' I do like to be beside the seaside ' and Buxtehude's Prelude and Fugue in D major have very little in common except that both can be performed in their appropriate styles on the organ of the Royal Festival Hall.
In this film Simon Preston takes a chronological journey through the organist's repertoire, stopping en route to explain the various tonal devices, e.g., stops, manuals, and pedals, and sets out to show that the Royal Festival Hall organ needs to be a thousand instruments to accommodate the many different kinds of sound that organ music requires.
Simon Preston , who is Organist and Lecturer in Music at Christ Church, Oxford, illustrates his journey with music by Bach, Buxtehude, Handel. Cesar Franck, Couperin, Messiaen and Vierne together with an ear-boggling version of The Ride of the Valkyries.
Film cameramen PETER HALL PETER BARTLETT. DAVID FEIG Film sound bill CHESNEAU
Film editor ARTHUR BENNETT Producer ALAN BENSON