In my 1995 “Critics’ choice” I declared the Herald recording of Dupre’s Versets to be my favourite release of the year, so it’s fitting that my first review disc for 1996 should be another recording of the same work. Both recordings intersperse the sung plainchants which originally inspired Dupre to improvise these versets (which so moved Claude Johnson, the then Managing Director of Rolls Royce, that he paid Dupre to write them out and have them published), although the sense of enveloping the organ pieces within the context of a service of Vespers is rather lost in this new release as the Choral Scholars of St Nicholas, Meerbusch-Osterath were recorded elsewhere and not always entirely in the same key as the organ, and the final prayers and collects of the Vespers proper are omitted. I also miss David Hill’s discreet accompaniments to the sung plainchant which added such a sense of occasion to the Herald disc.
Nevertheless Suzanne Chaisemartin plays with a more tangible sense of improvisation than Philip Lefebvre. Her wonderfully spontaneous rubato with an instinctive feel for the rhythm and shape of the plainchant really do create the impression that she is acting on impulse, drawing the organ piece out of the spirit of the chant. It also helps that the Rouen organ is so well endowed with colours, something even more vital to what is the first CD recording of the Seven Pieces Dupre wrote for his 1933 New York recital tour. Apparently inspired by the exotic sounds available on the electric organs he had encountered on a previous visit to America Dupre allowed his aural imagination full rein. The music itself may never reach the heights of inspiration which is the hallmark of the Versets but in terms of organ colour and effect these are glittering pieces. A valuable addition to the catalogue.
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