Harpsichord News

Recital programming: Program notes

Seated one day at the harpsichord, I was weary and ill at ease because the mid-July deadline for this column was approaching too rapidly, and my mind, in its summer mode, seemed frail as a lily, too weak for a thought as I searched for a topic. And then, a miracle: the printed program from my harpsichord recital at the 2012 East Texas Pipe Organ Festival fell out of a score. Rereading it brought not only a wave of nostalgia, but also a sense of continued satisfaction at both the balance and variety of the chosen pieces, selected painstakingly to present contrasting musical styles as well as offering a bit of respite to the ears of the festival participants who heard a number of organ recitals each day.

Some vignettes about the unusual logistics required to present this program at Trinity Episcopal Church in Longview on my 74th birthday may be found in The Diapason’s Harpsichord News column published in February 2013 (page 20). If any readers are curious, I refer them to that issue, which also contains Neal Campbell’s thoughtful commentaries on the entire 2012 festival. What follows in this month’s column has not appeared previously in The Diapason. These are my “notes to the program.” I present them now as examples of brief word pictures intended to aid a listener’s understanding of music that, for many, was probably being heard for the first time. As for the selections, I specifically tried to choose at least some works by composers who might be familiar to organists, while offering a variety of musical styles, durations, and tonalities both major and minor. 

The program notes

Introduction to the Program: The Italian composer Giovanni Maria Trabaci wrote in the Preface to Book II of his Pieces ‘per ogni (all) strumenti, ma ispecialmente per i Cimbali e gli Organi’ [1615]: “the harpsichord is the lord of all instruments in the world and on it everything may be played with ease.” [“il Cimbalo è Signor di tutti l’istromenti del mondo, et in lui si possono sonare ogni  cosa con facilità.”]  

While I am not totally convinced of the ease of playing offered by some of these contrasting selections from the contemporary and Baroque repertoires, I do suggest that each one of them has musical interest. The pieces by John Challis and Duke Ellington are probably unique to my repertoire since they remain unpublished.

The program

A Triptych for Harpsichord (1982)—Gerald Near (b. 1942). In addition to writing a wonderful Concerto for Harpsichord and Strings for me to premiere at the American Guild of Organists national convention in the Twin Cities in 1980, Gerald responded to my request for a new work to play at a recital for the Dallas Museum of Art’s major El Greco exhibition in 1983. The three brief contrasting movements suggest bells (“Carillon”), an amorous dance (“Siciliano”), and a homage to the harpsichord works of Domenico Scarlatti and Manuel de Falla (“Final”). 

Sonate pour Claveçin (1958)—Bohuslav Martinů (1890–1959). During the final year of his life, in response to a commission from the Swiss harpsichordist Antoinette Vischer, Martinů composed this compact, but major, Sonate. Essentially it is a piece in one movement with three sections: the first and last are kaleidoscopic, filled with brief colorful musical ideas; the second is gentle and nostalgic, as the homesick expatriate composer makes short allusions to two beloved iconic Czech works: the Wenceslaus Chorale and Dvorák’s Cello Concerto. While quite “pianistic” in its demands, the Sonate also allows brilliant use of the harpsichord’s two keyboards in realizing both Martinů’s magical sonorities and his occasional use of bitonality.

“Chaconne in D Minor” (Partita for Solo Violin, BWV 1004)—Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), arranged for harpsichord solo by John Challis (1907–1974). One of Bach’s most-often transcribed works, this particular setting for harpsichord by the pioneering American early instrument maker survives only in a manuscript submitted for copyright (on Bach’s birthday in 1944), now preserved in the Library of Congress, Washington D.C., Challis also was an early advocate of variable tempi in Baroque music, serving as a mentor in that respect to organist E. Power Biggs, who proudly owned one of the builder’s impressive large pedal instruments.¹

A Single Petal of a Rose (1965)—Duke Ellington (1899–1974), edited in 1985 by Igor Kipnis and Dave Brubeck, and by Larry Palmer in 2012. Edward Kennedy Ellington responded to Antoinette Vischer’s request for a piece by sending her a piano transcription of his A Single Petal of a Rose, a work already dedicated to the British monarch Queen Elizabeth II. When American harpsichordist Kipnis asked if I could point him to Ellington’s unique work for harpsichord, I referred him to the facsimile of Ellington’s manuscript published in Ule Troxler’s book Antoinette Vischer, which details the works to be found in the Vischer Collection at the Sacher Foundation in Basel, Switzerland. (See “The A-Team,” The Diapason, February 2017, pp. 12–13.) Years later, Kipnis sent me his one-page transcription for harpsichord, an arrangement made in collaboration with his friend, the jazz great Dave Brubeck. To fit my hands and harpsichord I have made some further adjustments to their arrangement of this lovely, gentle work.²

La D’Héricourt; La Lugeac—Claude-Bénigne Balbastre (1727–1799). These are two of the most idiomatic of French harpsichord works from the eighteenth century, and none is more so than the one honoring M. l’Abbé d’Héricourt, Conseiller de Grand’ Chambre. With the tempo marking “noblement,” this composition stays mostly in the middle range of the harpsichord, a particularly resonant glory of the eighteenth-century French instruments. In contrast, the boisterous, “music-hall” qualities of La Lugeac suggest that it may be named for Charles-Antoine de Guerin, a page to King Louis XV. Known subsequently as the Marquis de Lugeac, the former page became secretary and companion to the Marquis de Valery, the king’s representative to the court of Frederick the Great. The American harpsichordist and conductor Alan Curtis, who edited Balbastre’s keyboard works, noted that “few Italianate jigs—Scarlatti not even excepted—can match the outrageously bumptious and attractive La Lugeac.”

