Organ Voluntary following Evensong at Swansea Minster Church of Saint Mary with Holy Trinity Chapel

Tierce en Taille is an expressive aria for the tierce stop, made to sound as pungent as tolerable through placement in the tenor range and was composed by Louis Marchand. The soft accompaniment is in character of the French Baroque style and has many dissonances over a slow pedal line, with occasional chromaticism. The registration used in this recording is included below. Marchand appears to be one of those notorious people in music history who was best known to succeeding generations not for his music, but for the romantic anecdotes regarding his personal and professional career. Born in Lyon on the 2nd of February, 1669, Marchand was the son of a local organist and was a prodigy. At the ripe age of fourteen, Marchand had already been taken on as organist at the Cathedral of Nivers, from which post he later advanced to the similar job at the Cathedral of Auxerre. In 1689, Marchand then moved to Paris. Though Marchand aspired to an appointment at the Royal Court, the position was unavailable and so he settled for various jobs at the Church of the Jesuits in the Rue Saint-Jacques, at Saint-Benoit, at Saint-Honore, and at the Church of the Franciscans. Swell: Rohr Flute 8, Lieblich Flute 4 Choir: Stopped Diapason 8, Flute 4, Nazard 2 2/3, Block Flute 2, Tierce 1 3/5 Pedal: Bourdon 16 Couplers: Swell to Pedal