Virgil Fox Memorial Concert
Peter Richard Conte (organ)
Paul Bisaccia (piano)
Sunday 7 October 2001
Lord
& Taylor Department Store, Philadelphia,
on the Wanamaker Organ
Elgar (trans. Hesford): Pomp and Circumstance No. 1 in D major
Fauré (trans. Hebble): Nocturne from Incidental Music to Shylock
Bach: Toccata
in F major, BWV 540
Rachmaninoff (trans.
Conte):
Concerto for Piano and Orchestra No. 2 in C minor, Op. 16
Franck: Pièce Héroïque
Dukas (trans. Conte): The Sorcerer's Apprentice
Wagner(trans. Lemare): Liebestod from Tristan und Isolde
Mulet: Carillon sortie on "Tu Es Petra"
for organ in D
major
Vierne: Carillon de Westminster
Bach (arr. Fox): Komm, süsser Tod
A full house packed the Grand Court at the Lord & Taylor store (the old
John Wanamaker department store) in center city Philadelphia for the first
after-hours concert in quite some time on the Wanamaker Organ, the world's
largest playable instrument . The occasion was the annual Virgil Fox
Memorial Concert presented by the Virgil Fox Society; this year it was
co-presented by the Friends of the Wanamaker Organ in honor of the 90th
anniversary of the Wanamaker Organ, the 175th anniversary of Lord & Taylor
department stores and the 10th anniversary of the Friends of the Wanamaker
Organ. The featured soloist was Peter Richard Conte, director of music at
St. Clement's Church in Philadelphia and the equivalent of organiste
titulaire for the Wanamaker Organ.
Following a rousing rendition of the national anthem (where the audience sang along), Mr. Conte opened with Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance No. 1 in a transcription by Bryan
Hesford. Frankly, Mr. Conte seemed a bit unsettled in this piece, which he 
has played more effectively on other occasions. Also, one would have thought the full organ
might have come into play in the finale — somehow, the impact of this
blockbuster seemed diminished.
Virgil Fox recorded the Nocturne from Shylock at Wanamaker's; Mr. Conte's performance of the same transcription (by Robert Hebble) resembled Mr. Fox's in its andante tempo but used a much lighter registration. The lovely 8' Clear Flute in the Ethereal Organ (a small division of the instrument with its pipes way up on the seventh floor) seemed louder than I have ever heard it, and the speed of the tremulant was disturbing.
Bach's Toccata in F Major, played at the extremely rapid tempo for which Mr. Fox was notorious, made only a fair impression. Then came Conte's own transcription for piano and organ of Rachmaninoff's Second Piano Concerto. Paul Bisaccia was the fine pianist, but his efforts were sabotaged by bad miking (especially in the first movement), which caused the piano to be swamped by the organ. The other two movements were more successful, and at the end there was a standing ovation and cheers for this effort.
After the intermission came an interesting clip from a 1979 Evening Magazine television show featuring an interview with Virgil Fox and an excerpt from one of his performances on the Wanamaker Organ. This was new footage for many of us and was well worth showing.
The second half of the concert was a happier affair. Conte opened with a blazing rendition of Franck's Pièce Héroïque, taken at an energetic lively tempo that maintained 
interest (unlike so many performances of this work that drag on endlessly); the organ sounded especially good here. Then came the best performance of the evening: Conte's own sensational transcription of The Sorcerer's Apprentice . (This has become a Conte specialty and will appear on his forthcoming CD for Dorian.) Conte strives to imitate the exact orchestration in his transcriptions; working pistons effortlessly, he used this organ's many colorful resources to tell Dukas' tale. The two final chords, played on what was apparently the tutti, indicated
that we had not heard much of all the big reeds or full couplers during the
evening. Although many in the audience jumped a bit at this unexpected sound, a
few more thrills like this would have been welcome.
Wagner's Liebestod, in the well-known transcription by Edwin Lemare, brought forth some lush registrations and displayed this instrument's renowned 87-rank String Division nicely. Then the formal program ended with Mulet's Tu es Petra, one of Virgil's most popular encores.
Two unannounced encores were Vierne's Carillon de Westminster, featuring the well-regulated Tower Chimes, and the inevitable Fox arrangement of Bach's Komm, süsser Tod, conceived for the Wanamaker Organ in
1939 for the national convention of the American Guild of Organists. Conte
handled this tricky piece smoothly but could have begun and ended just a bit
more quietly. Maybe we needed those 6 gently eerie vox humana stops (the last portion of the instrument that remains out of operation), lurking silently in the
Orchestral Organ.