“Lambert’s Fireside,” “De la Mare’s Pavane,” and “Hughes’ Ballet” (from the collection Lambert’s Clavichord, 1926–1928)—Herbert Howells (1892–1983). The composer was the next to youngest person pictured in a 1923 book of Modern British Composers comprising 17 master portraits by the photographer and clavichord maker Herbert Lambert of Bath. As a tangible expression of gratitude for this honor, Howells requested 11 of his fellow sitters each to contribute a short characteristic piece to be presented to the photographer. All acquiesced, but one year later, only Howells had composed anything for the project, so he wrote the additional 11 pieces himself. Issued in 1928 by Oxford University Press, Lambert’s Clavichord was the first new music for clavichord to be published in the twentieth century. Several questions regarding names found in the titles as well as a few printed notes that were suspect led me to schedule a London interview with the composer during a 1974 trip to the UK, a meeting that led ultimately to my commissioning the Dallas Canticles, as well as a respectful, unforgettable friendship with the elderly master.³

Toccata in E Minor, BWV 914—J. S.
Bach. The shortest of the composer’s seven toccatas for harpsichord, the E Minor consists of an introduction (with an organ-pedal-like opening figure insistently repeated six times); a contrapuntal   “poco” Allegro; a dramatic recitative (Adagio); and a driving, perpetual motion three-voice fugue. Musicologist David Schulenberg (in The Keyboard Music of J. S. Bach; Schirmer Books, New York, 1992) noted the close similarity of the fugue’s opening and some subsequent passages to an anonymous work from a Naples manuscript ascribed to Benedetto Marcello. While it was not unusual for Baroque composers to borrow from (and improve upon) existing works, the amount of pre-existing material utilized in this particular fugue is greater than normal; however, as Schulenberg concludes, “[Bach] nevertheless made characteristic alterations.” I would add that in no way do these borrowings detract from the visceral excitement of Bach’s propulsive and dramatic conclusion.

Heads up: Registration for the 2017 ETPOF

According to the East Texas Pipe Organ Festival website there is still an opportunity to register (at discounted prices) for the star-studded programs planned for this year’s festival. But do not delay: the opportunity for savings expires on September 15. Visit: http://easttexaspipeorganfestival.com.

Recent losses 

Elizabeth Chojnacka (born September 10, 1939, in Warsaw) died in Paris on May 28. Celebrated for her virtuosic keyboard technique, Chojnacka was known primarily as an avid and exciting performer of contemporary harpsichord music. Her renderings of all three of the solo harpsichord works by Ligeti are highly lauded, and the composer honored her by dedicating the third, Hungarian Rock, to her.

Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini (born October 7, 1929, in Bologna) died in that Italian city on July 11. Organist, harpsichordist, scholar, and instrument collector, Luigi was well known to us in Dallas, having been a guest at Southern Methodist University on several occasions. Most memorably, he was part of the so-designated “Haarlem Trio” organized by Robert Anderson as a week-long postscript to the 1972 American Guild of Organists convention in Dallas. The three major European visiting artists for that event—Marie-Claire Alain, Anton Heiller, and Tagliavini—each gave daily masterclasses for the large number of participants who remained in Dallas for a second week of study with these annual leaders of the Haarlem Summer Academies in the Netherlands, resulting in what may be the only time in Southern Methodist University history that the organ department achieved a financial surplus rather than a deficit!

Two vignettes from that stellar week have become an unforgettable part of   Dallas’s musical history: Luigi’s chosen workshop topic was the organ music of Girolamo Frescobaldi, and he had assigned to the prize-winning finalists from the AGO Young Organists’ Competition all of the pieces contained in that composer’s liturgical settings for organ, known as Fiori Musicali. One of the finalists who had not won an AGO prize left Dallas in high dudgeon. Unfortunately, this participant had been assigned the very first piece in this set of “Musical Flowers.” Professor Tagliavini began his afternoon class with a brief overview of the work’s history and importance, and then peered over his glasses as he announced, “And now we will hear the first piece, Frescobaldi’s ‘Toccata avanti della Messa’.”

The total lack of response became embarrassing; there was no respondent. So our guest teacher moved on to the next piece. And thus it was that each afternoon session began with the same question from Luigi: “And who will play the ‘Toccata avanti della Messa’?”—always followed by total silence. A stickler for completeness, on the fifth and final day of the course Luigi made his same query, again to no avail. So with his usual smile and slight lisp he intoned, “Then I shall play the ‘Toccata avanti della Messa’!” And so he did with total mastery and grace. And all was well within the Italian Baroque solar system,  for Frescobaldi’s magnum opus was, at last, complete in Dallas!

The second vignette, equally Luigi-esque, occurred when Dr. Anderson, always volatile and energetic, and I were awaiting Tagliavini’s arrival to play an evening organ recital for the workshop audience. It was scheduled to begin at 8 p.m. and by five minutes before that hour Dr. Anderson was pacing the corridor near the door to the Caruth Auditorium stage. With less than two minutes to spare, Luigi ambled down the hallway. Bob called out, “Luigi, hurry!” To which the unflappable Italian stopped walking, carefully placed his leather briefcase on the floor, and, with his characteristically kindly smile, said, “Why, Bob? Has the recital already begun?” ν

Notes

1. For further information see my essay, “John Challis and Bach’s Chaconne in D Minor,” in Music and Its Questions: Essays in Honor of Peter Williams, edited by Thomas Donahue (Organ Historical Society Press, 2007); and my CD recording of the Bach transcription on Hommages for Harpsichord (SoundBoard 2008).

2. Concerning Lambert’s Clavichord, see my chapter on Herbert Howells in Twentieth Century Organ Music, edited by Christopher Anderson (Routledge, 2012).

A posthumous gift from Gustav Leonardt

It is now six years since Gustav Leonhardt departed this mortal coil on January 16, 2012, but his idiomatic arrangements of J. S. Bach’s solo violin and cello suites, partitas, and sonatas have recently been published by Bärenreiter-Verlag. This new volume presents an unexpected New Year’s gift to those of us who had feared that the master harpsichordist’s transcriptions of some of the composer’s most beloved music might have been burned along with the bulk of his personal correspondence.

Issued in the familiar-looking blue Bach Edition as Suites, Partitas, Sonatas Transcribed for Harpsichord (BA 11820, ˇ39.95) the idiomatic arrangements have been prepared for publication by Leonhardt’s friend and student Sieba Henstra, who has contributed a comprehensive editorial commentary. Skip Sempé’s eloquent preface quotes Bach contemporaries Jacob Adlung and Johann Friedrich Agricola, both of whom wrote about Bach’s own keyboard performances of these works that were originally written for bowed string instruments. Sempé concludes by quoting Leonhardt’s own words from the Dutchman’s notes to a 1976 recording: “I think that Bach would have forgiven me for the fact that I have set myself to making arrangements of his works; whether or not he would have forgiven the way I have done it, remains, of course, a moot point.”

The following 135 pages of music comprise the violin sonatas in D minor, transposed from the original G minor, BWV 1001; in G major, from C major, BWV 1005; three Partitas, in E minor, from the original B minor, BWV 1002; G minor, from D, BWV 1004; and A major, from E, BWV 1006. The cello suites in E-flat, BWV 1010, C minor, BWV 1011, and D major, BWV 1012, are transcribed without a change of key; and two individual movements, an Allemande in A minor, from Bach’s Partita for Flute, BWV 1013, and “Sarabande in C Minor” from his Suite for Lute, BWV 997, are likewise both transcribed in their original keys.

