The Belgian-born César Franck was organist of St. Clotilde in Paris for over 30 years and from 1872 onward professor of organ at the Conservatoire. His works for the instrument form a much more important and distinctive contribution to its repertoire than their number might suggest. Liszt remarked of his Six Pieces, “These poetic works have a clearly marked place alongside the masterpieces of Bach.”  

Franck stands as a cornerstone of the French organ tradition, leading an intrepid group of younger composers in Paris at a time when the imposing heights of Wagner’s chromaticism influenced French music, as much as did a rediscovery of earlier French traditions of music. His students gave him the nickname “Pater seraphicus” (seraphic father).  

Written in the last year of his life, his Three Chorals for organ represent a mastering of motivic development. In the deeply felt Choral No. 2 in B minor, which we hear first, Franck is at his most emotional. The composer uses the term “choral” not in the German sense (meaning a Lutheran hymn-melody) but to describe an original theme harmonized in chorale fashion. His best work, this is a giant passacaglia, suggesting the tolling of a great bell as it moves from somber genesis through an avalanche of sound to its peaceful end.  —Excerpted from a note by Gillian Weir and notes from the LA Phil archives