David Yearsley: Handel's Organ Banquet
False Azure Records

As reported by American organist and scholar David Yearsley, George Frideric Handel (1685-1759) was regarded by his contemporaries as "one of the greatest organists of his or any time.” Yet Yearsley also notes that the composer “left only a slender volume of solo organ music and these pieces are for hands alone.” Why? Because the organs of his adopted country England were almost universally without “a keyboard for the feet.” The foundation of the German organist's art, by comparison, was the pedal, such that in a given work the separate parts played by the left and right feet might couple with contrapuntal patterns produced by the hands. Yet while Handel was accustomed to playing organs with pedalboards in Germany, when he moved to London in 1710 only the organ at St. Paul's Cathedral had a pedalboard and a smaller one than those in Germany. One of the major attractions of Yearsley's seventy-minute Handel feast is therefore the presence of pedal parts, the result four-limbed performances that make the most of the resources afforded him by Munetaka Yokota's 2010 Baroque organ at Cornell University's Anabel Taylor Chapel.

Yearsley's well-qualified for the project. An award-winning performer and respected author, he's issued recordings of, among other things, J. S. Bach's organ trio sonatas and written a number of books about the composer, including (no surprise) Bach's Feet: the Organ Pedals in European Culture (2012). He's also a music critic for the Anderson Valley Advertiser and the Herbert Gussman Professor of Music at Cornell University. While he focuses on Handel alone on the release, Yearsley's selections are inspired, including as they do Messiah and opera excerpts, the Trio Sonata in F, Concerto in G minor/G major, and even an improvisation on Handel's most famous chorus, “Hallelujah,” to round things off. Yearsley's background imbues these performances with authority and authenticity that when partnered with the glorious timbres of the Anabel Taylor organ make for a sumptuous listen.

The album begins with the “Sinfony” that opens Messiah, the overture, in Yearsley's words, stern, lofty, trill-ornamented, and eventually blended with a fugue from a Handel harpsichord suite. The sound of the organ is magnificent, its textures thick, glorious, and resonant, and presented with clarity. After that grandiose overture, the graceful aria “As with rosy steps, the morn" from the 1750 oratorio Theodora is tackled, the tone of the chorale gentler and the slower tempo facilitating an enhanced appreciation of the arrangement's contrapuntal design. Another choral-like aria from Theodora, “Lord, to Thee, each night and day,” includes a right-foot addition by Yearsley to complement the left's original bass line. Bookending a central section featuring the turbulent evocation of an earthquake and thunderstorm are lyrical episodes of a more serene persuasion. From Handel's first London opera Rinaldo (1711) comes “Lascia ch'io pianga” (Let me weep), the restrained nuance of the arrangement beautifully tailored to amplify the mournfulness of the material. In stark contrast, the anthemic opening chorus of “O praise the Lord with one consent” builds towards a contrapuntal climax “in which the feet run wild again.”

In their multi-part presentations, the Trio Sonata in F and Concerto in G minor/G major cover an immense amount of stylistic and tonal ground. In the former, a stately “Largo” leads into triumphant “Allegro – Adagio” and “Allegro” movements before ultimately resolving with a delightful “Menuet: Allegro moderato.” The concerto sets sail with a dramatic “Larghetto, e staccato” before brightening with a radiant “Allegro” and easing into a calming “Adagio” and singing “Andante.” Elsewhere, the Passacaille in G, derived from a Handel quartet, appears here as a trio with each hand taking a part and the pedal as the bass line. Near the album's end Yearsley returns to Messiah for an adaptation of its final “Amen” chorus as a valedictory “Fuga in D.” Listening to this recording, one can't help but be convinced by Yearsley's assessment of the organ as “the instrument of instruments—a symphony unto itself.”

January 2025