It has been an unmitigated pleasure to play through these magnificent pieces and a special joy to have another musical connection to a great mentor and friend­—the opportunity to play Leonhardt’s harpsichord-friendly version of the extensive D-Minor Ciaccona for Solo Violin (which sounds magnificent in its higher G minor key) and to compare it with the thicker, more pianistic arrangement by John Challis (his 1941 manuscript found at the Library of Congress, still unpublished). I recommend this new volume to all harpsichordists who love Bach’s music, and I wish for each player the unique joy of experiencing yet another addition to our ever-expanding keyboard repertoire.

G. L. dubs me his “Doctor-Father”

An excerpt from a letter received from Professor Leonhardt, dated Amsterdam, June 3, 2003:

Dear Larry,

. . . Fond memories bring me back to Dallas’ SMU [Southern Methodist University]. Do you know that you started my series [of honorary degrees]? Followers were Amsterdam, Harvard, Metz and Padova . . .

With all best wishes,

Yours ever,

Utti L.

A lengthy backstory is involved, the culmination of many years of varied experiences with Leonhardt.  

I first visited Haarlem, the Netherlands, during the summer of 1958 when fellow Oberlin organ major Max Yount and I drove through much of northern Europe following our junior year at the Salzburg Mozarteum. We spent several days in the charming Dutch town, attending events sponsored by its annual Summer Academy. Four years later, after completing doctoral study at the Eastman School in Rochester, New York, I was hired for my first academic position at St. Paul’s College, Lawrenceville, Virginia, a small school where I taught for two years as a replacement music professor while the incumbent was pursuing his doctoral studies. Following that first year of teaching I returned to Europe during the summer break to attend the first of my two Haarlem summer academies. The year was 1964, and my purpose was to join the three-week class of intensive harpsichord studies with Professor Gustav Leonhardt.

Three years later I returned to Haarlem, full of ideas and solutions that had been developing since that first encounter with Leonhardt’s teaching. By this time I was fully convinced that his examples of number symbolism and its hidden truths in many Bach works were indeed correct as well as fascinating. We had a very full repertoire assignment for that summer of 1967, and many of the participants in Leonhardt’s classes were too reticent to volunteer as players. I was not afraid to play for him, so I was invited to do so quite frequently. And, since I was staying with a friend in Amsterdam this time around, it happened that I usually arrived at the train station about the same time as my professor. We would have coffee together as we made the short trip to Haarlem, and I came to know Leonhardt as a delightful travel companion, as well as an inspiring teacher.

After my 1970 move to teach in Dallas there were quite a few opportunities to hear Leonhardt during his various concert trips to the United States. As a member of SMU’s faculty senate for 12 years, eventually I was named chair of the Honorary Degrees Committee. Perusing a list of past recipients I noted that artists, musicians, and women seemed to be few and far between in the honors lists, so I proposed three names to the senate: Georgia O’Keeffe, Leonard Bernstein, and Gustav Leonhardt. My faculty colleagues were enthusiastic about all three of them. 

The university president, however, not so much. There was a rule that each honors recipient had to appear in person to receive the degree. Georgia O’Keeffe let it be known that she did not need the honor, but would be happy to accept it if it were bestowed in a balloon over Albuquerque. I suggested that a video could be made of such an event, one that would surely arouse far-reaching interest throughout the entire United States. The president nearly had apoplexy, and that idea was scuttled at once. Leonard Bernstein was already scheduled to be in Dallas to conduct a benefit concert in SMU’s McFarlin Auditorium on the next day following commencement. In this instance I suggested that his degree ceremony be postponed until that evening, when it would make sense to bestow Lennie’s honor during the concert’s intermission. Again, it was too radical an idea, and Bernstein’s honorary degree also was denied.

Leonhardt already had concert commitments on the date of the ceremonies for 1982, but he communicated to SMU’s administrators that he would be delighted to arrange his schedule to accept his first doctorate the following year. Thus it was that on May 21, 1983, I had the proud honor of reading Gustav Leonhardt’s doctoral citation, ending with the time-honored statement, “In recognition of his consummate artistry and service to the world of music, Southern Methodist University is proud to confer upon Gustav Leonhardt the degree Doctor of Music, honoris causa.” 

Shortly thereafter he suggested that, from henceforth, it need not be “Dr. Leonhardt” or “Dr. Palmer,” but, in friendship, the time had come for us to use first names, even the diminutive “Utti” that his close friends were invited to call him.

As part of Utti’s commencement weekend in Dallas he gave a solo recital (which included his transcription of the D-Minor Violin Partita), conducted a harpsichord masterclass for our students, and served as the much-appreciated speaker for the evening ceremony during which each School of the Arts student walked across the stage to receive the diploma signifying a degree that had been granted that morning at the all-university ceremony. Utti had found a 17th-century English poem about a hard-drinking British university student, a word picture that soon had his audience convulsed in paroxysms of laughter. We had many post-ceremony requests for that text, but we never procured a copy of it. I still wonder if, perhaps, Utti, who had a very droll sense of humor, might not have composed the poem himself?

At any rate, I found it amusing, as did he, that a student should become the “Doctor-Father” for his teacher, the whole concept of which has to do with the thesis advisor for the philosophy doctorate in German academia. It has occurred to me that, in writing this long-overdue memoir, my delight at the publication of Leonhardt’s lovely Bach transcriptions may be the final award for such a brilliant “thesis” and should require the time-honored repetition of the words, “Welcome to the company of scholars.” But of course, he had been in that company already for a very, very long time.

2017 Harpsichord News columns: a guide

January: According to Janus: columns published in 2016; the East Texas Pipe Organ Festival 2016: two vignettes; possible future topics.

February: The A-Team: Antoinette Vischer and her commissions of contemporary harpsichord music.

March: Lessons from (François) Couperin: hints for harpsichord pedagogy using his L’art de toucher le Claveçin.

April: Where next? More pedagogical repertory suggestions.

May: An Italian Christmas; Paul Wolfe; Glen Wilson’s Froberger CD.

June: Harpsichord maker Richard Kingston: a tribute for his 70th birthday.

July: Celebrating Scott Ross; a performance practice letter from Beverly Scheibert, Early Keyboard Journal #30; remembering Isolde Ahlgrimm.

