Organ virtuoso Richard Unfried[¹] reviews Jung-A Lee’s Private Organ Recital

Organ virtuoso Richard Unfried[¹] reviews Jung-A Lee’s Private Organ Recital in Walt Disney Concert Hall.

For the concert or recording organist, the bench of the Glatter Götz/Rosales pipe organ’s stage console in the Walt Disney Concert Hall must be, like its theme park namesake, “The Happiest Place on Earth.” It is hard to imagine a finer instrument, and it inspires more than one’s best performance from all who play it.

Jung-A Lee is no stranger to this organ, having released her first recording on it (Amazing Grace) in 2015. She is also seasoned in the art of conquering larger pipe organs through her extensive concertizing around the globe.

The recording session for A Private Organ Recital was attended by fifteen lucky people including the executive producer and underwriter, his select guests, and the recording technicians. While some of the twelve tracks on the CD are take one, Jung-A asserts that no track went beyond three takes. Most delightful to this reviewer is the authenticity of the tracks. All were recorded straight through, no corrections, no cut and paste, no editing. One has to laud the musicianship, technic, and stamina of one who can deliver twelve “correct” tracks in one session with so few takes. Jung-A is so comfortable in her performance that one can sense and enjoy the fun in her music.

The Walt Disney Concert Hall organ was designed for a great auditorium, not a cathedral. Accordingly, Yasuhisa Toyota’s superb acoustics that serve the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra so well suit this organ equally well. A rehearing of Jung-A’s 2015 CD suggests a microphone placement from the front center of the stage.

For her new project, Jung-A and the producer wanted a tighter more intimate sound and they were successful. At first hearing, the pipes of the primary keyboard, which organists call the “Great,” have a pleasing “in your face” immediacy. The pipes of the other three keyboards benefit from the refinement of distance, and reveal Disney Hall’s larger acoustic space.  These details fade from one’s awareness, however, as the magnificent beauty of the Glatter Götz/Rosales organ and Jung-A Lee’s superb artistry overwhelm the listener in a most delightful recording.

The album features twelve tracks providing a comprehensive tour of the organ, covering four centuries of organ repertoire. Two pieces, tracks 1 and 10, were commissioned for this recording in honor of Simon Woods, new CEO at the Los Angeles Philharmonic Orchestra.

For appropriate American bookends, the CD begins with Adam Knight Gilbert’s Woods and Brooks, and ends with a set of variations on the national anthem by the late nineteenth century New Englander, Dudley Buck.

