Hailed along with his contemporary J. S. Bach as the greatest organist of his age, Handel left behind almost no solo works for the King of Instruments. Undaunted, David fires up the famed Cornell Baroque Organ and cooks up a menu of vivid reimaginings—not merely reheatings—of some of the timeless hit-maker’s winning recipes. The feast’s first and last courses are the opening and closing numbers of Messiah, the finale featuring a four-part fugal cadenza for the feet alone! In between, the table is heaped with sumptuous portions of other succulent fare from operas and oratorios, concertos and sonatas. On the way out the door, there is a bonbon of a bonus track.
This Banquet has been generously funded by the Cornell Center for Historical Keyboards and is now being served up on False Azure Records, a label recently founded by Cornell D.M.A. and Bard College faculty member, Ryan MacEvoy McCullough, a frequent return guest to our campus as a pianist.
Handel’s Organ Banquet is now available as a CD and as a digital album on Bandcamp. False Azure Records.
