He played his last concert riddled with cancer and with some broken fingers and died shortly thereafter. He said he believed he played the organ before he was born and would play the organ forever in Heaven.
People have no idea how amazing this is. To play all those rhythms and harmonies on one instrument is incredible. Bass, Harmony and melody throughout the whole piece with both hands and both feet.
This composition was sent to E Power Biggs by Ives when Biggs asked Ives if he had a organ composition that he could play on his Sunday morning radio show featuring the organ. If Biggs hadn't asked, this wonderful composition would probably been lost forever. Biggs also, knocks it out of the ballpark!!!
Ives composed it in 1891, and it remained unpublished until at least 1949, when Biggs popularized it. Indeed, would have been a real shame if it had gotten lost....
I missed out on him as I barely remember him when he was alive. So glad I can now hear him play on YOU tube...what a wonderful man he was with music and passion and convictions. Truly remarkable with a sense of humor--- and an all time great!
I heard Virgil play this piece on a theater pipe organ recording. I loved it!! Much more fun than this recording is as he also clowned around a litte while playing it. What a showman!!!
The great Virgil Fox...............that is totally and completely an understatement. Virgil Fox plays the organ better than even Ives could have and he is impeccable. Ives woudl have been proud.
I saw him many, many, many years ago at Rockefeller Memorial Chapel on the U of Chicago campus. He was introduced to us wearing a long cape and when he removed it there was a flamboyant red satin lining. I still remember my introduction to him and his talent and miss hearing him live.
THANK YOU for POSTING Mr Fox even today still one of the greatest organists but I must say the young fellow from NE PA, Cameron is dang good and I would love to have seen the 2 of them push off on one another...would have been fun to watch. RIP Mr. Fox and Mr. Cameron You keep going young man...
Virgil Fox was an amazing organist. He had that Rodgers organ made for his traveling performances. There was nothing at that time to compare with it. I played Black Beauty for an afternoon once in 1970. It had seventeen speaker cabinets. The console was filled with hundreds of individual oscillators.. it was NOT a digital organ at that time. It was totally analog. In person, it had an amazing sound that could shake the building. This piece is challenging and, as usual, Virgil made it look easy.
My wife and I attended a live concert in a large cathedral and heard first hand this Black Beauty. The locals were offended that Vergil wasn't playing their new Vonbekerath (sp) pipe organ so during the intermission Vergil went to the organ loft and played the heck out of the pipe organ, satisfied the locals and finished the concert on Black Beauty and received a standing ovation.
This is an amazing piece, especially when you consider that it was written in the 19th Century, long before syncopation and jazz music had been around. Imagine how odd a piece like this would have sounded then when the "normal" or "popular" music was so different. Truly amazing. Plus I can't believe how fast Virgil Fox can move his feet around the 6 minute mark. Wow!
You might be correct, but funny thing about mics- great pipe organs are all over RUclips being played by students whose friends caught their session on a cheap camera mic and the organ still sounds great, even though nowhere as good as professional equipment. Knowing the growing pains of digital instruments, I'll guess that he suffered along with the technology. If your goal is to bring organ music to halls that have no instrument, a baby digital is better than no organ.
Virgil Fox was the Liberace of the organ. However, it wasn't all about show. He challenged the norms of organ performance. I'm a pianist, and I play Bach with pedal and on the piano, both of which Bach didn't have. The Ives is a stellar performance, and Ives would have loved it.
Also this organ was intended to be used in large spaces with reverberation. If you were to play a pipe instrument in a dead space it would not sound too pretty. This was the effect of a television studio.
@southernsceptic rubbish, Ives would have wanted it this way. He need the time to make the changes. This version is amazing in its multiple sounds. His technique is perfection, squeezes every drop out of the music. I can see Ives laughing in the audience. He plays like a real musician, unafraid to put his own stamp on the music, not like the robots the music schools crank out. People always bash someone different, even if a genius.
One must remember that Rodgers was built nearly 30 years ago. Digital technology now has most people looking for pipework when they hear a new Allen or Rodgers. But it was state-of-the-art then, for sure! Virgil Fox had no peer then and probably doesn't now, either.
Mr Fox said something to the effect that "not interprerting notes was the only way some people could get into the House of Music". I agree with you!! I don't point fingers at the purists but I know what I like and Mr. Fox was one of the greatest.
The immortal master! Compared to today's digital and virtual organs, this 'state of the art' instrument sounds like the world's largest accordion but hey, you work with what's available. The fact that he was willing to tolerate this is a testament to his dedication to bring the organ to the masses.
