Alain pieces

Yes. Given what you are looking for—quiet, contemplative, mystical Alain rather than the spectacular Litanies/Trois Danses, and pieces that you could actually learn on a pipe organ or adapt to your synthesizer setup—I would start with a surprisingly small group.

Jehan Alain’s catalogue includes a number of very short pieces, and several are only a page or two. IMSLP lists the complete organ repertoire and is particularly useful for identifying these shorter works.

My first choices for you

Piece

Character

Difficulty

Why I’d try it

Berceuse sur deux notes qui cornent, JA 7bis

🌙 Lullaby, hypnotic

Easy

Probably the best starting point

Grave, JA 32

Deep, slow, meditative

Easy–moderate

Very little material, lots of atmosphere

Monodie

Solitary, floating, mystical

Moderate

Excellent for synthesizer

Postlude pour l’office de complies, JA 29

Night prayer / darkness

Moderate

Particularly suited to your interest in contemplative sound

Choral cistercien

Ancient, devotional

Moderate

Very interesting connection to medieval/monastic sound

Choral dorien, JA 67

Modal, austere, spacious

Moderate

One of the best introductions to Alain’s modal language

Choral phrygien, JA 68

Darker, mysterious

Moderate

Beautiful companion to the Dorian Choral

Le jardin suspendu, JA 71

🌌 Dreamlike, mystical

Moderate+

Probably the major piece I’d eventually want you to learn

The Berceuse particularly jumps out. It was composed in 1929, is only one page, and the surviving published edition was edited by Marie-Claire Alain.

And the title itself—Berceuse sur deux notes qui cornent—roughly “Lullaby on Two Horn-like/Drone Notes”—tells you something about the conception. It isn’t trying to be a conventional Romantic organ piece. It is almost an exercise in sound, resonance and hypnotic repetition.

That could be fantastic on your synthesizer.

The one I’d especially recommend for you:

Le jardin suspendu

This is the piece I’d put near the center of your Alain exploration.

Le jardin suspendu means “The Hanging Garden.” It has that suspended, non-narrative quality that seems particularly compatible with the kind of Indian/Sant/Rumi mystical sound-world you’ve been exploring.

It isn’t as easy as the Berceuse, but it is not in the same category of technical virtuosity as Litanies or Trois Danses. It appears in the second volume of Alain’s organ works alongside Aria, the Danses à Agni Yavishta, Intermezzo, and Litanies.

And Alain’s music as a whole is remarkably concerned with precisely this territory: mystery, fleeting impressions, serene lullaby, ecstatic dance, and sounds that seem to come from outside conventional Western musical language.

The two

Chorals

could be especially good for you

Choral dorien and Choral phrygien were written in 1935. They’re short, serious, modal pieces rather than flashy organ showpieces.

And there’s an interesting wrinkle: Alain’s “Dorian” and “Phrygian” titles do not correspond simply to the medieval church modes bearing those names; they refer to Alain’s interpretation of the Ancient Greek modes.

That makes them particularly interesting in light of the modal/nada/sacred sound investigations we’ve been doing. I’d be inclined to explore these with you almost as sound studies, not merely as organ repertoire.

Scores: you can start without buying an expensive collection

There is a very useful IMSLP collection of Alain’s organ works, including the three-volume L’œuvre d’orgue.

For example, the Deux Chorals has a six-page complete score available there, and the site even has synthesized/MIDI realizations of both pieces.

The Berceuse is even better for experimenting: the available score is only one page.

So I’d actually suggest not buying anything yet.

Your synthesizer setup could be unusually interesting here

For your Arturia KeyLab + Yamaha P-125 + iPad/MacBook/Ableton setup, Alain is a very good composer to experiment with.

You could take something like the Berceuse and make three versions:

1. Pipe organ

• Principal/Flute foundation

• very little registration change

• let the room provide the reverb

2. “Mystical” synthesizer

• soft flute/air tone

• very slow attack

• long release

• enormous but subtle reverb

• perhaps a quiet drone underneath

3. Hybrid Alain

• Yamaha piano playing the written notes

• Arturia controlling a sustained organ/synth layer

• iPad handling reverb/ambient processing

The important thing would be not to turn Alain into generic New Age music. His strange intervals and modal colors are the interesting part. Keep those intact and simply explore what happens when the timbre changes.

And there is a particularly nice historical reason to do this: Alain himself was fascinated by non-European music and sound, and his music often balances the serene and the ecstatic.

If I were choosing your first 5

I’d make your little “Jehan Alain Mystical Studies” repertoire:

1. Berceuse sur deux notes qui cornent — easiest, hypnotic

2. Grave — very slow and concentrated

3. Choral dorien — modal

4. Choral phrygien — darker modal counterpart

5. Le jardin suspendu — the larger mystical destination

The Grave is also only a one-page work, and IMSLP identifies Marie-Claire Alain as its editor.

I think the Berceuse + Grave are the two we should actually look at first. If you can get the PDFs from IMSLP, we could go through the scores measure by measure and I can tell you: what the notes are doing, what Alain is trying to evoke, how difficult each hand/pedal part really is, what pipe-organ stops I’d use, and then how I would recreate the same spiritual atmosphere on your Arturia/iPad/Ableton setup.