Fagus-Music.Com
Fagus-Music.Com
Geoffrey Atkinson - Editor
The following computer-set editions have all been critically acclaimed. In each case (except Greene) they are the first complete edition since their first appearance in the 18th. and early 19th. centuries. All have a substantial introduction and editorial notes which include details of the composers’ lives and their circumstances, historical perspectives, sources, editorial methods and commentaries.
Editions of Old English Organ Music
Thomas Adams was born nearly a generation after his friend and exemplar, Samuel Wesley. His organ music can be seen as the last flowering of the genre known as ‘Old English Organ Music’ that was to fade with the belated addition of a proper pedal department to the British instrument. The style is clearly mature and the ideas are beautifully worked with grace and polish. There is a masterful emphasis on counterpoint in these pieces and the counterpoint is all-pervasive and sometimes almost dazzlingly effortless; even non-fugal movements are full of dual themes carefully worked in imitation.
Adams was a virtuoso and his technical demands will often stretch even good players.
These volumes form part of a series which will in due course make available all Thomas Adams’s organ works
NB: Thomas Adams was born nearly a generation after his friend and exemplar, Samuel Wesley. Volume 1 is one of the final issues (the situation is at present unresolved since other material has been recently been uncovered at the British Library). Please don’t ask why Vol 1 is one of the last to be issued - it just happened that way. Here are some of Adams’s most inventive fugues. No 4 is quite outstanding and is offered here separately for those who don’t want to be overwhelmed by counterpoint. This is a magnificent piece of work, one plainly influenced by JSB of course, but none the worse for that.
| Volume 1 |
£15.00
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| Volume 2 |
£10.00 |
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Six Voluntaries dedicated to Samuel Wesley
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| Volume 3 |
£10.00 |
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Six Easy Voluntaries for Young Students
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| Volume 4 |
£10.00 |
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Grand Organ piece dedicated to Rev John Vane Three Organ Pieces dedicated to Vincent Novello
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| Volume 5 |
£12.00 |
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Six Pieces dedicated to Thomas Attwood
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| Volume 6 |
£11.00 |
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Voluntaries 1- 6 (c. 1828) (C)
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£11.00 |
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Twelve Voluntaries (nos 7-12 ) (B/C) (from a set consisting of 4 books of 3 voluntaries c.1828)
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| Volume 8 |
£12.00 |
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Miscellaneous Sets of Variations (B/C) A Rose Tree full in bearing - Adeste Fideles (B+)- Quant è Più Bella - Varied Theme and Fugues (Manuals only) Thomas Adams was born nearly a generation after his friend and exemplar, Samuel Wesley. This issue contains all of Adams’s sets of variations. ‘Adeste Fideles’ was made available earlier and will continue to be sold separately if required for £5.00. ‘A Rose Tree’ is an old Irish tune while ‘Quant è Più Bella’ is a melody taken from an opera by Paisiello which was also the theme of a set of variations by Beethoven.
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| Volume 9 |
£12.00 |
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Ninety Interludes (A/B) An extraordinarily useful collection of very short pieces for manuals only, varying in length from 4 to 16 bars, in all keys up to 4 sharps or flats in two series - 4/4 and 3/2. These pieces would be very useful in covering moments when a brief passage of music is desirable - e.g. at the receiving of the offering. Furthermore, for teachers and students they will be found to be very useful as exercises and practice in sight-reading, transposition, and the improvisation of variations and elaborations which might go no further at first than rendering parts of the bass on the pedals.
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| Volume 10 |
£15.00 |
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(B/C) This volume is thought to be final issue in the series and follows further truffle-hunting in the British Library. The Overture is a fine, vigorous, cheerful piece, well worth an occasional outing. The two fugues are an attempt to write in a quite ‘learned’ style but using popular material, whereas the Variations demonstrate that, despite appearances, Adams must have had a fine sense of humour with a section ‘in the crack’d clarinet style’ where the tune is presented off-key and distorted, in a manner quite unprecedented for 1822.
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Complete Edition of ‘Ten Voluntaries for Organ or Harpsichord’ (first published 1757-8)
(Oecumuse)
| Volume 1 (Nos. 1 - 5) | £12.00 |
| Volume 2 (Nos. 6 - 10) | £12.00 |
| Toccata (C) | £5.00 |
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(ed. by Geoffrey Atkinson) |
Gaston Bélier (1863-1938) was a student of Eugene Gigout at the Paris Conservatoire. He was organist at the Cathedral of Saint-Maclou Pontoise from 1892 to his death, and deputy organist at St. Ferdinand des Ternes in Paris from 1927. This edition has been made from a printed copy in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France in Paris. This is a dazzling show piece, and it is not quite as difficult as it may sound - as long as you can cope with Bachian ‘staircase’ descent passages in the pedals.
| Oh for a closer walk with God (A/B) | 1 copy £2.50 |
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(ed. by Geoffrey Atkinson) S or T solo, SATB Organ |
5+ each £2.00 |
A ‘golden oldie’ if ever there was one - old fashioned even in 1916 when it was published. Even 10 years ago it might have caused embarrassment. But times and tastes change and now this piece can be seen as a charming, most effective, and beautifully written anthem in a Stainer-ish idiom. Easy for all, but very rewarding and the grannies (they are people too) will love it.
Complete Edition of 'Twelve Voluntaries for Organ or Harpsichord' (first published 1779)
(Oecumuse)
| In one Volume | £12.00 |
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La Bèatitude - Dialogue à Deux Choeurs (1711) (B) |
£4.00 |
This is a splendid bit of Baroquery by a virtually unknown French composer. It is of course, given the date, for manuals only. Really lively with some wonderful harmonic scrunches, the editor has found this piece makes a fine start to a recital (to calm the nerves - no feet, you see) or a voluntary at any cheerful time of year.
