The Divine Art team are delighted to announce a new album of organ music from Alexander Ffinch entitled Parallels is to be released in February 2024.

There are three major organ works: Suite No. 1 by Florence Price (first commercial recording); Rubrics, A Liturgical Suite for Organ by Dan Locklair, and the Romantic showpiece Suite Gothique by Léon Boëllman. These are joined by some splendid arrangements of English staples such as Elgar’s Chanson de Matin and Pomp and Circumstance. All suitably demonstrates the breadth and sonority of the Harrison and Harrison organ of Cheltenham College, and excitingly there are some surprise appearances of music not usually associated with the organ here too. 

The Florence Price Suite No. 1 is a substantial, virtuosic and visual work, which demonstrates similarity with both the Boëllmann and Locklair Suites. The composer draws from influences including spirituals, hymns and pentatonic themes. There is a nod to the chromatic harmony of Suite Gothique in the opening Fantasy, but the overall harmonic idiom is strongly influenced by jazz harmonies which, along with the Juba dance syncopations in the final Toccato link neatly to the rhythmic drive and themes in Rubrics.

Florence Price’s compositional intention was to convey a heritage though its past… “paralleled or influenced by contacts of the present day.”… and the album’s title Parallels is chosen to present her Suite No.1 with some of its possible influences and parallels. The present day for us now is represented by Alexander’s own arrangement for organ of the hit single Paradise by the contemporary band Coldplay which sits surprisingly well within Price’s rationale.

Album details:

Label:  Divine Art

Title: Parallels

Catalogue number:  DDX 21112

Artists: Alexander Ffinch

Composers: Florence Price, Dan Locklair, Léon Boëllman, Elgar