1. Adam Knight Gilbert has truly achieved a Renaissance flavor in Woods and Brooks. As you become familiar with it, you might enjoy tracking how the composer creates short melodic elements to commemorate the names Woods, Brookes, Isabel, Barnaby, and Los Angeles Philharmonic. The key is included in the album notes. The several bird calls created by the Pajaritos stop (similar to the “Nightingale” stop on other organs) are also a delight.
2. Jung-A sounds quite at ease in Bovet’s Hamburger Totentanz which manages to grab the listener’s interest in spite of the rhythmic figure that repeats relentlessly throughout. Once you are on board with it, Bovet tosses in clear melodic references to the Barcarolle (Tales of Hoffman), Beethoven’s Für Elise, and the sailor’s chorus (Flying Dutchman). Could there be humor in the third reference as one begins to wonder “how could this piece end?” . . . but it does!
3. Carillon de Westminster may be Louis Vierne’s best known work as its famous melody is familiar to anyone who has ever heard a chime clock. It requires frequent crescendo and decrescendo effects from the organ. Violinists create a crescendo by bowing more heavily, wind players blow harder, and pianists strike their keys harder. Organists can do none of that. Instead, a complete organ has the pipes of at least one keyboard in a box with Venetian Shutters the size of your bedroom wall on the audience side. The Glatter Götz/Rosales organ has the pipes of two keyboards (Swell and Positive) separately so enclosed. Pipe organ technology allows the organist to move these shutters quickly and with ease while playing, as you will hear in Jung-A’s performance. One can imagine hearing the great bells in the distance as you walk, even dance, toward them in a long crescendo to a thrilling climax as you arrive at the cathedral entrance.
4. Titles of organ pieces in the French Baroque era were usually quite instructive. First, Elevation: Tierce en Taille was intended to accompany the moment in the mass when the priest raises the chalice or Host (Elevation). Second, the melody should be played on a combination of stops capped by one pitched two octaves and a third above the note played (“Tierce”), and the melody is placed in the tenor (“en Taille”) octave of the keyboard. Although many of the notes are written with “equal” rhythmic values, organists of the era often injected a stylish uneven quality. Jung-A presents this “notes inégales” effect as well.
5. If you are thinking you would like to hear the Bovet piece again, Buxtehude’s Ciacona in C Minor may do the trick. The theme, usually in the bass, is repeated throughout. The hands provide well-crafted variations above, each with its own tone colors culminating in a grand full organ.
6. Miroir is cleverly placed right after the Ciacona. After hearing a repeated bass theme in the Ciacona, you may have wondered “what if the repetition technique were applied to the right hand part instead?” Ad Wammes provides a satisfying answer. Perhaps a more challenging piece technically than one might think, Jung-A again performs with ease.
7. A beloved barn burner, Toccata by John Weaver could work equally well for brass. Reed stops, the organ’s brass equivalents, are thus appropriate here. We are indebted to French organists who since the late nineteenth century have reveled in the sound of brilliant brass toned stops enclosed in the previously mentioned expression boxes. Harnessing the bright sound and great power of the reed stops behind closed shutters provides what is often called a “swarm of bees in a barrel” effect. Jung-A uses this sound effectively here and elsewhere.
8. Jung-A certainly captures the fleeting spirit of youth suggested by Sweelinck’s title Mein junges Leben hat ein End. She initially expressed concern that the large modern Glatter Götz/Rosales organ would overwhelm this early seventeenth century theme and its five variations. Not to worry. The Disney organ serves the piece well, as do her varied and clear registrations.
9. Johann Sebastian Bach’s Prelude in B Minor is the great master’s only work on this recording. Jung-A achieves a clear and at times dance like quality. Her choice of 16’ pedal reed from the four available gives the bass line of the plenum passages a very satisfying solidity and rich trombone like timbre without overpowering the contrapuntal texture.
10. Blessed Assurance is the second new piece commissioned for this CD. Jung-A presents a three stanza A-B-A work on the beloved gospel song. We can hear the softer and more lush string tones of this beautiful instrument in the second stanza (B). The first and last stanzas (A) feature roulade-like up and down runs in the hands over the soprano range melody played in the foot pedals. She reaches back to an earlier era in this melodic use of the pedals, as does Adam Knight Gilbert in track one. Primitive one manual organs can still be found in Italy where one or two small blocks of wood hinged to the floor are connected by a thin leather strap to one or two keys up on the bass end of the manual. Holding a bass note with the foot allowed more freedom for the fingers in the early seventeenth century. Playing a complete soprano melody with the feet was an even greater motivation for developing an extended chromatic pedal keyboard. One wonders how Jung-A achieves a lyric quality in the pedal melody while her hands fly all over the place. Jung-A makes numerous harmonic ventures, most notably just before the end.
11. In Olivier Messiaen’s programmatic Les Anges from his La Nativité suite, we can easily imagine the fluttering of angels’ wings. But with closer microphone placement, we might say “The angels have landed!” The expression shutters provide a nice fade away at the end.
12. Most Americans may hear only a single stanza of the Star Spangled Banner, often in a sports venue, and then lasting little more than a minute. To hear it treated many times so beautifully over nearly thirteen minutes, in both contemplative and triumphant moods, on such a monumental organ is an emotional experience for many.

—Richard Unfried, Professor of Music Emeritus, Biola University

[1] Professor Richard Unfried, organist at the Crystal Cathedral also served 21 years with the Robert Schuller Ministries.  Professor Unfried is Professor of Music Emeritus, Biola University.