Rondeau from Abdelazer (B) £3.00 (Arranged by Geoffrey Atkinson)
Yes, that piece again - the one made famous by Benjamin Britten when he used it as the theme for his ‘Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra’, and one which has cropped up in several different arrangements over the years. This version’s claim on your attention is that it has been recast as a Trumpet or Tuba solo, with ritornelli on the accompanying manual. It works very well like this.
Complete Edition of Organ Voluntaries
(Fagus-Music.Com)
| Volume 1 1804 (12 Voluntaries) | £22.50 |
| Volume 2 1812 (12 Voluntaries) (edited by Geoffrey Atkinson) and Voluntary in G (edited by Gillian Ward Russell) |
£22.50 |
John Travers (c.1703 - 1758)
Complete Edition of ‘Twelve Voluntaries for Organ or Harpsichord’ (first published 1769)
(Oecumuse)
| Volume 1 (Nos. 1 - 6) | £12.00 |
| Volume 2 (Nos. 7 - 12) | £12.00 |
Complete Organ Works
Organ Works Volume 1
(Oecumuse)
| Voluntaries OP.6 (1-6) | £15.00 |
Organ Works Volume 2
(Oecumuse)
| Voluntaries OP.6 (7.-12) | £15.00 |
Organ Works Volume 3
(Volumes 3-12 Fagus-Music.Com)
Voluntary in B flat dedicated to Thomas Attwood (No 1)
Voluntary in C minor dedicated to Thomas Adams (No 1)
Voluntary in G dedicated to Thomas Adams (No 2)
| In one Volume | £12.00 |
Organ Works Volume 4
A Short and Familiar Voluntary.
Voluntaries (3) dedicated to Drummer, Linley and Gauntlett
| In one Volume | £10.00 |
Organ Works Volume 5
6 Fugues with Introduction for Young Organists.
| In one Volume | £8.00 |
Organ Works Volume 6
6 Organ Voluntaries composed for the use of young organists..
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£8.00 |
Organ Works Volume 7
6 Voluntaries dedicated to John Harding
| In one Volume | £10.00 |
Organ Works Volume 8
6 Introducing Voluntaries and a loud Voluntary; Voluntary in B Flat
| In one Volume | £10.00 |
Organ Works Volume 9
12 Short Pieces with a Full Voluntary Added KO 617
Variations on 'Rue Brittania'
Variations on 'God Save the King'
| In one Volume | £15.00 |
Volume 9A
God Save The Queen KO 678
| In one Volume | £5.00 |
This one escaped notice when the Wesley complete edition was planned, and when we discovered that Jennifer Bate had recorded a piece that was not the same as ‘Variations on God Save the King’ (KO 623), research uncovered this set of variations. KO 678 which is in fact is somewhat superior to KO 623 which truthfully is a bit of a pot-boiler. This piece will be incorporated into all subsequent printings of Volume 9, but is here offered as a separate item at a special price, for all those who already have the complete Volume 9
Organ Works Volume 10
34 short pieces
| In one Volume | £15.00 |
Organ Works Volume 11
12 Miscellaneous Longer Voluntaries
(Unpublished in Wesley's lifetime)
| In one Volume | £15.00 |
Organ Works Volume 12
Grand Duet KO 604
Introduction to J.S. Bach Fugue in E flat for four hands KO 669,
Vincent Novello's arrangement of the Fugue for four hands
| In one Volume | £15.00 |
Piano Works
Two Piano Sonatas (C/D) £12.00
Piano Sonata in D Minor (Salomon) KO 705
Piano Sonata in C KO 753
| (The Christmas Carol, Varied as a Rondo, for the Piano Forte) KO 718 |
£6.00 |
(Edited with notes by Geoffrey Atkinson)
Sam’s organ music has been a huge seller ever since Barry Brunton started the process by issuing Volume 1 of what was to become the complete collected edition of the organ works. Sam also wrote a good deal of piano music, some which was of the pot-boiling tendency, aimed at a burgeoning market for popular piano music. Some of this music is however of the highest quality and in the next series if issues there will be included a volume of two outstanding and significant sonatas. No wild claims are made for the ‘Christmas Rondo’ but it is not negligible and has some interesting features and inventive counterpoint, and might be just the thing for a Christmas recital or soirée.
Other Works
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£12.00 £20.00 (Two Copies) |
Edited by Geoffrey Atkinson and Philip Olleson.
A twenty minute five movement work which will appeal to both recitalists and domestic devotees. Available in landscape format (Primo and Secondo on opposite pages), or Portrait (Primo and Secondo on same page).
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Sonata for Violin and Piano K0 508 |
£12.00 |
Edited by Philip Olleson.
A fine work for this medium. The instruments have equal partnership.
Choral Works
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£1.50 £1.00 (five copies or more) |
Arranged by Geoffrey Atkinson for SATB and Organ
The original is laid out for SAATTB; this arrangement re-distributes the vocal material, without significant loss, into a more practical version for the usual complement of voices, and adds an organ part (the use of which would have been understood). While brief (scarcely 2 minutes) it is absolutely magnificent in its celebration of the intervals of sevenths and ninths (melodically and harmonically); listened to ‘innocently’ one would assume it was work of Samuel’s son, Samuel Sebastian at his most exuberant, and written at least 30 years later that its actual date, 1827. The text of the motet in English is ‘Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedech’, and the arrangement was made to be sung at the installation of a new minister at a church in Aberdeen.
Last updated: 05 January 2020