Wow this is old! I actually have the DVD of this somewhere, and I think it was a promo for Rodgers if I'm not mistaken. Too bad there's no audio recording of him playing this on a real organ to my knowledge. Virgil's playing is absolutely impeccable, even on what sounds like MIDI by today's standards.
does anyone else think that the editing of this video makes it really hard to watch? I can't focus on watching anything when there are three different videos overlapped with each other.
What a wonderful composition for organ! So much classical organ music is deadly serious (but enjoyable, of course). Here Ives gives the organ a sense of humor. I laughed out loud starting from 5:20 to 5:30. For the benefit of our British friends, Ives was not poking fun at you - the tune is known as America (aka Of Thee I Sing) by Yankees.
I used to have an LP witht this one it and I was amazed at this piece then. The organ used also sounded better perhaps because it was a pipe organ and not an electronic.
+steamrocks Don't you mean - how they cheat imitations that records pipe organs as evolved - that's all they are. The noise still comes through speakers and not from pipes.
and today, a substantial instrument costs over $1million to build, while the pipe organ enjoys NO traction among the art ("classical") music audience. this is because it has no proper "advocate". there is no joshua bell or evgeny kissin of the pipe organ. it is just that simple.
at this time, the "baby" digital instruments were nothing more than juke boxes, inasmuch as they employed only a single sample to "support" 61 notes (the entire compass of a keyboard or "manual"). the advanced analogue technology of rodgers, augmented by bob walker's circuitry, provided a more convincing representation.
It is impossible for me to find the score of this peice on internet. I've only found the piano transcription. I see I can only play Bach on organ because I can only find his scores.
Note to the E. Power Biggs video of the same piece (superior sound quality, but far less entertaining than this one): Sixteen year old Charles Edward Ives composed this set of variations on "America (My Country 'Tis of Thee)" for organ in 1891. In 1948, E. Power Biggs contacted Ives inquiring if he had composed any organ music that Biggs might perform on his weekly radio program. After Biggs helped Ives recover this long-forgotten piece, he performed it on his July 4th broadcast that year, and the work was finally published in 1949.
How do you know this is a Rodger? I thought the key desk looked more like an old allen to me, and if thats the case then the Allen sound has come a long way since this recording. I have been to there website as of late and they sound very close now to a pipe organ that I can hardly tell. But the tech. behind the key desk can only go as far as what the speakers will allow. Pipes are always better the sound is pure not created. Is this organ Allen or Rodgers.. or is it something else?
Mark7lincoln if you look at the video more carefully you will see the name, RODGERS boldly displayed on the console. the instrument was built exactly to Fox’s specifications and was state-of-the-art for its time. digital sampling was not available at this scale then. also, this was his touring instrument. i know of no organist who has done more to popularize & raise awareness of the organ than Virgil Fox. plus, he was virtuoso. truly amazing man.
thanks for posting this. by the way i see that there are still a ton of elitist pricks in classical music. don't you guys have something better to do like wear trucker hats and go to Belle & Sebastian concerts or something?
I always liked Virgil Fox, though he was unorthodox. In today's organ world, perhaps Cameron Carpenter fills his shoes. Ives' Variations is a wonderful piece.
If this video were all I knew about Virgil Fox I would conclude that he was an eccentric uncle of Austin Powers. The poor old Rodgers sounds awful, too. Thank goodness my first exposure to Fox was an LP of him playing the Wanamaker organ, presumable while wearing more conventional clothing.
When I was in my 20's I had a chance to play the great Wanamaker organ for an hour during the Xmas Season. I can tell you it was grand but by the time I was done I was so drained..... Mr. Fox and this piece was the 1st I had heard of him. Wonderful. I thank all of the posters here on RUclips bringing these old musicians to life all over again for the new kids on the block... Can you imagine what the great masters would say if they were alive today...
Course, that could be the quality of the mics. I'm sure if in person, it really did sound like a huge accordion, a would class player like him wouldn't play on such an instrument. Just my guess...
This organ's sound reminds me to much of a stadium organ, nothing like a true pipe organ sound. But regardless he plays it remarkable, to bad the organ can't keep up with him lol.
I have played a Rodgers Pipe/Pipe-less Combination Organ. I'd have to say I was not impressed. Our church owns an Allen Quantum Console and it is great. Fox's playing is enough to leave a person speechless though.
Sorry, I can't stand this Allen organ. Works my nerves. Love you Virgil... through the years. I listen to your last concert in The Seattle Concert Hall. I'll never forget the moment. Ever.
