The importance of this recording is twofold: it provides a cross-section of Francis Jackson's organ music output, played by the composer himself, and it displays generously the riches of the fine 1911 Forster & Andrews organ (rebuilt by Compton after war damage) in the City Hall. Edinburgh Fanfare opens a golden gate to the programme, a brilliant display, not unlike alternate jets of fire and water. Rock-steady in its harmonic structure, this short gesture encapsulates some of Jackson's musical characteristics—a sense of theatre, a genius for patient timing and spacious scoring to go with it. These attributes may in part be a bequest from Sir Edward Bairstow, the composer's teacher, whose grand manner was a response to the militant vastness of York Minster. Jackson followed Bairstow as organist of York and refreshed those great spaces with a different tonal palette, often modal in feeling, building, as in Recessional, into an almost Waltonesque tumult of gothic grandeur. Quieter moments reveal a taste for French harmony, which fits naturally a mind capable of viewing so obliquely the familiar hymn tunes of the Five Preludes.
Francis Jackson's immaculate playing lets the music flow. Even at the most climactic moments there is no trace of truculence. A fine performance and a faithful recording, with rather more tape hiss on one of my copies of the cassette than on the other. There is no LP equivalent.'