Organ concertos, Op. 4 (Handel) had already been established during his one-year position as cathedral organist in Halle in 1702. Handel's organ concertos thus have a special place in his oeuvre. They paved the way for Mozart and Beethoven, who like Handel achieved fame in their lifetimes as composers and performers of their own concertos. In the sinfonias of some of his cantatas, Johann Sebastian Bach had already introduced concerto movements for organ and orchestra. However, Bach's organs in both Weimar and Leipzig were large organs with double keyboards and pedals, powerful instruments that could only dominate a baroque orchestra. Bach's organ writing in the
Strathclyde Concertos of the "Strathclyde Concertos", Davies increased the number of soloists. The Ninth (1994) is scored for six woodwind soloists, while the Tenth (1996) is a concerto for orchestra whose finale is a sort of recapitulation of ideas heard in the earlier concertos. The first two concertos were recorded by Unicorn-Kanchana, with the composer conducting. The remainder were recorded by Collins Classics. This concerto is based on two pre-existent works: Haydn's overture "L'isola disabitata" and a two-part setting of the opening line of Ecclesiastes, "Vanitas vanitatum et omnia vanitas" by the early seventeenth-century composer Jan Albert Ban. Strathclyde Concertos The Strathclyde