Charles Davis - This is not an Allen, but rather a Rodgers analog organ. It was called black beauty and was not owned by Virgil. Later he purchased a 4 manual Allen digital. Not that the Allen lived up to the standards of today, but it was decidedly better than the Rogers.
It's very interesting that most of the sections are played too fast... however when push comes to shove he plays the pedal section in the final variation far to slow.... And whats with all this staccato pedalling... Theatre Organist?
Who did the goofy video excuse for "effects"? What a mess. As always, Virgil is the consumate virtuoso/showman. People don't like it; I guess they wouldn't have liked Franz Lizst either. It's said that he was first to turn the piano to the side, so that the audience could admire his facial profile. Another virtuoso/showman.
Comparing Power Biggs and Virgil Fox, I have the intention that Virgil Fox wanted nothing but producing himself, he understood nothing about the music, but this in a rather amusing way. Perhaps he wanted to show how not to play this piece.
He played his last concert riddled with cancer and with some broken fingers and died shortly thereafter. He said he believed he played the organ before he was born and would play the organ forever in Heaven.
People have no idea how amazing this is. To play all those rhythms and harmonies on one instrument is incredible. Bass, Harmony and melody throughout the whole piece with both hands and both feet.
Saw him in Charlotte many years ago. Fantastic performance, especially with his pedal work.
This composition was sent to E Power Biggs by Ives when Biggs asked Ives if he had a organ composition that he could play on his Sunday morning radio show featuring the organ. If Biggs hadn't asked, this wonderful composition would probably been lost forever. Biggs also, knocks it out of the ballpark!!!
Ives composed it in 1891, and it remained unpublished until at least 1949, when Biggs popularized it. Indeed, would have been a real shame if it had gotten lost....
Phil Richards Another fact I forgot, Mrs. Ives found the comp and mailed it to Biggs.
I missed out on him as I barely remember him when he was alive. So glad I can now hear him play on YOU tube...what a wonderful man he was with music and passion and convictions. Truly remarkable with a sense of humor--- and an all time great!
I heard Virgil play this piece on a theater pipe organ recording. I loved it!! Much more fun than this recording is as he also clowned around a litte while playing it.
What a showman!!!
The great Virgil Fox...............that is totally and completely an understatement. Virgil Fox plays the organ better than even Ives could have and he is impeccable. Ives woudl have been proud.
I saw him many, many, many years ago at Rockefeller Memorial Chapel on the U of Chicago campus. He was introduced to us wearing a long cape and when he removed it there was a flamboyant red satin lining. I still remember my introduction to him and his talent and miss hearing him live.
Extremely grateful to get to watch this in 2023 - Virgil Fox in a grape-purple suit just shredding some Charles Ives.
Thank you so much for this post! I heard him play this live.
A real tour de force. Both composer and performer breathed life into this otherwise dull tune (God Save the Queen/King). Awesome!
i saw him play meany times ,once on this organ ,what a show .he had the place rocking
Alright, it’s a mr Rodgers neighborhood figital organ…
THANK YOU for POSTING
Mr Fox even today still one of the greatest organists but I must say the young fellow from NE PA, Cameron is dang good and I would love to have seen the 2 of them push off on one another...would have been fun to watch.
RIP Mr. Fox and Mr. Cameron You keep going young man...
Virgil Fox was an amazing organist. He had that Rodgers organ made for his traveling performances. There was nothing at that time to compare with it. I played Black Beauty for an afternoon once in 1970. It had seventeen speaker cabinets. The console was filled with hundreds of individual oscillators.. it was NOT a digital organ at that time. It was totally analog. In person, it had an amazing sound that could shake the building. This piece is challenging and, as usual, Virgil made it look easy.
My wife and I attended a live concert in a large cathedral and heard first hand this Black Beauty. The locals were offended that Vergil wasn't playing their new Vonbekerath (sp) pipe organ so during the intermission Vergil went to the organ loft and played the heck out of the pipe organ, satisfied the locals and finished the concert on Black Beauty and received a standing ovation.
Un genio assoluto! Grandissimo Virgil! Come avrei voluto poterti ascoltare di persona! Ma sei sempre vivo con il tuo virtuosissimo talento!
One of the best to ever play the instrument!They dont make organists like this anymore.
This is an amazing piece, especially when you consider that it was written in the 19th Century, long before syncopation and jazz music had been around. Imagine how odd a piece like this would have sounded then when the "normal" or "popular" music was so different. Truly amazing. Plus I can't believe how fast Virgil Fox can move his feet around the 6 minute mark. Wow!
