E-mail to WXXI

For me it’s the Saint Saëns Organ Symphony. (Take it up to about a minute everyone.)
I had a stroke October 26, 1993; fairly serious, but I recovered fairly well from it.
Shortly after my return home from various hospitals, someone, probably Mordecai, played the Saint Saëns Organ Symphony on WXXI.
“WHOA!” I said. “I recognize that. Soon-or-later an organ-blast will occur. It occurs here. Here we go everyone!”
I was introduced to the Saint Saëns Organ Symphony while a student at Houghton College in the ‘60s. Houghton has that fabulous pipe-organ, but it’s more appropriate for Bach or the Widor Organ Symphony.
The Saint Saëns Organ Symphony is rather turgid and overblown.
A guy named Baxter played it for me on his hi-fi.
Baxter was in ecstasy; conducting as it went along.
After graduation I bought the recording myself, and essentially learned it; as one does with just about every musical piece they appreciate.
This is the long prelude; then the organ-blast.
Every time I hear it played, I remember that “whoa” moment. It always chokes me up.

Radio-station WXXI, the public-radio FM classical music station in Rochester, NY, we listen to, has asked its listeners to detail their favorite classical piece, and why it turns them on. —Mordecai Lipshitz was afternoon announcer at that time. He has since retired.

I had a stroke October 26, 1993. It was caused by a Patent Foreman Ovale (PTO), a hole between the upper chambers of my heart, allowing a clot to pass to my brain.

“Houghton College,” in western New York, is from where I graduated with a BA in 1966. I’ve never regretted it, although I didn’t graduate with their approval. Houghton is a religious liberal-arts college. —They had a fabulous pipe-organ.

Harold Baxter, Class of 1966; a music-major (I think). He lived in a rooming-house, and had a massive record-collection and a hi-fi.