Gail Archer: Cantius
Meyer Media

Cantius, Gail Archer's tenth release, is a fine addition to the American organist's discography. The concluding chapter in her Eastern European trilogy, the sixty-five-minute collection features material by Polish composers of the nineteenth to twenty-first centuries, of the six Henryk Mikolaj Gorecki (1933-2010) the one probably most familiar to Western audiences. The album title fittingly references St. John Cantius, a popular saint in Poland, and was itself recorded at Chicago's St. John Cantius Church with Archer playing the 1926 Casavant organ. When not developing and recording album projects, Archer is the college organist at Vassar College, director of the music program at Barnard College, Columbia University, and a faculty member of Harriman Institute, Columbia University.

Her affection for the music on Cantius has been long gestating. In 2003, she played five summer concerts in different locations in Poland and has visited annually ever since to perform at organ recitals. Though her association with the country's traditions has sensitized her to how much its organ literature is grounded in the Roman Catholic faith, her set-list is deliberately broad in featuring a programme that includes “a living artist, a woman composer, and examples of romantic and contemporary works.” One comes away from Cantius with a newfound appreciation for the vitality of the organ music, past and present, originating from the country.

At the album's start, Improvisation on a Polish Hymn by Mieczyslaw Surzynski (1866-1924) makes good on its title by following a stately voicing of the chorale with imaginative variations, the Casavant organ's abundant range of timbres used to good effect early on. Wincenty Rychling (1841-1896) then makes a brief two-minute appearance with Pastorale in F# Minor, a gleaming, 6/8 setting that vividly alternates between major and minor modes. Excerpted from the First Suite for Organ, the ABA-structured Meditation-Elegie from Felix Borowski (1872-1956) begins with a haunting figure in E minor and then further tantalizes when it transitions to anthemic block chords for the central section.

In the first of two three-part works included on Cantius, Triptych for Organ by Pawel Lukaszewski (b.1968) packs ample activity into its ten-minute frame. Long, slow notes at the start of “Souvenir I” swell into rapidly alternating chords before peaceful resolution is achieved and the respectively tranquil and epic ruminations of “Offertorium” and “Icon” take over. The similarly titled Tryptychon for Organ by Tadeusz Paciorkiewicz (1916-98) caps the release with a rousing, circus-inflected “Introduction,” restlessly explorative “Meditation,” and suitably lively “Toccata.”

Though its title might suggest a longer, multi-part work, Symphony No. 8 for Organ by Felix Nowowiejski (1877-1946) is a single-movement, twelve-minute setting that progresses from triplets and sixteenth-note figures into a dramatic romantic expression. An ongoing shifting of its harmonic centre lends the piece an unstable, even at times queasy quality that holds the attention. In a piece that's more percussive in effect than melodic, Gorecki's Kantata for Organ catches the ear in opening with loud phrases that mutate as parts of the chord are subtracted and added to over the course of the alternately rumbling and simmering work. Also arresting the ear is Esquisse for Organ by Grazyna Bacewicz (1909-69) with its bold splashes of broken chords and devilish dance flourishes.

July 2022