Composer-organist Maurice Duruflé a 20th century man of all musical eras

There is a magnetic power to the music of Maurice Duruflé. The French organist and composer, who died 23 years ago (at age 84), somehow managed to include the whole scope of Western music traditions -- from Medieval plainsong to the 20th century's rejection of a fixed tonal anchor -- in his work.

To go with today's interview with young Ontario organist Ryan William Jackson.

Here is Duruflé performing the Prélude to his 1932 Organ Suite in 1966, at St. Thomas's Church on 5th Ave. in New York City. That organ is similar in sound to the mighty Casavant at Metropolitan United Church in Toronto, where Jackson will play.

Here is Duruflé playing his transcription of a Charles Tournemire improvisation on the Cavaillé-Coll gallery organ at the gorgeous 16th century Parisian church of St. Étienne-du-Mont, also in 1932, where he was the titular organist from 1929 until his death (the organist had the organ substantially altered and renovated in the 1950s).