Gerald Hendrie: Complete Organ Music, Vol. 2

The organ music of Gerald Hendrie – born in England in 1935 but resident in France since 1996 – encompasses a huge range of influences, among them the organist-composers who went before him (not least Franck, Dupré and Messiaen), dodecaphony, mediaeval plainchant and modality and jazz. The resulting works are as varied as the styles that fed into them, from grandiose to gentle, from severe to whimsical, from lyrical to lively. The mighty, 25-minute Sonata: In Praise of Reconciliation uses whimsical references to two cities bombed in the Second World War – the ‘Coventry Carol’ and the ‘Dresden Amen’ – to make a monumental plea for peace.