An overdose of E

Praeludium in E minor - Bruhns

Vater unser im Himmelreich BWV682 - Bach

Sonata No 2 - Hindemith

Deux Fantaisies - Alain

Sonata in E minor BWV528 - Bach

Toccata in E BWV566 - Bach

All OF the visiting jury members for the Dublin International Organ Competition will be giving recitals during the week. First off, at St Michael's, Dun Laoghaire, on Sunday, was Wolfgang Zerer.

Now in his mid-30s, this German-born organist gave a recital that was notable for playing of fine technical finish informed by youthful high spirits. He set some daring speeds, yet never for a moment let his listeners feel that accuracy of delivery or articulation would be compromised by his choices.

The toccata rhetoric of the outer works by Bruhns and Bach involved him in some extremes of flexion in rubato, but the elasticity was never stretched beyond breaking point, and the centre held.

Yet for all the care with which the programme was layered and constructed - parallels (which he elaborated in his programme note) between the outer works, contrasted pieces from the 1930s at its heart - there was some fundamental flaw to the evening, and the whole somehow seemed less than the sum of its parts. Could it have been the superabundance of the key of E, which permeated the evening to an extraordinary extent - in the Hindemith and Alain, and Bach's Vater unser, as well as the works above for which the key is clearly stated?

If tonality is still to function today, as it did when all of this music was written, then contrast of key has to be a fundamental consideration in programme building. The lesson of Sunday's recital has to be: ignore it at your peril.

The Dublin International Organ and Choral Festival runs until Sunday. For information ring 01-6773066