August: Christmas in August: reviews of J. William Greene’s Christmas Ayres and Dances, Book 2, a new CD of Stephen Dodgson’s Inventions for Harpsichord, and Meredith Kirkpatrick’s book, Reflections of an American Harpsichordist, essays by her uncle, Ralph Kirkpatrick.

September: Recital programming: sample program notes by LP from a harpsichord recital at the East Texas Pipe Organ Festival, 2012.

October: From the Harpsichord Editor’s mailbox: four new keyboard scores by Carson Cooman; John Turner’s discovery of a lost cantata (with harpsichord) by British composer Alan Rawsthorne; and Mark Schweizer’s 14th Liturgical Mystery.

November: From A to Z: Aliénor retrospective in May 2018 and SMU’s Meadows Museum Zurbarân Exhibition celebrated musically at the 1762 Caetano Oldovini organ.

December: Remembering Zuzana Ru˚žicˇková by Robert Tifft.

The A Team:
Antoinette Vischer’s
Commissions for Harpsichord

Marguerite Bertha Antoinette Vischer (born February 13, 1909, in Basel, Switzerland) was the only child of a wealthy banker and his wife. She began her musical career as a pianist, and, with the connections that her affluent family was able to provide, had a fair success, although her hands were smaller than ideal for a pianistic career. In 1931 Vischer began her harpsichord studies in Vienna with Herr Erhard Kranz, and there she made her debut as a harpsichordist on an instrument of undoubtedly sturdy character, as was the wont of Germanic production instruments of the time. A brief press notice of the concert informed the public that “Fräulein Vischer played Bach’s C Minor Fantasia and Fugue on a harpsichord loaned by Herr von Hoboken.”

During the same year, probably at the suggestion of Basel’s musical guru Paul Sacher, Vischer studied with Wanda Lan-dowska, the reigning priestess of the harpsichord, at her “temple of early music” in St-Leu-la-Fôret, near Paris. Although it is not known just how many lessons Vischer had with Mme. Landowska, a communication regarding the price of study exists in the Vischer Collection at the Sacher Foundation: private lessons cost 400 French francs each; a bargain package of three could be had for 1,000.

Rolf Liebermann

Back home in Switzerland, Vischer spent the next 21 years concentrating on “old” music. She developed a group of devotees for her early music house concerts, many of them with collaborators Max Meili, tenor, and Fritz Wörsching, lutenist. It was the Swiss composer and international opera administrator Rolf Liebermann who initiated Vischer’s interest in contemporary music, beginning with a question to her, “Why only old music?” Since the harpsichordist admired Liebermann’s polyphonic style of writing, she offered her first commission to him, resulting in his Musique pour clavecin in 1952. An astute multi-faceted musician and administrator, Liebermann encouraged Vischer to record. Her first essay in this format included Liebermann’s new piece as well as a work by another Swiss composer, George Gruntz.

Bohuslav Martinů

Liebermann also served as Vischer’s conduit to other composers: a 1958 letter affirms his fulfillment of Vischer’s wish that he contact Bohuslav Martinů, the Czech composer, at that time resident in Switzerland. This connection led to one of Vischer’s finest commissions, Martinů’s 1958 Sonate pour clavecin, as well as his Deux Impromptus, two small satellite pieces completed in 1959, the year of the expatriate composer’s death.

From that first 1952 commission until Vischer’s death in 1973 she commissioned at least 44 new works that bolstered (and sometimes battered) the contemporary harpsichord repertoire. Composers rarely refused her offers: that she was the only daughter of a Swiss banker doubtless helped, but it was evident as well that she was interested in novel forms of musical expression—the more startling the sounds, or the method of producing them, the better.

Maurice Ohana

In 1960 Vischer turned to the French-Spanish-Moroccan composer Maurice Ohana. His Carillons for the Hours of the Day and of the Night incorporated bell-like clusters, the French folksong Frère Jacques, and, for the accommodation of her small hands, two wooden rulers, one 12-inch, one 13½-inch, to achieve the spans of large diatonic and chromatic tone clusters, triple forte, composed as conclusion for the evocative work.

Luciano Berio

Vischer first met Luciano Berio during the intermission of a concert in Basel, and she gladly accepted the composer’s invitation to visit him in Milan. Was it, perhaps, the influence of the “many shared whiskeys” which led to the unusual format of that harpsichord composition, Rounds? This graphic work is to be played right-side up, then upside down, and finally repeated in its original format, but at a faster tempo. Perhaps because of the vocal prowess of Berio’s wife Cathy Berberian, a voice part was added for an alternative version, which was the one Vischer chose to employ for her recording of the work.

In the waning years of the twentieth century when I visited the Sacher Foundation for some research in the Vischer Collection, it was a delight to discover a letter to Vischer from my first harpsichord teacher, Isolde Ahlgrimm, who wrote:

Congratulations on the recording [of] the Berio piece . . . . I find it fantastically played. I am, presently, in need of help because one of my students wishes to play the Berio without voice part, and I cannot read this notation. Never-the-less I am of the opinion that one cannot disregard this music, which is much better written than all the ‘Pseudo-Bach’ with wrong notes. (Letter dated February 10, 1970)

Cathy Berberian

The visit to Milan also resulted in a second commission: “Hurrah!” wrote Vischer. “Cathy [Berberian] will make for me a piece. I think some sort of moscitos [sic] played with the right hand, and the left has to kill the moscito with claps on my knee!” The “score” of this creation consists of a pre-addressed postcard to be mailed to the composer, with the request for a return message; a table for translating that message into a rhythmic form of Morse code; a sample sketch of how this all works, followed by an outline of a possible performance, illustrating how the right hand begins playing notes at the very top of the keyboard, then descends gradually to the bass register, finally killing the imaginary buzzing mosquito by slapping the right hand with the left and exclaiming loudly “SPLAT.” The title of this “drama in music,” Morsicathy, is a four-way pun: Morsi is the Morse code used for the rhythm; Cathy is the author of the original message and the piece; Morsicat(h)y is the phonetic spelling of the Italian word “morsicati” or “bitten”—the fate of mosquito victims; Mors is the Latin word for death, and also the fate of THIS imaginary insect.

John Cage and Lejaren Hiller

Berberian’s piece is a jolly scherzo compared to the mega-happening created by Americans John Cage and Lejaren Hiller. As early as 1962 Vischer had requested a work from the bad boy of chance music (John Cage), and had been put off with the suggestion that she consider performing a work that already existed: his models of indeterminacy Variations I and II. By 1967, however, Cage was thinking forward to a grand-scale extravaganza that came to be known as HPSCHD (the computer’s six-letter name for the instrument).

