Pardue Excels in Organ Concert

A good-sized audience of just under 300 persons braved the sticky heat in Memorial Church last night for the second of two organ recitals by Lois Pardue, Assistant University Organist and Organist of the Summer School.

Mrs. Pardue continues to deserve a place among the top rank of contemporary organists. She has on more than one occasion proved herself to be a finer musician than many of the organists with a big reputation. Her playing last night was about as close to being note-perfect as any live organ recital I can recall. She manifested facile fingers, fleet feet, and fluid phrasing. Her choice of registration was always judicious, effective, and appropriate to the style and period of the pieces she performed. And there was none of the dreary or mechanical dispiritedness that characterizes so much organ playing these days.

In an almost all-German program, it was only proper that the first half be given over to J. S. Bach. There was the monumental Prelude and Fugue in G Major; and the three-movement Trio Sonata No. 1 in E Flat, one of the most treacherous challenges in the entire literature. Of the two chorale-preludes, Liebster Jesu, wir sind hier presented a constant parade of startling dissonances. Later periods were represented by Mozart's charming, if second-drawer, Sonata No. 15 in C; Brahms' rich-textured Fugue in A Flat Minor (a most rare key); and Hermann Schroeder's chorale-prelude Schoenster Herr Jesu.

The only non-German composer was Harvard's own Walter Piston, with his early, acerb Chromatic Study on BACH, and his more recent and highly important Prelude and Allegro. In this and the Mozart, Mrs. Pardue was assisted by a string orchestra of Summer School students, conducted by G. Wallace Wood worth, James Edward Ditson Professor of Music.