Lamentation

Some information on the composer:
Joseph Haspel is an American composer, living in New Jersey.
He started studying music and composing early in life and was particularly drawn to contrapunctal music.

His formal studies were at NYU with George Edelmann.
After graduating as a piano major in 1985 he started work as a private piano teacher and composer.
Nowadays he tries to keep as much time as possible for composing, which has become a central activity in his life. He also is organist and choirmaster of a church in Bridgewater, New Jersey.

Joe very kindly dedicated “Lamentation” to me. I am honoured that he trusted me with this fine piece of music. Imho it is worth a prominent place in the Concert Hall.
We worked closely together on realizing this recording, me sending Joe first drafts of the recording, him commenting on it and sometimes correcting mistakes via the internet. We consulted each other on registration of certain parts and choice of organ and it was a joy to work together this way: composer and performer.
Thanks very much, Joe, for all the input and support!

This is a kind of a live // midi recording. I recorded my playing in midi, because there are a few gradual stop changes in this piece, which I could not have done with two hands and two feet fully occupied on my console. I'm not an expert button-pusher like some of our members who are really wizards at that, Anglican scholars as they are. The consoles they play on look more complicated than the flightdeck of a 747.
So I used the midi recorder for that; playing in everything first and pulling the stops later while replaying.
Very relaxing, I can tell you!

Anyway, both Joe and I are pleased with the result. There is always room for improvement ofcourse, but for now this is it.

I hope some of you will take the trouble to listen to this piece more than once.
It is not “easy listening music”. It requires an effort from the listener as well.
But worth it!