Lunchtime Organ Recital Services: Zsombor Tóth-Vajna (Royal College of Music)

for 30 mins
The Temple Church, London
The Temple Church, Temple, London, EC4Y 1BB, United Kingdom

John Blow (1649–1708)

Psalm 100 · Jubilate Deo
Verse in C Major, No. 2 · after Girolamo Frescobaldi’s Toccata XII
Voluntary in G Major, No. 14
Voluntary in G Minor, No. 18
Psalm 148 · Laudate Dominum de caelis
Verse in G Major, No. 10
Voluntary in G Minor, No. 17
Voluntary in D Minor · after Johann Jakob Froberger’s Ricercar in D minor
Psalm 113 · Laudate, pueri, Dominum

Zsombor Tóth-Vajna is a Hungarian organist, harpsichordist and conductor, and one of the leading international performer-scholars specialising in the organ music of John Blow and English Restoration keyboard repertoire. His work brings historical research into direct dialogue with performance on period instruments, with particular emphasis on reconstructing the sound world and performance practices of late seventeenth-century England. He studied harpsichord and organ at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest with Miklós Spányi, graduating with highest honours, before continuing his studies at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam with Menno van Delft, Richard Egarr and Jacques van Oortmerssen. He also holds a degree in medicine from Semmelweis University in Budapest. At the Royal College of Music in London, Tóth-Vajna devoted his doctoral research to the performance practice, stylistic context and organ culture of Restoration England, with particular emphasis on John Blow. Combining manuscript and archival research with practical experimentation on surviving and historically informed instruments, his work explores organ building, registration, ornamentation, improvisation and musical rhetoric. His research reassesses Blow as a principal architect of post-Restoration English organ culture, and this repertoire has become a central field of his international scholarly and performing activity. He has performed widely across Europe and the United States as a soloist, conductor and continuo player. He is founder and artistic director of the Budapest-based baroque orchestra Harmonia Caelestis and specialises as a conductor in historically informed performance, particularly Purcell, Handel and Bach. With his twin brother Gergely he also appears as the Piano e Forte Duo. He has released ten solo recordings. His distinctions include the Kerpel Prize of Semmelweis University (2013), the Hungarian Bach Prize (2019), the Honorary Medal of Buda Castle and the Hungarian Gold Cross of the Order of Merit (2024). In 2025 he received the Liszt Ferenc Prize, and in 2026 the Pro Cultura Hungarica Award.

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The Temple Church, London

Welcome to the prayerful and beautiful Temple Church, steeped in the history of Christendom, this country and the whole Common Law World. 1162: the Round Church was built to be London’s Jerusalem. 1214–19: Magna Carta was negotiated in the Temple, and its greatest hero was buried in the Church. 1584, 1776, 1787: from Raleigh’s expeditions through the colonial constitutions to the American Declaration of Independence and Constitution, the Temple was the birthplace of American Law. And to this day the Church serves the legal colleges Inner and Middle Temple, London’s residents, visiting jurists and travellers from all over the world with some of the most uplifting services, music and discussions in London.

How can so ancient a building be equipped to serve the modern age in prayer and praise and engagement with the socio-legal challenges facing Britain and the wider world? Through Restoration & Renewal: Equipping the Temple Church for the next 100 Years, a major programme of refurbishment and repair, energised and supported by The Friends of the Temple Church.

Robin Griffith-Jones Master of the Temple
Mark Hatcher Reader of the Temple

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Lunchtime Organ Recital Services: Zsombor Tóth-Vajna (Royal College of Music)

for 30 mins
The Temple Church, London
The Temple Church, Temple, London, EC4Y 1BB, United Kingdom

John Blow (1649–1708)

Psalm 100 · Jubilate Deo
Verse in C Major, No. 2 · after Girolamo Frescobaldi’s Toccata XII
Voluntary in G Major, No. 14
Voluntary in G Minor, No. 18
Psalm 148 · Laudate Dominum de caelis
Verse in G Major, No. 10
Voluntary in G Minor, No. 17
Voluntary in D Minor · after Johann Jakob Froberger’s Ricercar in D minor
Psalm 113 · Laudate, pueri, Dominum

Zsombor Tóth-Vajna is a Hungarian organist, harpsichordist and conductor, and one of the leading international performer-scholars specialising in the organ music of John Blow and English Restoration keyboard repertoire. His work brings historical research into direct dialogue with performance on period instruments, with particular emphasis on reconstructing the sound world and performance practices of late seventeenth-century England. He studied harpsichord and organ at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest with Miklós Spányi, graduating with highest honours, before continuing his studies at the Conservatorium van Amsterdam with Menno van Delft, Richard Egarr and Jacques van Oortmerssen. He also holds a degree in medicine from Semmelweis University in Budapest. At the Royal College of Music in London, Tóth-Vajna devoted his doctoral research to the performance practice, stylistic context and organ culture of Restoration England, with particular emphasis on John Blow. Combining manuscript and archival research with practical experimentation on surviving and historically informed instruments, his work explores organ building, registration, ornamentation, improvisation and musical rhetoric. His research reassesses Blow as a principal architect of post-Restoration English organ culture, and this repertoire has become a central field of his international scholarly and performing activity. He has performed widely across Europe and the United States as a soloist, conductor and continuo player. He is founder and artistic director of the Budapest-based baroque orchestra Harmonia Caelestis and specialises as a conductor in historically informed performance, particularly Purcell, Handel and Bach. With his twin brother Gergely he also appears as the Piano e Forte Duo. He has released ten solo recordings. His distinctions include the Kerpel Prize of Semmelweis University (2013), the Hungarian Bach Prize (2019), the Honorary Medal of Buda Castle and the Hungarian Gold Cross of the Order of Merit (2024). In 2025 he received the Liszt Ferenc Prize, and in 2026 the Pro Cultura Hungarica Award.

More info Join online

Safeguarding

The care and protection of children, young people and vulnerable adults who are involved in Church activities is the responsibility of the whole Church. Everyone who participates in the life of the Church has a role to play in promoting a Safer Church for all.This Safeguarding Policy is based on the Safeguarding Policy Statement of the Church of England that was agreed and published by the House of Bishops in 2017. It sets out the Safeguarding Policy of the Diocese of London and in particular a summary of the roles and responsibilities of all church bodies and office holders as we work together to protect children, young people and vulnerable adults who are involved in church activities.

This policy makes six overarching policy commitments:

To promote a safer environment and culture
To enable and ensure safe recruitment practice and to support all those within the Church with any responsibility related to children, young people, and vulnerable adults
To respond promptly to every safeguarding concern or allegation
To offer pastoral care to victims/survivors of abuse and other affected persons
To offer pastoral care to those who are the subject of concerns or allegations of abuse and other affected persons
To respond to those who may pose a present risk to others.

https://www.templechurch.com/application/files/7216/2074/0149/Temple_Church_Safeguarding_Policy_revi

The Temple Church, London Charity No. 1205712