# Organ concerto recordings



## Pmartel63 (Dec 9, 2020)

So I'm looking for complete period performances of organ concerti by Albinon, Bach and Handel

Thus far I only see recordings for Albinoni by I Musici (I think) on Philips, and have an erato set of the Handel which sadly is dreadfully performed and almost sounds like elevator music, I know there are period Bach performances and als always your input is apprecaite


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## Anooj (Dec 5, 2021)

Trevor Pinnock’s recordings of Handel’s organ concerti are really good


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

Is the Erato the one with Koopman? I found this pretty good. My favorite is Tachezi/Harnoncourt but it's only opp.4+7 and two more concertos on a different disc (different issues, once as filler for water music), so not as complete as many other recordings.
Another relatively famous 1970s HIP effort (with some noises from mechanisms) is Chorzempa/Schröder on Philips. 
A "safe" (not adventurous) choice is Preston/Pinnock (Archiv)


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## RobertJTh (Sep 19, 2021)

With Handel's organ concerto there's the problem that some performers choose a large organ with inflates the music and sounds unidiomatic - or go for the opposite and play everything on a tiny portable organ that doesn't have the necessary presence.
There's a nice modern and inexpensive set on Brilliant Classics which I own, with Christian Schmitt and the Stuttgart Chamber orchestra conducted by Nicol Matt. That one walks the middle ground: a medium sized 2 manuals organ, not disproportionally big, but with enough volume and variety in color.


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## Pmartel63 (Dec 9, 2020)

Kreisler jr said:


> Is the Erato the one with Koopman? I found this pretty good. My favorite is Tachezi/Harnoncourt but it's only opp.4+7 and two more concertos on a different disc (different issues, once as filler for water music), so not as complete as many other recordings.
> Another relatively famous 1970s HIP effort (with some noises from mechanisms) is Chorzempa/Schröder on Philips.
> A "safe" (not adventurous) choice is Preston/Pinnock (Archiv)


The one I have is with Marie-Claire Alain and Jean -Francois Paiilard
It's okay, but oh the strings are so 'elevator music'


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## Kreisler jr (Apr 21, 2021)

Yes, that's the early 60s style. I think you would improve on this recordings with almost any of the others mentioned so far. Just try samples, at least some of the recordings recommended were also (partly) available as cheap twofers, trios or one disc selections.

Bach didn't really write any full concerto for organ and orchestra; the closest is an organ version of the famous d minor keyboard concerto because in the cantata 146 there is an organ version of the first movement. There are recordings of this one and also some of the other keyboard concertos with organ but I don't know any I'd recommend. The other Bach "organ concerti" are arrangements of concerti by Vivaldi and others for solo organ; they are very nice but without orchestra and mostly in mixed organ anthologies, so I cannot really recommend a single or double disc either, but they are findable.


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## RobertJTh (Sep 19, 2021)

Kreisler jr said:


> Bach didn't really write any full concerto for organ and orchestra; the closest is an organ version of the famous d minor keyboard concerto because in the cantata 146 there is an organ version of the first movement.


There's also a realisation of the unfinished concerto BWV 1059 (based on the arrangement in the cantata BWV 32) for organ and orchestra, played by Ton Koopman as a "filler" on his Brandenburg Concerto collection. It sounds pretty spectacular.


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