Any new CD of Bach’s organ music needs to have something special about it if it is to make its mark in an area of the catalogue which is pretty much saturated. An exceptional recording, a particularly interesting instrument, a player who brings something distinctive; any one of those would do the trick. Sadly we have none here.

Priory’s recording is perfectly acceptable but it lacks warmth or atmosphere (for which the building is largely to blame). As for the St Marylebone Rieger, it makes a clean sound and possesses some suitably Germanic stops, but nothing (except possibly the solo combination for Schmücke dich) which really stands out or which makes one wish that Andrew Arthur had mapped out his registrations in his accompanying booklet-notes. As for Arthur’s playing itself, I find this some of the most unmemorable Bach I’ve heard in a long while. Even the flighty outer sections of BWV572 have a solidity which, while not exactly unattractive, is hardly endearing. Everything lacks shape, comprising a constant succession of almost mechanically detached notes which destroy any sense of line and which pall very, very quickly. A decidedly pointillist Gott, Schöpfer, heiliger is typical; where is the chorale melody amid all these musical barbs?

On the plus side, this is undeniably clean and precise playing which follows the letter of the score with scholarly precision and does so with well judged and highly sensible tempi. Students of Bach’s organ music may find a valuable source of reference here; others would be best advised to look elsewhere for communicative and listener-friendly Bach.