Carlo Curley
Carlo Curley
5:32PM BST 17 Aug 2012
Carlo Curley, who has died aged 59,
was the self-styled “Pavarotti of the organ” – an entertaining figure with a phenomenal keyboard technique whose oversized
personality drew large crowds.
Like Pavarotti, Curley was an
enormous bear of a man, standing 6ft tall and almost as wide, wearing a floppy,
multicoloured tie and beaming behind his beard. He
also shared with the tenor an irrepressible degree of showmanship; he could
work a crowd into frenzy – dancing in the aisles and weeping in the pews were
reported at some concerts – by blasting away with the fortissimo range of his
powerful instrument.
“Bach invented rock ’n roll,” he
would insist, adding that a work by Handel was a “real toe-tapper”. A typical
Curley programme, whether in the concert hall or the
cathedral, was as likely to include the theme to Monty Python’s Flying Circus
as it was the classics. Such kitsch would have purists sneering about his lack
of taste, but Curley was unabashed, instructing his audience to fasten their
seat belts before pulling out all the stops to ensure that they got their
money’s worth.
In a profession known for its
relative anonymity, Curley cut a brash, ebullient and outspoken figure,
collecting almost as many musical enemies as friends, particularly in Britain.
When the purists became too vociferous he would challenge them to a “battle of
the organs”, in which he would pit his portable Allen instrument against the
finest British cathedral consoles, a form of musical bloodsport
in the nave.
Naturally his preference was for
bringing the organist out of the organ loft and on to centre
stage. When the keyboard itself could not be moved, he would insist on a camera
and a video screen so that “the audience can all see me flying”, as he once
told the journalist Mark Pappenheim.
In the 1970s he was resident
organist at Alexandra Palace, introducing each work to audiences of up to 4,000
in recitals compèred by Richard Baker or Thora Hird. He was also the first
organist to play at the White House (for President Carter), and liked to recall
how he had performed for several European royal families. Prince Henrik of Denmark was a particularly close friend, but
Curley found the Danish organ world “extremely narrow”.
Although a man of devout faith,
Curley railed against the instrument’s association with organised
religion. “I have to oversell the organ because it has been relegated to
accompanying church services for so many years… people forget that it can be a
very viable concert medium.”
Curley played most recitals from
memory, mercilessly mocking those performers who needed both a page-turner as
well as assistants to pull the stops. “It looked like a typewriter convention,”
he said of one colleague’s recital, adding: “I’d like to see the organ put back
where it belongs: in the forefront of the concert world.” No Curley recital
would end without him kissing the instrument and shamelessly plugging his
recordings from the stage.
Carlo James Curley was born in
Monroe, North Carolina, on August 24 1952, into a Methodist family of Irish
descent. He was as mystified as anyone about his Italian name. “Perhaps they
went out for a great pasta meal on the night I was conceived,” he would joke.
His mother was an orchestral violinist in Florida and his grandmother a
professor of piano in Massachusetts. Carlo was soon playing the piano and
singing in the choir. However, his desire to explore the church organ was
persistently rebuffed by a choirmaster, who regarded the instrument as his “own
personal fiefdom”. Aged six, Carlo “took a Coca-Cola bottle, broke a back
window [of the church] and pulled myself through”. Although he required 25
stitches to his arm – and was soundly thrashed with a belt by his grandfather –
he had found the instrument of his dreams. “I thought I was in heaven.”
He attended North Carolina School of
the Arts and, by the age of 15, was organist at a large Baptist church in
Atlanta, Georgia, before studying privately with a number of teachers,
including Virgil Fox in America and Sir George Thalben-Ball
in Britain. At 18 he was director of music at Girard College, Philadelphia.
Thereafter he lived a somewhat
peripatetic life, moving between the United States, Scandinavia and Britain,
eventually settling in Melton Mowbray. Unlike many
musicians he was disdainful of academia, always refusing to teach or take on
pupils. “I don’t have the patience,” he told the Buffalo News in New York.
In 1998 he published his
autobiography, In the Pipeline, which regaled readers not only with his taste
in musical instruments but also a detailed account of his predilection for
Danish blondes. He also made several recordings for Decca, many of which were
accompanied by his own idiosyncratic sleeve notes.
On one occasion he reportedly had to
be rescued from an organ loft where he had become stuck because of his massive
physique. A master of the double entendre, he regaled listeners to the BBC
World Service with the tale of how he could “erect my organ on any stage in
less than 20 minutes”.
In the Christmas 1991 edition of
Private Eye, Curley advertised for a romantic partner. “One-off, good-humoured, handsomely statuesque Yank teddy bear...
seeks a prospective Mrs Bach,” he wrote. He remained
unmarried.
Carlo Curley, born August 24 1952,
died August 11 2012