Both the British and the Americans seem intent on re-discovering their countries' nineteenth-century composers. The Victorian era in both countries was a time when interest in concert music grew rapidly. The eventual bloom of world-class composers (for instance:
Elgar, Vaughan Williams, and Holst;
Ives, MacDowell, and Griffes) occurred in a garden prepared by the likes of the American composers Horatio Parker, Dudley Buck, W. Eugene Thayer, John Knowles Paine, and George E. Whiting, to name those represented on this disc of secular American organ music.
The works are all in standard academic forms, and for the most part the composers are German-trained. Four of them (all except Parker, b. 1863) were born within two years of each other from 1838 to 1840. The works are Buck's Grand Sonata in E flat, Thayer's Variations on the Russian National Hymn, Parker's Fugue Op. 36 No. 3, Paine's Fantasie on "A Mighty Fortress," and the Prelude, Op. 53, by Whiting.
While symphony orchestras and professional chamber performers were scarce at the time, one thing that America had plenty of was organs, not only church organs but home consoles owned by rich people.
The recording was made in St. Joseph's Old Cathedral, Buffalo, New York, an organ of the period (and not without mechanical and wind sounds, which are scarcely objectionable). The works are all interesting journeyman compositions, at the least. Although they are all a little too serious, there is some very good music here.
The playing, by Richard Morris, is committed, fluent, and apt, and Andrew Raeburn's recording is natural, if not spectacular.