Organ Masterclass with David Briggs

David Briggs had a private Masterclass at St. James' Cathedral with me, Manuel Piazza and Gerald Loo on Saturday, April 28th.

Manuel Piazza is an organ student at the University of Toronto and he is the Bevan Organ Scholar and the Organ Scholar at St. James' Cathedral. Gerald Loo is working towards his Fellowship Diploma of the Royal College of Organists.  He also plays at St. Paul's Bloor.
I was the most junior person there! But, I was invited because I take lessons at St. James with Ian Sadler.

We all worked on different things.

I worked on two pieces that I will be doing in my upcoming recital on Tuesday, May 8th at 1pm at St. James.

Manuel Piazza played Choral no. 2 in B minor by César Franck, 

And Gerald improvised a passacaglia.

We each had about 40 minutes of one-on-one instruction with David.

I played Choral Song By Samuel Sebastian Wesley and Gaelic Fantasy by Hans André Stamm.

For Choral Song, David recommended that I change some fingering and registration to make it more stylistically appropriate for a mid 19th century piece.

Gaelic Fantasy is a contemporary piece. It doesn't have dynamic markings or suggestions for registration so he recommended making the whole piece a giant crescendo. It is a piece that makes you want to dance and you will love the celtic themes and the crescendo just works. 

David suggested ways to make Manuel's piece more expressive. One way was by using rubato in a slightly different way. He also changed the registration to reflect the composer's intentions.

David is extraordinarily good at showing us such small things that make a huge difference. It is these details that make him such a good organist!

For Gerald's improvisation, David pointed out that you need to have a plan. You need to think about are the implied harmony and the variations that you might do. One specific thing he mentioned was that using thirds and sixths can help make it easier for the actual improvisation.

A special thank you to Robert Busiakiewicz, who organized the Masterclass and to David Briggs for being so patient!
Thank you!