‘And an old white horse…’ takes as its starting point a memorable line from T.S.Eliot’s
Journey of the Magi. The image of an old white horse galloping away across a meadow links with various other religious images including The Crucifixion, and a passage in Revelation which presages the ‘last things’ of the world. There the horse is an image of terrifying power. In Eliot, the horse is old, lacking virility and power. The journey taken by this organ piece is not intended to be literal but reflects the universal significance of the journey that the Magi make, symbolic in many ways of the journey of the human soul.
The fierce rhythmic drive of the central section is closest to the image of ‘last things’ in its intensity. The melody heard slowly in the manuals in the opening bars, returns, in a more concentrated form, in the pedals in this section. Then the piece returns to the calm of the opening, slowly fading out through pulsating versions of the work’s opening chords.
‘And an old white horse…’ was written for organist Tom Bell who has performed the piece widely and recorded it on the organ of Blackburn Cathedral. You can listen to Tom’s performance here:
- ISMN: 9790570683895 (M570683895)