Customer Reviews

The Organists' Manual: Technical Studies & Selected Compositions for the Organ

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Davis's "Organists Manual" is THE method for beginning organists. It contains repertoire at graded levels of difficulty that can be used all throughout the organist's career, and technical exercises that help with problems contained in the book's repertoire. However, organists who want to advance their technique will probably need to buy another method with more technical exercises--especially pedal exercises.

I study the organ with Dr.Susan Marchant (Pittsburg State University), who suggested me to afford one for my personal collection. This book is a fine treatise for organists, it's "a must" for any organist to have one. The book had been complied so well and contains a lot of techniques to help you improving your skills precisely. Believe me, it's so worth it.

My teacher uses this book faithfully for organ instruction and after using it in lessons I can see why: it contains basic exercises for warming up and achieving finger coordination and dexterity. It also contains some of the best organ pieces that a person of any experience can play to increase his or her technique. A must have for teachers and students.

I have studied organ at the undergraduate and graduate levels at several music universities. I hold a BS in music education and a graduate certificate in church music. The organist's manual by Davis is, in my opinion, far superior to the Gleason Method. All technical exercises and selection of repertoire is more interesting. I understand the organ much better after using the Davis book. I own all of the Gleason methods, but I find myself using and playing from the Davis book more. I congratulate Mr. Davis on this fabulous instruction manual. Will there be a second edition??? I hope so.

This book was suggested to me by a fellow organist, who recommended it highly. I was an accomplished pianist looking to begin studying some basics of organ playing, and I was not disappointed. Davis' book offers a very basic approach to learning to play the organ, from attack and release, to pedal excercises, and over 100 graded classical compositions. Most valuable to me, however, is the long section on phrasing and articulation and the appendix on the organ itself and hymn-playing.

The only complaint I had was that it was very similar to the method of organ playing by Gleason. This book would be perfectly complimented by a competent teacher and Nilson's excellent pedal excercises.

I am a pianist who recently started studying organ to upgrade my skill for playing in church. This is a great resource, with quite a bit of very fine music. As another reviewer stated, it is quite similar in concept to the classic organ method by Gleason, which I also respect and enjoy. But I find the repertoire here more interesting and serviceable than what you will find in the Gleason.

Also contains very fine chapters on registration, articulation and phrasing. An essential resource in my opinion.

This book is excellent for learning or reviewing organ skills; uses actual, common organist pieces for learning, not boring exercises like many books;

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This is the finest universal organ method I have come across to date. I believe it is intended tfor the beginner or intermediate student. All aspects of playing the instrument are covered, with a focus on church service work and the issues dealing with that job.
I recommend it highly.

I just began organ lessons a few months ago with this book, and I find it very helpful. It has good exercises for manuals alone, as well as pedal exercises. The second half of the book includes compositions that are for manuals alone, and ones with pedal. They are pieces that one can learn and keep in one's repertoire. I highly recommend this book to any beginning or experienced organist.

Although this is an introductory text, its audience is definitely the mature adult learner or pianist turned organist. For example, it presupposes music reading knowledge, but does explain organ-specific (pedal) notation. Note that it is a "manual" and not a "method". It's a wonderful reference. As a pianist I find it an excellent introduction to the performance idiosyncrasies of the instrument, such as repeated notes, as well as a good overview of things all keyboard players should know but are emphasized in the playing of the organ, such as finger independence, substitution, and 'finger glissando'. Not ever being particularly enamored with the Baroque period, I found especially helpful the section that enumerated all the various ornamentations and their possible interpretations.

There's a good learning curve and a good variety in the pieces offered. I really liked that Davis presents pieces that gradually integrate more and more of the pedal with manual playing, since I find that the most difficult part of organ playing.