Anna Lapwood made the good old organ cool

Anna Lapwood is considered an exceptional figure in the classical music world. The organist has completely rejuvenated the image of her instrument, which is often associated with older music and the church. This fills her as a musician with new energy, she said during a meeting in London. And indeed, she speaks with radiant enthusiasm, yet completely unpretentious, about her music on the organ, her interaction with her audience, and the opportunity to inspire people with classical music—even those who have had nothing to do with it before.

Anna Lapwood's story is about years of hard work, which form the basis for the almost fairytale-like twists and turns of her life. The unique nature of her instrument played a role in one of these coincidences. Hardly anyone has an organ the size Lapwood needs at home. This means that she rehearses her music in unfamiliar rooms and meets strangers. Her rehearsal room in London is the Royal Albert Hall, one of the largest organs in the world, with more than 10,000 pipes and 147 stops. Organists can only practice on it when there is no other activity, usually in the middle of the night, from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. Lapwood then rehearses until she can catch the first train to Cambridgeshire, where she lives, at dawn.

But you're not really alone in the Royal Albert Hall's gigantic hall, even at night. Meanwhile, cleaning crews sweep, and workers, already preparing for the next event, are busy. One night, the musician Bonobo, known for his ambient and downbeat productions, was also there. Bonobo was so impressed by Lapwood's playing that he spontaneously invited her to perform with him the next evening. He gave her sheet music; time was short; but what followed was a pivotal moment of her life.

It was a truly grand show: In the middle of Bonobo's piece, the giant organ, which had previously been in darkness, was bathed in dazzling light – like an apparition from another world, with considerable cinematic effect. "I was moving far outside my comfort zone," Lapwood recalls. "But it was one of the most magical moments of my musical life." In a seamless transition to Bonobo's pounding beat, Anna Lapwood made the organ ring out, playing her way into another realm of fame that evening.

Suddenly, young people who had previously been indifferent to organ music or had barely heard of it became interested in her art. Today, the interest of new audiences is no longer solely due to Lapwood's collaboration with Bonobo, but rather to her fundamental willingness to cross-over the spectrum in her performances: pop, classical, film music—she incorporates everything that suits her own preferences. She enjoys film scores by Erich Wolfgang Korngold and Hans Zimmer, but also Taylor Swift. Added to this is a talent for communication that spans all media channels.

She hosts concerts at the Proms and radio shows; she's a gifted communicator and sees digital media as a valuable platform for gaining new listeners. "I'm actually very shy and introverted. But I've seen the power artists have—for example, when it comes to a misunderstood instrument like the organ: I can demonstrate why I'm so passionate about it." On stage, she tells "personal stories" that captivate the audience. She also gives lectures on topics such as resilience and expanding one's boundaries, and, not yet thirty years old, she's already talking about wanting to help the next generation.

She now has a million followers on Instagram alone. Lapwood thinks inclusively and knows that a sense of community develops among her fans when they take clips and photos during her concerts, which they then share afterward. She speaks of "community" and shared emotional experiences – in which she also participates. She is carried by the enthusiasm of her fans and doesn't mind being filmed during performances, as long as mobile phones don't disturb other audience members. The fact that the BBC named her the "Tiktok Organist" doesn't bother her at all. As one English presenter put it, she has made the organ "cool" and is "the most visible organist in the world."

Her career began quite differently: with choirs behind college walls in Oxford and Cambridge. Her parents had even met in a choir. Lapwood's path to choral music led via a three-year organ scholarship at Magdalen College – with an all-male choir. Having attended a girls' school, she was the first woman to hold this position, which had existed for more than 500 years, and where she mastered the "steepest learning curve" of her life.

At 21, she was appointed the youngest Director of Music at an Oxbridge college. At Pembroke College, she was responsible for all choral music activities. In practice, this mainly meant conducting the various choirs. She had worked for nine years as Director of Music at Pembroke in Cambridge, a dream job with great responsibility, as she explains. But she wanted to play the organ again, write and commission pieces. At that time, she decided to accept all requests for organ playing for a year and then make a decision – choir or organ. That was in 2019. And then Covid came. During the lockdown, she founded an online choir with more than 1,000 NHS employees, which she still raves about today. Whatever happened back then: "I played the organ eight hours a day. That was the beginning of what I do now," she says.

She developed her love of music early on – out of admiration for her brother, who repeatedly learned instruments that she then wanted to master. He gave up music, and she continued. The only reason there was a piano in her grandmother's house was because a fortune teller at a circus had prophesied that one of her children would develop a great talent for music. In the end, none of her children ever worked as musicians. But a generation later, her granddaughter fulfilled the prophecy, and her grandmother triumphed. The piano, along with the harp, is still one of the many instruments that Anna Lapwood plays today, along with the organ: "From a very early age, music was the most natural form of communication for me."

Many things in her life have emerged organically, through encounters and events, to which she wants to remain open. She certainly didn't plan her career the way it is now. "I don't have a five-year plan—but I know what I want to do in the next two years."

She'll soon embark on a world tour. She'll be performing at Hamburg's Elbphilharmonie and the Sydney Opera House, and she'll be performing in Nuremberg, Cologne, and Dresden. A new album ("Firedove") has also just been released, which, she says, perfectly reflects her personality. It brings together pieces from a wide variety of genres, from pop and film music to French organ romanticism—a bold mix, but presented without the pandering attitude that would fool listeners into thinking a Bob Dylan song and an organ prelude by Maurice Duruflé are somehow the same thing.

Anna Lapwood loves many things about her instrument, including its expressive range: "You can play the softest part or shake the entire building." Almost every concert sounds different because it's played on different organs in different venues. "Since I've approached the instrument in my own way and no longer adhere to what others have dictated, I've lost the feeling of being separate from it. It's like putting on armor. Or as if the instrument and I are creating this sound together. You can claim so much space for yourself in such a positive way. I highly recommend it to everyone."