Franck, C: Pièce pour Grand Orgue

Alongside the Three Pieces, the Six Pieces and the Three Chorales that constitute the body of Franck’s organ works, there is also an entire series of organ works dating from Franck’s youth. These pieces, the majority of which exist only in manuscript, were published after Franck’s death by his son.

These works, often small in scale and clearly intended for organists to use during services, form an impressive collection. Even though the influences of his teachers and models are clearly to be heard, a fair proportion of these works already bear the stamp of the mature composer and pater seraphicus.

After the successful release of César Franck’s complete organ works on 3 double SACDs audite now presents these recordings in a 6-CD boxed set. This complete edition naturally includes the 12 major well-known works of this composer. In addition to these, it contains many smaller treasures of the repertoire among them at least 40 minutes of music which were presented as first recordings in the original SACD release: The works for harmonium are available here in their entirety in their versions for organ, as are two organ works discovered during the 1970s and 1980s, also new to the recording medium. Besides these aspects of completeness, the present complete production is marked by the special sound of the Goll Organ. Its warm, soft sound, resulting from widely constructed pipes, creates an unobtrusive power and fullness; the essence of the French Cavaillé Organs has been preserved and further developed in this instrument.

Hans-Eberhard Roß, Cantor of the Deanery St. Martin in Memmingen, was decisively and authoritatively involved in the planning and disposition of this organ. Interested music lovers can call up the exact registrations of all the pieces from www.audite.de simultaneously with this issue, as well as short videos about the construction of the organ. The 64pp bilingual booklet gives detailed information about this production.