You might be correct, but funny thing about mics- great pipe organs are all over RUclips being played by students whose friends caught their session on a cheap camera mic and the organ still sounds great, even though nowhere as good as professional equipment. Knowing the growing pains of digital instruments, I'll guess that he suffered along with the technology. If your goal is to bring organ music to halls that have no instrument, a baby digital is better than no organ.
7:35... HOLY FEET!
Virgil Fox was the Liberace of the organ. However, it wasn't all about show. He challenged the norms of organ performance. I'm a pianist, and I play Bach with pedal and on the piano, both of which Bach didn't have. The Ives is a stellar performance, and Ives would have loved it.
Also this organ was intended to be used in large spaces with reverberation. If you were to play a pipe instrument in a dead space it would not sound too pretty. This was the effect of a television studio.
@southernsceptic rubbish, Ives would have wanted it this way. He need the time to make the changes. This version is amazing in its multiple sounds. His technique is perfection, squeezes every drop out of the music. I can see Ives laughing in the audience. He plays like a real musician, unafraid to put his own stamp on the music, not like the robots the music schools crank out. People always bash someone different, even if a genius.
One must remember that Rodgers was built nearly 30 years ago. Digital technology now has most people looking for pipework when they hear a new Allen or Rodgers. But it was state-of-the-art then, for sure! Virgil Fox had no peer then and probably doesn't now, either.
Mr Fox said something to the effect that "not interprerting notes was the only way some people could get into the House of Music".
I agree with you!! I don't point fingers at the purists but I know what I like and Mr. Fox was one of the greatest.
The immortal master!
Compared to today's digital and virtual organs, this 'state of the art' instrument sounds like the world's largest accordion but hey, you work with what's available.
The fact that he was willing to tolerate this is a testament to his dedication to bring the organ to the masses.
Electronic organs have certainly improved....
@morristhecat56 It's his Rodgers tour organ. Black Beauty is what it was called.
very awesome... is this available on iTunes?
LOVE IT!...VIRGIL IS THE MAN!
this rocks.
What a character
Very electronic sounding, theatrical yet stilted and without the character Ives would have liked.
Wow this is old! I actually have the DVD of this somewhere, and I think it was a promo for Rodgers if I'm not mistaken. Too bad there's no audio recording of him playing this on a real organ to my knowledge. Virgil's playing is absolutely impeccable, even on what sounds like MIDI by today's standards.
I LOVE VIRGIL FOX
Miss you Virgil Fox.... hope you meet the Bach Family in heaven's organ loft.
I had to listen to this to wash the stench of Nugent off me. Thank you, Virgil. You rocked.
Good point. My musicology professor didn't elaborate on that consideration.
this is his traveling organ
If Virgil ever played drums, he'd have a wicked double bass technique!
Hey Yall !!! @420
I know I'm not searching and reaching
but did y'all hear that mix .... crazy props
does anyone else think that the editing of this video makes it really hard to watch? I can't focus on watching anything when there are three different videos overlapped with each other.
I found some of the imagery confusing.
What a wonderful composition for organ! So much classical organ music is deadly serious (but enjoyable, of course). Here Ives gives the organ a sense of humor. I laughed out loud starting from 5:20 to 5:30. For the benefit of our British friends, Ives was not poking fun at you - the tune is known as America (aka Of Thee I Sing) by Yankees.
I used to have an LP witht this one it and I was amazed at this piece then. The organ used also sounded better perhaps because it was a pipe organ and not an electronic.
Only on the Black Beauty can Virgil Fox play the variation @ 6:16 the way he did.
To me...the variation sounds "right' on this instrument.
What would it be like to hear him on the Trinity M & O? How the VirTual organ has evolved!
+steamrocks Don't you mean - how they cheat imitations that records pipe organs as evolved - that's all they are. The noise still comes through speakers and not from pipes.
+robert shaw Yearh, like.. .You know, recordings ;)
and today, a substantial instrument costs over $1million to build, while the pipe organ enjoys NO traction among the art ("classical") music audience. this is because it has no proper "advocate". there is no joshua bell or evgeny kissin of the pipe organ. it is just that simple.
at this time, the "baby" digital instruments were nothing more than juke boxes, inasmuch as they employed only a single sample to "support" 61 notes (the entire compass of a keyboard or "manual"). the advanced analogue technology of rodgers, augmented by bob walker's circuitry, provided a more convincing representation.
