Organ music recommendations (church and other pipe organs, not electric ones)

A while ago I bought this compilaton of French organ music recordings my Marie-Claire Alain, and it's been my jam for months! I particularly like her recordings of works by the Baroque composer Nicolas de Grigny, her brother Jehan Alain, and Maurice Duruflé (who is one of my favourite composers). The organ is the coolest live instrument besides the synthesizer!

What other organ compositions and recordings would you recommend? Religious and secular, solo organ and orchestral works, modern and early music, are all fine. Obviously there's Bach and Messiaen, I'm fairly familiar with them... And I really dig Saint-Saëns' organ symphony and Poulenc's concerto for organ and orchestra, but did those guys write some other cool shit for the organ? Also, any recommendations for Renaissance organ works are more than welcome, because I don't anything about organ music of those times.

I guess there must also be some non-classical/non-religious music for the pipe organ music around? I don't know anything about it, but I'd definitely be interested in examples of that too.

Some of my favorite music. Montserrat Caballe is a name you should check out.

I know who she is, but I thought she was an opera singer? Has she recorded religious/organ works?

sorry, hitting the wine early. I mean Montserrat Torrent.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montserrat_Torrent

Not well-schooled in this realm, but this comp is pretty wild and probably up your alley:

https://www.discogs.com/André-Isoir-Jean-Claude-Raynaud-Modern-French-Organ-Music/release/5045754

Tuomas, you have to listen to Dieterich Buxtehude! He preceded J.S. Bach & his organ works are pure otherworldly Baroque genius.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3YiCEBZWv0w

Buxtehude is one organ dude who I've been meaning to check out, any recommendations on recordings of his music? This recent box set looks like it might be a good choice?

(xpost, ha!)

Aine o'Dwyer's Music for Church Cleaners vol. i and ii is a modern solo organ recording that is very beautiful and unlike much else, she nicely utilises the church acoustics and you do hear the church cleaners as well.

That sounds cool, but apparently it's vinyl-only, plut it's out of print?

plut = plus

sorry if this is super-obvious, but vierne's third organ symphony and widor's fifth organ symphony are acclaimed classics of the genre (organ symphonies, in this context, are for organ alone and do not feature orchestral backing). i also like boellman's suite gothique.

i also have a nice compilation by hans-ola ericsson called "organ music from the usa" that has ives, cage, copland, etc., and is pretty good (i really like "adeste fideles in an organ prelude").

Yeah, those Vierne and Widor symphonies and the Boëllmann suite are included in the Marie-Claire Alain box I mentioned in the first post, they are all very cool!

i was listening to this today. i have hundreds of amazing organ records at my store and i'm kinda the only one who cares about them.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1Qxixombe0

I like that one 60s Swedish duo... Knusson + somebody (?).. Hammond and drums, funky stuff, there's a proto-drumnbass tune on their album with earth on the cover.

Oh this thread is just for classical, oops

The fraught thing about choosing organ recordings is that the instruments themselves vary 1000x more than pianos do, and the acoustics of different churches vary 1000x more than concert halls do, and there also seem to be strange styles of rubato in organ playing which take some adjusting to for me

http://retro.recordsale.de/cdpix/g/gerdzacher-mauriciokageljuanallende-blingyoergy-phantasiefuerorgelmitobbligatisonorite%281%29.jpg

Jon Gibson, "Cycles"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyZ68lzPiYU

Popol Vuh, "Vuh"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbQ1v-nCFjA

xp to Tuomas: I'm no expert but I totally love Bryndorf's Buxtehude recordings.

just randomly came across this one again, actually

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NlNL0Cc7tr4

There's a disc of koechlin's solo organ works I want to check out. Based on the character of his orchestral music and choral music I'm assuming he will be great at solo organ.

A second vote here for Aine o'Dwyer's Music for Church Cleaners; really lovely stuff. I was annoyed to find it was OP, but you can buy a download here: http://mie.limitedrun.com/products/537633-aine-odwyer-music-for-church-cleaners-vol-i-and-ii-2lp

Third vote for o'Dwyer; I reviewed it for The Wire. It's really beautiful stuff.

Hmm, I guess I could get that digital version then...

http://www.amoeba.com/sized-images/max/500/500/uploads/albums/covers/other//PeterMichaelHamel_Bardo.jpg

Did anybody mention Dolly Collins' work on portative organ?
It tends to be more accompinament to a song than lead instrument but is dashed fine.
Gets pretty psychedelic sounding in places on Power of The True Love Knot and Hangman's Beautiful Daughter but is acoustic.

Terry Riley's also good.

have any of dolly's compositions ever been recorded?

as it happens, currently listening to messiaen plays messiaen which is a blast!

Really recommend checking out Ligeti organ works. One piece (pretty sure it's Etude No 2) requires the organ to be powered by a vacuum cleaner to give it Lowe pressure. Player holds down empty keys with her arm to reduce airflow even further, rolling arm off keys to increase and decrease it, bending pitches of the sounding notes. Am I making sense? Anyway Google that stuff it good

Keith Jarrett's Spheres

The King's College Choir YT channel can be pretty good (outside of the obligatory Xmas music) but oh my stars, this recital with Thomas Trotter, playing works from Duruflé and Rachel Laurin (who I know nothing about) is absolutely stunning.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLBkWYLIMYs

Can't find excerpts online but if you want truly monstrous pipe organ sounds, look no further than Jean-Luc Guionnet's 2CD 'Non-Organic Bias'.

Klaus Lang's two 'Organ Works' volumes are excellent moody things.

This Finnish comp is great too:
https://open.spotify.com/album/1KOxkpBgLjMkrrWPfD1lep

Another one I've been hooked on lately is this odd, modernist take on works by Hildegard von Bingen for pipe organ and soprano voice, truly haunting thing from back in 1998 that I found by accident earlier this week: https://www.discogs.com/release/1274746-Hildegard-von-Bingen-Antiphona-Liturgie-F%C3%BCr-Gesang-Und-Orgel

excellent, thank you.