While engaged in another of his “chance” performances, Cage typed a letter to Vischer (the amplified sounds of his typewriter forming one strand of the in-progress composition), requesting that she consider a trip to Illinois for the realization of his HPSCHD master plan. Eventually, it all came together, comprising the simultaneous collaboration of seven harpsichordists playing random bits, Mozart excerpts chosen according to patterns from the Chinese I Ching, together with the assistance of 52 tape machines, 59 power amplifiers, 59 loud speakers, 40 projected motion-picture films, 208 computer-generated tapes, 6,400 slides shown by 64 projectors . . . a dizzying and overwhelming four and one-half hour assault on the senses in this May 16, 1969, premiere at the Assembly Hall of the University of Illinois, Urbana. The New York Times described it as “the multimedia event of the decade.”

In a review of the Nonesuch recording of HPSCHD, Igor Kipnis commented that “At first noisy, this ‘experience’ ultimately becomes one of tedium and almost unrelieved boredom. Personally, I find the New York Subway offers as much sonic anarchy, and at least there you are getting from one place to another.” (Stereo Review, May 1970, p. 121.)

The price for this celebrity commission was 1,000 Swiss francs, the same amount paid to Martinů for his Sonate.

Duke Ellington

Another Vischer commission is the only harpsichord-related piece from the great jazz artist Duke Ellington, who at the request of a friend, had sent a copy of his A Single Petal of a Rose to Vischer at Christmas 1965. A longtime aficionado of jazz, Vischer included it on her Wergo recording Das moderne Cembalo, although correspondence shows that she was not certain if this work was dedicated to her, or whether the Duke planned to write something else for her. When at last she had the opportunity to meet Ellington following his concert in Basel, she presented him with a tape of her performance. As she remarked, “The tape fit under the arm more easily than a harpsichord.” Ellington was quite pleased with the sound of the piece on her instrument, but he had to admit that he could not dedicate the work to her because it was “already dedicated to another lady.” “Who might that be?” she inquired. “Why, Her Majesty, the Queen of England,” Ellington responded. 

Györgi Ligeti

When Hungarian composer György Ligeti moved to the West in 1956 he espoused electronic music and the current avant-garde musical scene almost immediately. It was, however, not until 1965 that Vischer contacted him to suggest the possibility of a commission. He assured her right away that he was interested, and that the size of her hands would present no difficulty, since he planned to write something using narrow intervals. Completed in January 1968, Ligeti’s ”four-minute-or-less” composition Continuum is undoubtedly THE masterwork of all Vischer’s commissions. It holds the position, for many of us, as the single most original solo harpsichord composition of the twentieth century.

Some of the composer’s written comments to Vischer are enlightening: “I conceived the work completely from the instrument.” [January 30, 1968.] “It should sound like a Zephyr wind—more like Debussy, had he composed for harpsichord.” [April 11, 1968.] “Play Continuum irrationally fast: even faster than possible.” [February 15, 1968.] Improbable velocity is exactly what Vischer achieved in her recording! That the notes may have been recorded an octave lower and re-recorded at double speed is made clear by Ligeti’s constant urging Vischer to play faster and his additional comments about recording studio manipulation in a letter of June 19, 1968, and by the known fact that Vischer’s virtuosity did not extend to this level of dexterity in any other of her known performances.

It was, as well, an expensive commission for her: Ligeti refused to accept the standard 1,000 Swiss franc honorarium and charged her double that amount, explaining, “I spend much time on small works, reworking them to my satisfaction.” [October 16, 1965.] The sheer physical effort of writing so many notes was certainly worth the higher fee, as was the outstanding masterpiece received. At last a genius had provided a harpsichord work totally without any neo-baroque tendencies or antique references, but one that fit the instrument’s capabilities in a perfectly idiomatic manner by exploiting the trill and tremolando throughout.

Mauricio Kagel

The final work added to the Vischer catalog was Recitative-Varie for Singing Harpsichordist by Mauricio Kagel. This creation is yet another mini-drama in which the female performer makes her entrance very slowly, proceeding with small steps while uttering some German titles from Bach cantatas, the words connected in such non-sequential ways that they become obscene. The vocal technique required is known as Sprechstimme, half speaking, half singing while employing non-specific pitches. The two hands are placed together in an attitude of prayer, these visual requirements all meant to remind an audience of the pre-performance mannerisms associated with Wanda Landowska. After being seated at the instrument, the harpsichordist accompanies herself only with the left hand in “um-pah-pah” bass patterns borrowed from a Chopin nocturne, while continuing her vocal Bach-babbling. At the end, a lethargic exit from the stage completes the choreography.

Vischer never performed this ultimate work. She wrote to Kagel that her voice would not be adequate for the task, and that for someone else to learn the part would take an immense amount of time. He replied that “apparently, she had not understood the humor of the piece, and that a beautiful voice was unnecessary for its authentic performance.” One doubts that a faux-Landowska performance of the Kagel work would have done any damage to Vischer’s reputation, just as one imagines that this “camel” [meaning a hybrid constructed of opposites] was probably much better for her health than the number of Camels [American cigarettes] that she chain-smoked every day.

Vischer died of a heart attack in December 1973, just three months after the death of her father; the only child did not survive for long without family. Her legacy of 44 new works for the harpsichord almost certainly means that she will not be forgotten. Her friend, the distinguished Swiss author and playwright Friedrich Dürrenmatt, contributed these perceptive words to the notes for her first major recording (dated December 24, 1966):

Antoinette Vischer has gone down in the annals of musical history in the most legitimate manner: as patroness. She caused the modern and ultra-modern composers of our time to interest themselves in an old-fashioned instrument—the harpsichord. As a result, an old-fashioned instrument became modern, and its abstract quality suited modern music. By commissioning compositions for it, Antoinette Vischer led modern music on to new paths. The manner in which she did this proves how consciously she proceeded
. . . . She knew whom she was ordering from, and was supplied with what she wanted: musical portraits by composers of themselves, in that they had to occupy themselves with apparently unfamiliar tasks. Thus, through the wiles of a woman once again, something new was born.” [Reprinted in Ule Troxler, Antoinette Vischer: Dokumente, p. 10; translated from the German by LP]

Larry Palmer is a contributing editor of The Diapason.

