Una Russell (organ)

Suite du huitiesme ton - Boyvin

Vater unser im Himmelreich - Bohm

Fantasia in G BWV572 - Bach

Nun komm, der Heiden Heiland BWV659, 661 - Bach

Processions - Eric Sweeney

Invocation Op 28 - Callaerts

Toccata Op 29 - Callaerts

Una Russell is one of those organists whose recitals are always likely to include something by a composer who's forgotten, neglected, or simply obscure. At St Michael's, Dun Laoghaire, on Sunday, that composer was Joseph Callaerts (1838-1901), a native of Antwerp who, for the last 25 years of his life, was the organist of Antwerp Cathedral.

The two pieces she chose, an Invocation and Toccata, were decoratively chromatic and showed a heavy reliance on easily-won technical effects, the sort of music where any essential matter seems very limited in relation to the elaboration of the padding that decks it out.

Eric Sweeney's Processions, sounding French in inclination but with the emphasis on rhythmic gesture rather than harmonic language, sounded rather more solid in achievement. And solid would be a fair description of Russell's playing of the earlier items in the programme, the manner a bit stiff in the opening Boyvin Suite (in spite of the use of notes inegales), but more consistently effective in the musically meatier worlds of Bohm and Bach.