At the end of his life,
Sir Andrew Davis
returned to the music of Bach, which he had often played at the beginning of his musical career as an organist. He made orchestral transcriptions of some of
Bach
's famous pieces and planned to record them all as conductor of the
BBC Philharmonic
. Sadly, he died before the project could be completed, and conductor
Martyn Brabbins
stepped in for the remainder. Thus,
King of Kings
makes a good bookending memorial to the beloved conductor. The album was released in 2025 and made classical best-seller lists in the summer of that year. Various orchestral transcriptions of
are on the market (and
would not have found them particularly strange once he got over the ensemble size), and beyond the memorial associations of the album, listeners will find the comparative aspect interesting. Those who begin the program with the
Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565
, may be disconcerted to hear that it bears little resemblance to
Leopold Stokowski
's glittering transcription made popular by the
Philadelphia Orchestra
. However, it is not meant to resemble that. Throughout,
Davis
went for more subtle effects that aimed to illustrate the complexities of the music. In the big preludes and fugues, he offers nifty orchestral equivalents of the organ's lower registers. In contrapuntally complex works like the chorale preludes, his orchestrations are like explorations of the finer points of
ian counterpoint.
makes a fine closing chapter to
' career, and it will appeal to anyone who likes to hear
played by a symphony orchestra and is interested in his reception history. ~ James Manheim