de concert avec castagnettes et plumes dans le paf. Extravagance incompréhensible au regard du reste, et véritablement trop grotesque pour qu'on vous recommande ce disque sans un grain de très gros sel.

An exciting release that embraces all the drama, quirkiness and transcendent beauty of Vierne's huge organ Symphonies. Ross's brilliant playing is captured in good sound.

The six organ symphonies of Louis Vieme naturally fall into the repertoire of such works by French composers, but they constitute a 'set' (albeit in some respects an unfinished one) far more readily put together as a sequence than any other. They virtually demand being heard as a major series of works in sequence, and I hope that at some point a dedicated organist will play all six in one recital This is because, from the start, they were planned as such: Vierne's six organ symphonies are each in a minor key, the rising sequence – Bach-like, as in the Clavierübung – being D minor, E minor, F sharp minor, G minor, A minor and B minor. Vierne was unable to complete the Seventh, in C minor, for which only sketches survive.

Of the six symphonies, only the first is in six movements – the others are all in five. In discussing the first volume of Hans-Eberhard Roß’s set in February 2013, I explained the multi-movement form of French organ symphonies, which I shall not repeat here, but what is remarkable in this sequence of extended works is the variety which Vierne brings to each multi-movement plan. He never 'repeats' himself in structuralization or emotional juxtaposition, and the result is – despite a certain macro-thematicism which tends to run throughout all six symphonies – that each work is quite different from its fellows, yet at the same time seems to 'belong' to the set.

It is a facet of large-scale integration of contrasts, which in my opinion has never received the musicological attention it deserves, but which these recordings in progress from this organist via Audite makes eminently worthwhile and practical.

Vierne was virtually sightless, and suffered greatly in his personal and professional life; the first element means that it is only quite recently that reliable editions of his works have appeared (he was considerably disadvantaged in checking proofs prior to publication and was often emotionally discouraged from dealing with practical matters). Although the symphonies were composed with the sounds of the great Cavaillé-Coll instrument at Notre-Dame very much in mind, the music in each symphony is sufficiently varied as to afford the performer with a number of choices, which in this case Roß explains in detail – at the same time as exhibiting his own love for and understanding of this music.

Thus it is that we have performances of these fine works which are compelling throughout. Particularly, the account of the great Adagio in the Third Symphony (arguably Vierne's masterpiece), shot through with deeply expressive invention, is very moving here, especially as the composer's individuality is strong and quite original, as we hear in the handful of recordings he made himself.

Roß’s accounts are consistently very good indeed: the main facet of his interpretative ability is that he brings out the character of each movement in both symphonies as well as relating them to the overall larger structure. This is a rare and noble quality, achieved through an integration of tempos as subtle use of registration – in the Third Symphony through relating the Adagio and the toccata-like finale, and in the Fourth (over which looms the shadow of the recently broken-out war) through thematic, cyclical, integration (César Franck was Vierne's teacher, albeit briefly) rather than emotional character (the variety in the first three movements is astonishing).

Apart from the committed intelligence of this fine player, the recording quality here is quite splendid, and this second volume deserves a strong recommendation to set alongside its predecessor.

Hans-Eberhard Roß, der Memminger Kirchenmusikdirektor, hat seinen Zyklus aller sechs Orgelsinfonien von Louis Vierne (1870 – 1937) fortgesetzt. Nun liegen die dritte und vierte Orgelsinfonie, komponiert in Viernes Sommerferien 1911 und 1914 vor – eingespielt natürlich wieder an der wandlungsfähigen Goll-Orgel von St. Martin in Memmingen. In der Entstehungszeit der Werke war der nahezu blinde Vierne Organist an Notre Dame in Paris, also an einem Instrument von Aristide Cavaillé Coll, jenem französischen Orgelbaumeister, der mit seinen technischen Neuerungen die Vielfarbigkeit spätromantischer und symphonischer Orgelwerke geradezu befördert hat. Widor, der Gattungsbegründer der Orgelsinfonie, profitierte davon – und dann sein Schüler Vierne, den Hans-Eberhard Roß mit Transparenz als Interpretationsprinzip, aber auch mit einer leuchtenden Mystik erklingen lässt.