Matthew Dirst

Berkeley Festival & Exhibition

The first American musician to win major international prizes in both organ and harpsichord, Dirst is widely admired for his stylish playing and conducting. This hour-long program, featuring music from an era when leading composers largely ignored the organ—”the king of instruments”—includes masterworks like Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Adagio and Allegro in F Minor” (KV 594) and a delightful trio sonata by Johann Ludwig Krebs.

Additional works include concertos by John Stanley, who succeeded Handel as organ soloist for the Covent Garden oratorios, and Christian Friederich Rüppe, whose sole surviving keyboard concerto, according to its original source, is suitable for performance on either fortepiano or organ.

Music from the Organ’s Nadir—Between Bach and Mendelssohn