I went to Lichfield Cathedral on Tuesday 17th October 2023, at 7:30pm to hear an organ recital by Peter Dyke.  I went with two friends from church, our organist and his wife, who I sing with in the church choir.  

The cathedral is a beautiful, very large ornate building famous for having 3 spires.  It has statues of saints all around it and to the side has a statue dating back to the 600s.  The doors are enormous and, as I walked through them, I felt excited and very small compared to the great height of the ceiling.  I really loved the huge, stained-glass windows that show about Jesus, Mary and the cross and the very large cross hanging from the ceiling in the middle.  The surroundings made me feel very spiritual and I could feel the history and thought about all the people who had been there before me.  It had an old-world smell from lots of wood inside and at the start the light shone brightly through the pretty colours of the windows.   It was quite chilly inside, since it was October and such a large building, but once I was engrossed in the music, I totally forgot about being cold.

The organ was to my right, it is a big organ though not huge and has beautiful, decorative pipes (though these are only for decoration as the real pipes are behind – I learned this when I was lucky enough to play it after the first recital I went to). 

As we were there early, it was quite quiet when we arrived, and we managed to get front row seats – the seating was rows of small, wooden chairs, but it was quite comfortable.  It became noisier as people arrived and found their seats.  There was a massive screen at the front of the cathedral that came on showing his fingers on the keyboard when he was ready to start the recital, so everyone went quiet in suspense. As the organist, Peter Dyke, started to play, the sound of the organ was so loud it filled the whole cathedral and as he played the louds and softs he made the music come to life and it was really exciting.

There was a wide range of music dating back to the 1800s, all the way up to the 2000s.  My favourite piece was Prelude and Fugue in E Minor by JS Bach.  I think I enjoyed this the most as I had heard it before, but I did enjoy all of the pieces.  I think I really enjoyed the concert, mainly because I am interested in music because of being a musician myself. My friends really enjoyed the concert too, especially as one plays the organ himself and is a volunteer at the cathedral.  

It was quite a long concert, and I had had a long day, so I was ready to go home when it finished, but I would love to go again.  I would highly recommend the organ recital, though maybe not for young children because it is very long and a lot of sitting.