A work by Dutilleux

It is extremely rare that I come upon a harpsichord-inclusive piece of music that has not been listed in Frances Bedford's Harpsichord and Clavichord Music of the Twentieth Century, but such was the case when I read the Chicago Symphony Orchestra program for concerts played during the last weekend in January. On the program was Symphony Number Two (Le double) by Henri Dutilleux (born 1916)--scored for two orchestras: a chamber group of oboe, clarinet, bassoon, trumpet, trombone, celesta, timpani, string quartet and HARPSICHORD, plus another complete orchestral force with harp and a large battery of percussion instruments.

Dutilleux' Second Symphony, commissioned by the conductor Charles Munch to celebrate the Boston Symphony's 75th anniversary, resembles a baroque concerto grosso, and is a work lasting approximately 30 minutes. Michael Gielen conducted and Mary Sauer (principal pianist of the Chicago Symphony) was harpsichordist for this set of performances. [With thanks to faithful reader and longtime friend Roy Kehl for sending the Symphony program.]

Violet

The early 20th-century harpsichordist Violet Gordon Woodhouse (1871-1948) is the subject of a dramatic presentation with music, Violet, by her biographer Jessica Douglas-Home. It was performed on December 16 in London's Bush Hall (a 1904 ballroom) by harpsichordist Maggie Cole with actors Maggie Henderson and Robert McBain.

The exotic Violet is surely an apt subject for a drama: drawn to the harpsichord through Arnold Dolmetsch she became a player of exquisite sensitivity, the first to make commercial recordings at the harpsichord. Her intense musicality had its counterpart in her unconventional personal life: married to Gordon Woodhouse, the couple shared a home with three other men in a long-lasting ménage à cinq. Women, too, were passionate in their devotion to Violet, among them the composer Ethel Smyth and the writer Radclyffe Hall. Devotées of her playing included the three literary Sitwells, George Bernard Shaw, T. E. Lawrence, and Serge Diaghilev.

Virginia Pleasants reports from London

The London musical scene has been enriched by the openings of the Handel House Museum (November 8, 2001) and the York Gate Collections at the Royal Academy of Music (February 27, 2002).

To honor one of music's most famous composers the Handel House Trust acquired his longtime residence at 25 Brook Street in central London, the site not only for the composition of several of the composer's most famous works (including Messiah), but also of rehearsals for their performances. Music is again to be heard in regular concerts on two harpsichords: a single-manual William Smith replica of an instrument in the Bate Collection, Oxford, and a two-manual Ruckers-style instrument by Bruce Kennedy. Both commissioned instruments are professionally maintained and are available to students for practice and concerts. A future addition will be a chamber organ, like the harpsichords a replica of an instrument Handel played in these rooms.

Lectures on Handelian subjects, both independently and in conjunction with concerts at nearby St. George's Church, are offered by the Museum. At last London boasts a major tribute to one of its most famous composers! [Contact information: The Handel House Museum, 25 Brook Street, London W1K 4HB; Website: http://www.handelhouse.org;

Email: [email protected]].

The Royal Academy of Music has officially opened its York Gate Collections of Musical Instruments at a site adjacent to the Academy (1 York Gate). There, nine pianos from the collection of Kenneth and Mary Mobbs are on loan. The collection shows the development of the grand piano in England during the first half of the 19th century; it provides a welcome corollary to the Academy's famed collection of string instruments.

Early Music: Chopin (!)

The Oxford University Press journal Early Music (Volume XXIX/3, August 2001) includes Laurence Libin's article "Robert Adam's Instruments for Catherine the Great" and several contributions on the topic "Chopin As Early Music," among them Jim Samson's "Chopin, Past and Present;" Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger's "Chopin and Pleyel;" and Jonathan Bellman's "Frédéric Chopin, Antoine de Kontski and the carezzando Touch."

These articles are highly recommended. I hope our readers will share them with their pianist friends, who, in general, often ignore the gentle sensitivity of Chopin's music and, if one believes contemporary reports, of his own playing.

Some years ago I read with great interest a small volume by Edith J. Hipkins: How Chopin Played (From Contemporary Impressions collected from the Diaries and Notebooks of the late A. J. Hipkins, F.S.A [1826-1903]), published in London (J. M. Dent and Sons Ltd, 1937). In this book the daughter of the harpsichord-playing pioneer relayed her father's observations of the great composer, impressions from very early in Hipkins' career as an employee of the Broadwood piano firm, where Chopin visited in April 1848. Hipkins reported that "Chopin's fortissimo was the full pure tone without noise, a harsh inelastic note being to him painful. His nuances were modifications of that tone, decreasing to the faintest yet always distinct pianissimo." [page 5]

Concerning Chopin's touch, Hipkins wrote "He changed fingers upon a key as often as an organ-player." (A footnote to this statement relates that "At the age of sixteen Chopin was appointed organist to the Lyceum at Warsaw.") [page 5]

Hipkins: "To return to pianos, [Chopin] especially liked Broadwood's Boudoir cottage pianos of that date, two-stringed, but very sweet instruments. . .  He played Bach's '48' all his life long. 'I don't practise my own compositions,' he said to Von Lentz. 'When I am about to give a concert, I close my doors for a time and play Bach.'" [page 7]

[A copy of this book having gone "astray" in our university library, I am doubly indebted to Mrs. Rodger Mirrey of London, who sent me a photocopy of the entire 39-page text.]

Still more from Early Music

The issue for February (Volume XXX/1) includes several items of interest to the harpsichordist: "Keyboard Instrument Building in London and the Sun Insurance Records, 1775-87" (Lance Whitehead and Jenny Nex); "The Dublin Virginal Manuscript: New Perspectives on Virginalist Ornamentation" (Desmond Hunter); "Repeat Signs and Binary Form in François Couperin's Pièces de claveçin" (Paul Cienniwa); plus correspondence about Domenico Scarlatti's 'tremulo' (Carl Sloane and Howard Schott) for erudition. And Howard Schott's lovely obituary of Igor Kipnis, for nostalgia.

[Send items for these columns to Dr. Larry Palmer, Division of Music, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75275; email [email protected]]

Larry Palmer is a contributing editor of The Diapason.

A work by Dutilleux

It is extremely rare that I come upon a harpsichord-inclusive piece of music that has not been listed in Frances Bedford's Harpsichord and Clavichord Music of the Twentieth Century, but such was the case when I read the Chicago Symphony Orchestra program for concerts played during the last weekend in January. On the program was Symphony Number Two (Le double) by Henri Dutilleux (born 1916)--scored for two orchestras: a chamber group of oboe, clarinet, bassoon, trumpet, trombone, celesta, timpani, string quartet and HARPSICHORD, plus another complete orchestral force with harp and a large battery of percussion instruments.

