This is, I think, the first systematic and compre hensive English book on the organ works of Bach. It comes from one who is both organist and musician. I hasten to explain. By both organist and musician I do not mean what some rude scribes mean when they say of a singer, by way of the highest praise they can give him, that he is not only a singer but a musician. I would never dream of suggesting that there are organists who are not musicians. But it goes without saying that there are musicians who are not organists. I know the tribe exists, because I am a humble member of it myself. My own practical acquaint ance with the organ has been limited to the rare occasions when I have sat by an organist friend who has allowed me to let my fingers wander idly over the noisy keys, as somebody's did in the song, and with the same futility. But though I cannot play the organ, I have studied a good deal of organ music my own knowledge of Bach's organ works, indeed, is derived in the first place from study of them either at the pianoforte or with the score on my knees. There must be many others who have learned them in the same way. But what we learn of them in this way is obviously not all that is to be learned about them. They were written for a particular instrument, and cannot fully come to life except on that instrument.