Remastered, these outstanding recordings made in Århus Cathedral are a model of how to combine atmosphere and clarity in this music, and no other player seems quite to equal Weir's remarkable identification with the reflective and dramatically explosive extremes of Messiaen's idiom.
At the risk of being accused of heresy, it's possible to doubt whether La Nativité du Seigneur really works as a compositional whole, given the surely undeniable imbalance between mediative and more dynamic music. But Weir evidently has no such doubts, sustaining the long, quiet episodes with particular sensitivity and irresistible conviction: if you're to perform the work complete, this is how it has to be. So, despite the achievements of both Olivier Latry and Jennifer Bate across the full range of Messiaen's organ works, Gillian Weir's performances again claim the definitive status which they were accorded when they were first released.

One of the most impressive recording projects I have ever encountered