Search - Bach, Heiller :: Organ Works

Excellent Playing, But Woefully Flawed Recording

04/17/1999

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Heiller is a fine organist, and his interpretations of these Bach standards are well-done. The dire shame of this project is that the recording itself is full of drop-outs, momentary loss of channels, hiss, and wow/flutter. These scars aren't present on all tracks, but are on many of them (including the momumental Passacaglia -- particularly at the trimphant climax!). I don't know if these recording problems were on the original 1964 LP release or occurred in the CD mastering process, but, in all my decades of listening to all types of music, I have NEVER heard a commercially-released recording with such fundamental technical errors. Someone -- either in 1964 or 1996 -- was asleep in the engineering booth!"