Dutilleux' Second Symphony, commissioned by the conductor Charles Munch to celebrate the Boston Symphony's 75th anniversary, resembles a baroque concerto grosso, and is a work lasting approximately 30 minutes. Michael Gielen conducted and Mary Sauer (principal pianist of the Chicago Symphony) was harpsichordist for this set of performances. [With thanks to faithful reader and longtime friend Roy Kehl for sending the Symphony program.]

Violet

The early 20th-century harpsichordist Violet Gordon Woodhouse (1871-1948) is the subject of a dramatic presentation with music, Violet, by her biographer Jessica Douglas-Home. It was performed on December 16 in London's Bush Hall (a 1904 ballroom) by harpsichordist Maggie Cole with actors Maggie Henderson and Robert McBain.

The exotic Violet is surely an apt subject for a drama: drawn to the harpsichord through Arnold Dolmetsch she became a player of exquisite sensitivity, the first to make commercial recordings at the harpsichord. Her intense musicality had its counterpart in her unconventional personal life: married to Gordon Woodhouse, the couple shared a home with three other men in a long-lasting ménage à cinq. Women, too, were passionate in their devotion to Violet, among them the composer Ethel Smyth and the writer Radclyffe Hall. Devotées of her playing included the three literary Sitwells, George Bernard Shaw, T. E. Lawrence, and Serge Diaghilev.

Virginia Pleasants reports from London

The London musical scene has been enriched by the openings of the Handel House Museum (November 8, 2001) and the York Gate Collections at the Royal Academy of Music (February 27, 2002).

To honor one of music's most famous composers the Handel House Trust acquired his longtime residence at 25 Brook Street in central London, the site not only for the composition of several of the composer's most famous works (including Messiah), but also of rehearsals for their performances. Music is again to be heard in regular concerts on two harpsichords: a single-manual William Smith replica of an instrument in the Bate Collection, Oxford, and a two-manual Ruckers-style instrument by Bruce Kennedy. Both commissioned instruments are professionally maintained and are available to students for practice and concerts. A future addition will be a chamber organ, like the harpsichords a replica of an instrument Handel played in these rooms.

Lectures on Handelian subjects, both independently and in conjunction with concerts at nearby St. George's Church, are offered by the Museum. At last London boasts a major tribute to one of its most famous composers! [Contact information: The Handel House Museum, 25 Brook Street, London W1K 4HB; Website: http://www.handelhouse.org;

Email: [email protected]].

The Royal Academy of Music has officially opened its York Gate Collections of Musical Instruments at a site adjacent to the Academy (1 York Gate). There, nine pianos from the collection of Kenneth and Mary Mobbs are on loan. The collection shows the development of the grand piano in England during the first half of the 19th century; it provides a welcome corollary to the Academy's famed collection of string instruments.

Early Music: Chopin (!)

The Oxford University Press journal Early Music (Volume XXIX/3, August 2001) includes Laurence Libin's article "Robert Adam's Instruments for Catherine the Great" and several contributions on the topic "Chopin As Early Music," among them Jim Samson's "Chopin, Past and Present;" Jean-Jacques Eigeldinger's "Chopin and Pleyel;" and Jonathan Bellman's "Frédéric Chopin, Antoine de Kontski and the carezzando Touch."

These articles are highly recommended. I hope our readers will share them with their pianist friends, who, in general, often ignore the gentle sensitivity of Chopin's music and, if one believes contemporary reports, of his own playing.

Some years ago I read with great interest a small volume by Edith J. Hipkins: How Chopin Played (From Contemporary Impressions collected from the Diaries and Notebooks of the late A. J. Hipkins, F.S.A [1826-1903]), published in London (J. M. Dent and Sons Ltd, 1937). In this book the daughter of the harpsichord-playing pioneer relayed her father's observations of the great composer, impressions from very early in Hipkins' career as an employee of the Broadwood piano firm, where Chopin visited in April 1848. Hipkins reported that "Chopin's fortissimo was the full pure tone without noise, a harsh inelastic note being to him painful. His nuances were modifications of that tone, decreasing to the faintest yet always distinct pianissimo." [page 5]

Concerning Chopin's touch, Hipkins wrote "He changed fingers upon a key as often as an organ-player." (A footnote to this statement relates that "At the age of sixteen Chopin was appointed organist to the Lyceum at Warsaw.") [page 5]

Hipkins: "To return to pianos, [Chopin] especially liked Broadwood's Boudoir cottage pianos of that date, two-stringed, but very sweet instruments. . .  He played Bach's '48' all his life long. 'I don't practise my own compositions,' he said to Von Lentz. 'When I am about to give a concert, I close my doors for a time and play Bach.'" [page 7]

[A copy of this book having gone "astray" in our university library, I am doubly indebted to Mrs. Rodger Mirrey of London, who sent me a photocopy of the entire 39-page text.]

Still more from Early Music

The issue for February (Volume XXX/1) includes several items of interest to the harpsichordist: "Keyboard Instrument Building in London and the Sun Insurance Records, 1775-87" (Lance Whitehead and Jenny Nex); "The Dublin Virginal Manuscript: New Perspectives on Virginalist Ornamentation" (Desmond Hunter); "Repeat Signs and Binary Form in François Couperin's Pièces de claveçin" (Paul Cienniwa); plus correspondence about Domenico Scarlatti's 'tremulo' (Carl Sloane and Howard Schott) for erudition. And Howard Schott's lovely obituary of Igor Kipnis, for nostalgia.

[Send items for these columns to Dr. Larry Palmer, Division of Music, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, TX 75275; email [email protected]]

July 24–August 7, 2004

Karyl Louwenaar Lueck holds degrees in piano from Wheaton College, Illinois (BM), the University of Illinois (MM), and the East- man School of Music (DMA); she also holds a certificate in harpsichord from the Musikhochschule in Cologne, Germany. In 1972 she joined the faculty of the Florida State University School of Music, where she teaches piano, harpsichord, fortepiano and continuo, and serves as Keyboard Area Coordinator. In addition to regular performances with Baroque Southeast, the Tallahassee Bach Parley and FSU colleagues, she performs on occasion with other period soloists and groups.

