Timothy Stewart’s organ recital at Westminster Abbey
Sunday 14 July 2024
Review by Angela Ransley
The Westminster Abbey Summer Organ Festival returns once again with its fabulous mix of celebrity recitals and fresh faces on the Young Artists Platform. This year the Keyboard Charitable Trust presented 20-year-old TIMOTHY STEWART, a first year student from the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire. Music has been his life since the age of 6: a full account of his progress can be found below.
The Westminster Abbey organ is a majestic instrument of five manuals and 94 stops offering a complex range of solo and combined registration. The recital opened grandly with the first movement of Widor’s Symphonie in G minor Op 42 no 2, first performed in 1876. This is one of ten such works which now form the backbone of the organ repertoire. They were called Symphonie because new organ-building techniques by French organ builder Aristide Cavaille-Coll extended the colour palette of the organ and created a warmer sound. Organists now refer to this type of instrument as Romantic or symphonic, hence Widor’s title.
