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When Neil Collier, of Priory Records, excitedly pulled off his headphones and said he had never heard anything like it, I was not altogether surprised. I had experienced it before, but for him it was the first time he had heard the indescribable grandeur of the tutti of Aristide Cavaille-Coll's 'Michelangelo of an organ', as Widor put it (un orgue à la Michel-Ange), at Saint-Ouen in Rouen, a city rich in fine organs. I was recording the first of a number of CDs I have had the privilege of making over the last few years and we had begun by recording Guilmant's Marche Funebre et Chant Seraphique, something of a nineteenth-century novelty item, which features at one point a crescendo from foundations to full organ over the space of just a few bars.

Planning a recording, choosing the repertoire, and the satisfaction of the finished product are all creatively rewarding, and the opportunity to live with and practise on a historic instrument for several intense days is fascinating and informative. The actual recording-sessions on the other hand are usually very hard work, and quite different from playing in a concert situation, where there is a sense of interaction with one's audience; playing to a microphone can be altogether more intimidating, despite the knowledge that one can replay pieces as necessary. However, whilst mistakes of note (or registration, especially on old organs without modern piston systems!) may be rectified by re-recording some passages, the more this is done the less spontaneous the music may become: with the advent of digital editing, we have probably become a little over-obsessed with accuracy at the expense of musicality. On the other hand, the opportunity to play passages several times may actually offer the player greater insights into aspects of his or her interpretation, especially on a relatively unfamiliar instrument. But there is nothing quite like the rare satisfaction of a perfect take - which is usually the one that falls victim to an unexpected car alarm or siren....

Despite the standardisation of major aspects of design and voicing, all organs inevitably end up having their own individual characteristics, not least because each has it own unique acoustics. In my experience, Cavaille-Coll's instruments are all quite different from each other, despite similarities on paper. Part of Cavaille-Coll's skill as a builder and voicer was to give his organs and their players the ability to create a symphonic crescendo and decrescendo through the use of double soundboards, ventils and graded wind pressures. At the console, the effect of adding each block of sound is quite audible, but away from the organ the sound unfolds smoothly and seamlessly, like the blooming of a rose. This is particularly so at Saint-Ouen, and Widor's description of the organ is immediately understandable when one plays it: every stop seems to have its own magical quality and ability to blend - helped, of course, by the magnificent acoustics of the building. No words can adequately describe this. More important still, the music written for instruments such as this really comes alive - the same as French classical music does on a Clicquot, or early English music on an old English organ.

Saint-Ouen has certain unusual features that the player needs to assimilate ('cope with' is perhaps a better way of putting it!): space is very limited at the console, and the organ stool is not adjustable, and certainly isn't designed for those with a bad back (but then the case was not built by Cavaille-Coll but by Carlier back in 1630 - when people were smaller!); the pedalboard is of course straight and flat, although one soon gets used to it; there is no Recit-to-Positif coupler: instead it's the other way around - Positif to Recit - something to exercise the mind as well as the shoulders when it comes to quick manual changes! Unusually, for a French organ, the Grand Orgue is the second manual, not the first; above one's head are the horizontal reeds 8 and 4 - these add a certain edge to the tone in the church, but up in the organ loft they are quite deafening, and you cannot hear much of the rest of the organ when they are drawn. A glance at the specification reveals that in effect this organ is a three-manual instrument spread over four manuals: the top manual (Bombarde) serves as the second half of the Grand Orgue, with the exception of the chamade reeds just mentioned. The Recit is of vast proportions, stretching across the whole width of the organ inside, and with shutters deployed across its entire east-facing surface, giving it a very wide dynamic range. As well as the usual bold strings, there is another, softer set, more akin to the volume of English strings but with a quite magical 'flutiness' about them. Another interesting stop is the Carillon - a mixture-stop that really does sound like the tinkling of bells in the ensemble.

The organ is in quite fragile condition at the time of writing, although it all still functions well; however, the current organist, Madame Morisset, advises against using the Octaves Graves until the organ is restored (a matter for current discussion and concern). While there are barker levers on the Grand Orgue and Recit, the Bombarde and Positif remain entirely mechanical, and the passage of time has made the respective manual actions rather uneven: the most-often-used Grand Orgue is the most fluid, the Recit slightly less so, while the Positif is becoming a little sticky, and the Bombarde - rarely played upon on its own - is quite heavy. At some time, the 16-, 8- and 4-ft reeds on the Bombarde have been fixed in such a way that they are pushed out together through the action of the Bombarde reed ventil pedal: they cannot be drawn by hand. (I don't know if this was an original feature).

The Saint-Ouen organ is, understandably, one of the most recorded instruments in the world, yet it is one of the most difficult to capture faithfully and effectively, not least because it can sound very different according to where one stands in the building. Some elect to put the microphones close to the organ, producing a remarkable clarity that simply doesn't exist in the building; others have strayed too far down that lengthy nave and made the organ sound distant and muddled. As there are galleries high up on either side of the nave, we were able to string the microphone up between them on the first visit; for a later recording, a long pole with a hydraulic pump was used.

I am very pleased with the results that we achieved on the two recordings I have made at Saint-Ouen. But a mere recording can never compare to the experience of hearing and playing an organ such as this at first hand, and I would urge you to go and experience that for yourself - you will not be disappointed!

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