RECORDS FROM AMERICA *POULENC: FRANCK. Concerto in G minor for Organ, String Orchestra and Timpani. E. Power Biggs (organ) with Columbia Symphony Orchestra (Richard Burgin). Pre-, lude, Fugue and Variation, Op. x8. Piece Heroique. E. Power Biggs (organ). Columbia 1■114329 (12 in.).

*F. POWER BIGGS RECITAL. WESLEY: Air and Gavotte. MOZART: Adagio for Glass Harmonica. LOUIS COUPERIN : Chaconne. MOZART: Prelude on the Ave Verum Corpus. MILHAUD : Pastorale. MULET : Toccata. Westminster Suite (arr. Biggs). E. Power Biggs (organ). Columbia ML4331 (12 in.). These records are not available in this country.

The partnership of organ and orchestra is always a somewhat uneasy one—even a friendly organ never seems to know its own strength—and works for this medium are few and far between. It is something of a surprise to see so urbane a composer as Poulenc toying with this potentially dangerous combination, and even more (recalling some of the embarrassingly trivial stuff he has produced) bringing off a lengthy work of coherence and serious purpose : it is indeed the only large-scale composition of his I know which is not let down by the quality of his invention. Written in 1938 (and still, I believe, unheard in this country), the Organ Concerto is in one continuous movement though made up of several short sections (beginning and ending with a dramatic andante which looks back over its shoulder at Bach) bound together by a four-note motto. As far as can be gathered without a score, the performance is a good one, though the ear becomes a little fatigued with the prevailing high level of dynamics in the greater part of the work. The balance of the organ and orchestra is unusually successful, and the recording outstandingly good.

So far as the rest of this collection goes, indeed, the recording is about the best part of it, and I can honestly say that these discs (taken, I understand, in the Symphony Hall in Boston) represent the finest recording I have heard of this unwieldy and treacherous instrument. That said, however, I cannot truthfully declare that I derived very much pleasure from these performances: Mr. Biggs uses some singularly aggressive solo reed stops (as in the Franck Prelude, Fugue and Variation) and often over-colours his registration (as in the semiquavers in the last section of that same work) ; his rhythmic sense is by no means always impeccable (as in the Byrd Pavane and Purcell Trumpet Tune) ; and I deplore his taste in rejecting, like a vulgar Italian tenor, fr and pp markings (as in the Franck Piece Herolque and the Mulct Toccata) in favour of something which will ipater les bourgeois. The Westminster Suite, described indifferently as " English music arranged for the organ by E. Power Biggs " and " English music for the organ arranged by E.P.B."—though, in English at least, the two don't mean the same—consists of snippets of Purcell, the Byrd Pavane for the Earle of Salisbury, and the Agincourt Song, attributed without a shred of evidence to Dunstable. The " recital " of short pieces is the most stylish of these collections : it is a pity that this particular disc is labelled like a two-headed penny.

L.S.