It is impossible for me to find the score of this peice on internet. I've only found the piano transcription. I see I can only play Bach on organ because I can only find his scores.
Try Organ Historical Society for music...also Google it. Good luck
slay queen
Note to the E. Power Biggs video of the same piece (superior sound quality, but far less entertaining than this one): Sixteen year old Charles Edward Ives composed this set of variations on "America (My Country 'Tis of Thee)" for organ in 1891. In 1948, E. Power Biggs contacted Ives inquiring if he had composed any organ music that Biggs might perform on his weekly radio program. After Biggs helped Ives recover this long-forgotten piece, he performed it on his July 4th broadcast that year, and the work was finally published in 1949.
How do you know this is a Rodger? I thought the key desk looked more like an old allen to me, and if thats the case then the Allen sound has come a long way since this recording. I have been to there website as of late and they sound very close now to a pipe organ that I can hardly tell. But the tech. behind the key desk can only go as far as what the speakers will allow. Pipes are always better the sound is pure not created. Is this organ Allen or Rodgers.. or is it something else?
Mark7lincoln if you look at the video more carefully you will see the name, RODGERS boldly displayed on the console. the instrument was built exactly to Fox’s specifications and was state-of-the-art for its time. digital sampling was not available at this scale then. also, this was his touring instrument. i know of no organist who has done more to popularize & raise awareness of the organ than Virgil Fox. plus, he was virtuoso. truly amazing man.
thanks for posting this.
by the way i see that there are still a ton of elitist pricks in classical music. don't you guys have something better to do like wear trucker hats and go to Belle & Sebastian concerts or something?
I always liked Virgil Fox, though he was unorthodox. In today's organ world, perhaps Cameron Carpenter fills his shoes. Ives' Variations is a wonderful piece.
If this video were all I knew about Virgil Fox I would conclude that he was an eccentric uncle of Austin Powers. The poor old Rodgers sounds awful, too. Thank goodness my first exposure to Fox was an LP of him playing the Wanamaker organ, presumable while wearing more conventional clothing.
When I was in my 20's I had a chance to play the great Wanamaker organ for an hour during the Xmas Season.
I can tell you it was grand but by the time I was done I was so drained.....
Mr. Fox and this piece was the 1st I had heard of him.
Wonderful.
I thank all of the posters here on RUclips bringing these old musicians to life all over again for the new kids on the block...
Can you imagine what the great masters would say if they were alive today...
5:26, best one.
and there is nothing wrong with competent theater organ playing
Naw, as it happens its digital, all custom to Fox's specs
5:26 is the best.
Course, that could be the quality of the mics. I'm sure if in person, it really did sound like a huge accordion, a would class player like him wouldn't play on such an instrument. Just my guess...
This organ's sound reminds me to much of a stadium organ, nothing like a true pipe organ sound. But regardless he plays it remarkable, to bad the organ can't keep up with him lol.
I have played a Rodgers Pipe/Pipe-less Combination Organ. I'd have to say I was not impressed. Our church owns an Allen Quantum Console and it is great. Fox's playing is enough to leave a person speechless though.
Sorry, I can't stand this Allen organ. Works my nerves. Love you Virgil... through the years. I listen to your last concert in The Seattle Concert Hall. I'll never forget the moment. Ever.
Charles Davis - This is not an Allen, but rather a Rodgers analog organ. It was called black beauty and was not owned by Virgil. Later he purchased a 4 manual Allen digital. Not that the Allen lived up to the standards of today, but it was decidedly better than the Rogers.
cameron carpenter will never be this good or this gay
It's very interesting that most of the sections are played too fast... however when push comes to shove he plays the pedal section in the final variation far to slow.... And whats with all this staccato pedalling... Theatre Organist?
He was gay and there is nothin wrong with that.
Shhhh! You'll upset David Snyder.
Who did the goofy video excuse for "effects"? What a mess.
As always, Virgil is the consumate virtuoso/showman. People don't like it; I guess they wouldn't have liked Franz Lizst either. It's said that he was first to turn the piano to the side, so that the audience could admire his facial profile. Another virtuoso/showman.
Great player. Horrilbe organ sound.
Comparing Power Biggs and Virgil Fox, I have the intention that Virgil Fox wanted nothing but producing himself, he understood nothing about the music, but this in a rather amusing way. Perhaps he wanted to show how not to play this piece.
Apparently he’s never heard of proper manual technique... you don’t play it like a piano.
Shameful !!!
This fucking nonsense.
But it’s fucking fun!
His interpretation of this piece is dreadful. He's inprovising parts of it as usual!