Details
Christuskirche
Elsa-Brändström-Straße 1
Dresden-Strehlen
Dresden
Saxony
01219
Germany
Programme
Johann Sebastian Bach – Prelude and Fugue in E minor, BWV 548
Bertie Baigent – Proud rock/bright sky (World Premiere)
Percy Whitlock – Four Extemporisations: Fanfare
Herbert Howells – Six Pieces for Organ: Preludio - Sine nomine
Herbert Howells – Six Pieces for Organ: Master Tallis's Testament
Herbert Howells – Six Pieces for Organ: Paean
Edward Elgar – Enigma Variations, Op.36: Nimrod
Maurice Duruflé – Prélude sur l’introit de l’Epiphanie Fugue sur le thème du Carillon des Heures de la Cathédrale de Soissons, op.12
Frank Martin – Agnus Dei
Max Reger – Variations and Fugue on 'God Save the King'
Noel Rawsthorne – Hornpipe Humoresque
Performers
Robert Smith – organ
Programme Note
Robert Smith is currently the Assistant Organist of St. Wilfrid's Church (York Oratory in Formation). In 2014/2015 he served as the Assistant Organist at St. Paul's Bloor Street, the largest Anglican church in Toronto, where he regularly accompanied the church choir. Previously the organ scholar of Somerville College, Oxford, he accompanied and occasionally directed the choir of that college for their regular services and concerts.
He began musical life aged 5 on the piano, then took up the organ aged 13 and received lessons from Henry Fairs at the Birmingham Conservatoire for five years. Upon reaching Oxford Robert was taught by Stephen Farr and William Whitehead, as well as achieving his ARCO diploma, for which he also won the Sowerbutts Prize and Durrant Prize.
He has had the pleasure of participating in numerous choir concerts and tours, notably at Blackburn Cathedral, Lancaster Priory, Birmingham Cathedral, Ampleforth Abbey, Coventry Cathedral and three times at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London. Robert regularly performs recitals as well as participating in masterclasses led by David Goode, Guy Bovet and Thomas Trotter. He collaborated with conductor Nicholas Cleobury for a concert recorded by the BBC.
Summer 2014 saw Robert take part in a choir tour of America and this has been followed by two recital tours of Germany, across Berlin, Brandenburg, Saxony, Thuringia and Bavaria. His first commercial solo CD, The Franz Liszt Memorial Organ in Weimar, was released by the German record label JUBAL in April 2015.