Building on topics discussed in previous films, Jeremiah Stephenson moves from discussing works conceived with organ accompaniment, to choral works with orchestral accompaniment which have to be played from piano transcriptions.

Jeremiah Stephenson explores the art of choral accompaniment in depth with the aim of providing a framework for you to make your own judgements, and a stimulus to explore fully the possibilities that each organ provides for imaginative accompaniment.

Jeremiah Stephenson discusses and illustrates ways in which the piano accompaniments in the vocal scores of Viennese Mass settings by composers such as Haydn, Mozart and Schubert can be adapted in order to make them effective and practical when played on the organ.

Magnus Williamson recounts the archival and archeological detective work that has taken place at Lincoln Cathedral, in conjunction with the Byrd quatercentenary.  By bringing the building in line with post-Restoration practice in 1702, the Dean and Chapter also ended a spatial arrangement which had once generated the rich pre-Reformation tradtions of organs and voices in ‘alternatim’.  The characteristics of the building, and their musical implications, are probed in detail.

Do you know of some good, under-used words from Christian hymnody that need new music? Organists’ Review magazine, with the IAO, have launched a competition for a newly-composed hymn tune.

The Coronation Service at Westminster Abbey on 6 May combined music from 350 years of church and royal tradition with many new commissions, all personally selected by The King.

Jeremiah Stephenson shares ideas on how to practise improvisation and develop the keyboard harmony reflexes to improvise on hymn tunes. 

David Pipe explores the musical styles which are part of the weekly repertoire of Catholic church musicians, with advice on accompanying responsorial psalms, hymns, and worship songs.

David Baker describes how music at Halifax Parish Church had been in decline until twenty-seven-year-old John Varley Roberts was appointed in late 1868, and transformed the choir at Halifax from a small, mixed group of voices up in the west gallery with an outmoded organ to a choral establishment of some seventy robed male singers in the chancel, accompanied by a four-manual instrument.