What made you keen to record organ music by Charles-Valentin Alkan?

Actually, a chap wrote in to Signum’s managing director and said, “After hearing this man’s playing of Widor, it would be perfect if he recorded Alkan next.” When I looked into it, I thought, “Oh yeah. This actually does suit me incredibly well.” Of course, Widor and Alkan were mutual admirers, but Alkan’s music is like Widor having taken a hallucinogenic drug while he was at the Folies Bergère.

Unlike Saint-Saëns, Vierne or Widor, who held positions at Parisian churches, Alkan, who was Jewish, did not. Is that why we don’t really know his organ works?

Joseph Nolan. Photo supplied

A lot of what can be played as an organist he actually wrote for the pedal clavier, of which he was a virtuoso. And that’s not an instrument that’s very well known, I think, even today. In addition, he disappeared completely from the scene all of a sudden for a very, very long time. I think it’s a combination of those things.  

Given that most of this music was written at a time when he was a recluse, who did...