We have printed reports on most of the Bruges harpsichord competitions since I wrote an article about the second triennial event for The Diapason of October 1968. That year there were 34 competitors; the jury included Isolde Ahlgrimm and Gustav Leonhardt; and, continuing a standard set at the first competition, no first prize was awarded in the solo harpsichord category.

For the October 1971 issue of the magazine, Bruges made the front page with news that American Scott Ross had become the first harpsichordist to achieve a first prize. The fourth competition, in 1974, again made the first page of our October issue, but this time, alas, none of the 33 competitors equaled Ross' high achievement.

And so it continued. For the following ten competitions we have had various reporters: Dale Carr wrote of the 1977 one, in which the highest award was a third prize, while the competitors numbered 52. In 1980, Bruce Gustafson counted 74 competing harpsichordists, but not until 1983 would Karyl Louwenaar be able to describe the excitement of another top prize winner as Christophe Rousset won his first place in solo playing, to become the second person crowned by the jury in this exacting event. It was also the year that the undersubscribed continuo competition was replaced by a fortepiano contest.

This month we are delighted to have Dr. Louwenaar Lueck's report on the fourteenth playing of the Bruges events. A distinguished contributor to the world of early keyboard, she is a professor at Florida State University, and has served as president of the Southeastern Historical Keyboard Society and chair of its Jurow Harpsichord Competition. When I learned that she planned to go to Bruges this past summer, I invited her to submit her impressions to The Diapason. After her initial response of "Phooey, I wanted to enjoy myself," this article shows that she was able to find enjoyment in her writing as well as in her visit to Belgium.

--Larry Palmer

The fair city of Brugge held its 41st Early Music Festival July 24-August 7, featuring triennial competitions for harpsichord (the fourteenth held since 1965) and pianoforte (the eighth since 1983). Given this year's very large field of ninety harpsichordists, the first-round playing lasted a full 3-1/2 days, at the close of which the jury chose nineteen semi-finalists, four of which later advanced into the final round. The pianoforte competition's four finalists were chosen directly from the thirty-nine preliminary round players, as no semi-final round had been planned.

For only the fifth time in the long history of the harpsichord competition the jury declared a First Prize winner: 19-year-old Benjamin Alard from France, who captivated the audience with his confident, well-shaped reading of the Ricercare à 3 from the Musikalisches Opfer, and an exhilarating performance of Bach's Concerto in D minor with Paul Dombrecht's ensemble "Il Fondamento." Alard's victory was sweetened further when he received the audience prize as well. The judges (Blandine Rannou, Ketil Haugsand, Johan Huys [president], Gustav Leonhardt, Davitt Moroney and Ludger Rémy) awarded second prize to Maria Uspenskaya from Russia, who made Bruges competition history by being chosen as a finalist also for the pianoforte competition and winning a co-equal third prize there. Co-equal third prizes in harpsichord were awarded to American Adam Pearl (a student of Webb Wiggins and "Promising Non-Finalist" award winner in the 2002 Jurow Competition) and to Mikhail Yarzhembovskiy from Russia.

Pianoforte competition judges Wolfgang Brunner, Johan Huys (president), Linda Nicholson, Alexei Lubimov, Ludger Rémy and Bart van Oort awarded no first prize this year. Second prize winner was Keiko Shichijo (Japan); third prize winner, co-equal with Maria Uspenskaya, was Irina Zahharenkova (Estonia); and winner of both fourth and audience prizes was Nicoleta Ion (Romania). In addition to these major prizes, honorable mentions were awarded to eight fortepianists and fifteen harpsichordists; among the latter was Joseph Gascho, another student of Webb Wiggins and winner of the 2002 Jurow Competition. The total value of all prizes awarded in both competitions was 24,900 euros (approximately $31,000).

While the annual competitions provide large blocks of daytime programming for the Flanders Festival, they are set within the rich context of many other events, including an array of midday and evening concerts, a large and impressive exhibition, and some smaller lectures, presentations and demonstrations.  Event venues range from the Provinciaal Hof on the main square (competitions) to the nearby Hallen Belfort (exhibition), to beautiful historic churches such as the Sint-Annakerk (concerts and recitals) and the modern Concertgebouw (midday recitals in the chamber music hall, evening concerts in the large hall).

Some of the musical highlights for this listener were Gustav Leonhardt's splendid performance of works by Buxtehude, Ritter, Pachelbel, L. Couperin, J. S. Bach and Forqueray, played on a one-day-old harpsichord by J. G. Karman (The Netherlands); Alexei Lubimov playing Glinka, Dussek and Schubert on a four-day-old early Graf copy by Paul McNulty; Davitt Moroney's revealing performance of works by William Byrd; the stunning Baroque trumpet playing in I Barocchisti's performance of Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 2; the uniquely beautiful music of Swedish composer Johan Helmich Roman [1694-1758] performed by the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra; and Ensemble Arte-Musica Milano's very fine performances of Domenico Scarlatti harpsichord sonatas, mandolin concerti, and cantatas for soprano and strings.

Denzil Wraight's discussion of "Cristofori's gravicembalo che fa il piano e il forte" was most illuminating, especially as enhanced by Aline Zylberjach's fine Scarlatti playing on Wraight's own Cristofori piano "copy" with its brass strings and cypress soundboard.

Finally, the exhibition was almost overwhelming with its 60+ exhibitors displaying dozens of old and new keyboard instruments as well as scores and facsimiles, books, CDs, tools and supplies. In one corner a caterer served lunch, snacks and beverages--a friendly and welcome touch.

While local citizens and tourists reveled in the warm sun and lack of rain, this visitor, for one, had hoped for cooler weather. Some of the venues became quite uncomfortable by late afternoon; but at least outdoors the evenings were always pleasantly cool. Two real heroes of the festival were Edmund Handy and Andrew Wooderson, official tuners for the competitions and concerts, who did amazingly fine work under sometimes challenging conditions. Also deserving of special mention and thanks are the many builders who provided harpsichords and pianos for the competitions and other events; unfortunately they were seldom identified by name.

Kudos go also to competitions coordinator Stefan Dewitte and his very fine staff, all of whom worked hard and long hours, always remaining friendly and helpful.  Finally, the esteemed--and now retiring--director of the Flanders Festival, Robrecht Dewitte (Stefan's father), was specially honored at the competition award ceremony for his long and distinguished service.  Although it may be difficult to imagine this event without Mr. and Mrs. Dewitte, the festival surely has a very bright future because of their outstanding leadership. Long live the Festival van Vlaanderen Brugge!