Prelude on "Song 46" (Drop, drop slow tears)

Based on the beautiful hymn tune by Orlando Gibbons, which is associated with the text “Drop. Drop slow tears,” “Prelude on Song 46” is my fourth Sowerby piece on YouTube.

In contrast to Arioso, this work has a straight forward, but simple beauty, which also contains some of Sowerby’s trademark bluesy chords.

All of these works are recorded on the Milan Digital Audio sample set of the 1928 E. M. Skinner organ in Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Church, Chicago, Illinois. By the way, this is one of the first sample sets created for Hauptwerk. Although it can sound amazing even today, it has only one release for each note of each stop and therefore cannot be used to play detached music. (Modern sample sets contain multiple releases for every note: including at least one for legato, portato, and staccato since the acoustics of the room are affected differently with each type of release.)

For anyone interested, this is a YouTube playlist of all of my Sowerby recordings: Prelude on"Song 46," Arioso, Air with Variations, and Requiescat in Pace.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVIFLvRdHVQ&list=PL4VZu2BZMrlwDPy8iS6A2rFeCqZ_IKZyu