Teisutis Makacinas Organ Sonata No. 5

The Development of Musica Poetica

Since the rediscovery of Quintilian's texts in the early Renaissance, many humanist writers have suggested a link between oratory and musical composition. With his treatise Musica poetica, Joachim Burmeister coined the term musica poetica for study of rhetorical relationships in music. This discipline, musica poetica, rationally explained the creative process of a composer, the structure of compositions, and the mechanism through which music moved the listener. Thereby a composer's craft could prompt a predictable emotional response from the listener--a principal goal of early Baroque composers. Although writers throughout Europe attested to the affective nature of music, German theorists cultivated musica poetica.

Influenced by Lutheran theology, humanists in Germany borrowed rhetorical techniques from the classical authors including Cicero and his successor Quintilian in order to deliver the Holy Word more effectively. (See Diagram 1, left-hand column.) Philipp Melanchthon emphasized this area of the trivium in the Lateinschulen curriculum and applied the traditional pedagogical method: (1)  praeceptum or the study of rules which required exact definitions and well-articulated concepts, (2) exemplus or the study of examples which encouraged analysis of well constructed works, and (3) imitatio or the imitation of examples which emphasized craft, not genius and inspiration typically associated with the Enlightenment or Romantic periods. In this way, the rhetorical concepts became not only a way of thinking about pre-existing works but also became prescriptive.

Martin Luther emphasized the power of music to secure faith: "after theology I accord to music the highest place and the greatest honor."1  (See Diagram 1, middle column.)  As the handmaiden to the Word, music can be understood as a "sermon in sound." Influenced by Boethius's cosmological conception of music, many seventeenth- and eighteenth-century writers justified music's holy power by explaining how ratios representing God's perfection resonated in the listener's soul.

The ancient Doctrine of Ethos convinced Luther of the didactic power of music. (See Diagram 1, right column.)  With the rise of the Doctrine of Affections during the seventeenth century as codified by Descartes, writers in Germany could then explain the mechanism through which music affected  listeners' passions. (See center of Diagram 1.)  Kircher, Bernhard, and Mattheson suggested that music no longer simply reflected the meaning of texts but actually moved listeners to predicable emotional states called affections. Cantors, such as Buxtehude and Bach, drew upon elements of musica poetica which served as a code for various affections in their compositions. With the rise of the Enlightenment, however, philosophers encouraged "natural" expression in music, which reflected a composer's personal sentiment and inspiration. With this emerging viewpoint, both the Doctrine of Affections and the cosmological conception of music became less tenable, and musical rhetoric declined with them. By the end of the eighteenth century, musica poetica had become a historical curiosity cataloged in Forkel's Allgemeine Geschichte der Musik (1788).

An Overview of Musica Poetica

Consider the rhetorical model of the composer's creative process presented in Table 1. Following Cicero's ideas that directly applied to music, Bernhard prescribes three compositional stages while Mattheson retains five stages somewhat analogous to rhetoric. In his first stage, inventio, the composer determines what his/her piece will be about, the loci topici. Mattheson suggests fundamental musical elements such as meter, key, and theme. This stage could also involve the working out of invertible counterpoint and other devices.   In the second stage, dispositio, the composer places this pre-compositional material in a logical succession and in appropriate keys. Later, in the elaboratio stage,  episodes connect the contrapuntal complexes or theme entrances determined in the dispositio. The composer also adds musical-rhetorical figures intended to persuade or move the listener to particular affections. In the decoratio, the composer ornaments themes and may incorporate further figures. Embellishments reinforce the work's style and can further alter the affect. The fifth stage, executio, involves performance of the work, frequently with additional improvised ornaments.

The disposition of any artwork in the rhetorical model can be described in two ways: (1) the Aristotelian model, beginning-middle-end, or (2) the more complicated Cicerone model. (See Table 2.) Burmeister subscribes to the first and Mattheson to the later. Consider the purpose of each section in the Cicerone model. The exordium of a speech arouses the listener's attention.  (Buxtehude praeludia invariably start with an opening toccata for this purpose.) The narratio establishes the composition's subject matter, but in musical discourse, Mattheson states that one may omit the narratio. The propositio presents the actual content of a speech or musical composition, i.e., the theme. In the body of the speech, the orator can alternate between arguments supporting his proposition, the confirmatio, and those refuting possible objections to the orator's proposition, the confutatio.  In music, confutatio sections frequently contain  contrasting themes and characters, heightened by increased dissonance. At the end, compositions conclude with the peroratio. This section often recalls the opening material with a ritornello or closes with pedal points and melodic repetition.

Many scholars question whether a singular Doctrine of Affections exists. Nonetheless, Table 3 presents an overview of the various viewpoints as codified by Descartes. According to this doctrine, people can have four different temperaments or a combination thereof: Sanguine, Choleric, Melancholic, and Phlegmatic. Specific body parts and humors participate in producing a variety of distinct emotional states, called affections. These fundamental affections can blend in various ways to create other affections. This rational system explains why and how listeners of different temperaments react to music. A year following Descartes' treatise, Kircher published an influential compendium of knowledge that connected various affections to specific musical elements. (See Table 4. Amour is especially provoking.)

Composers could choose a variety of musical figures to summon listeners' affections. In classical oratory according to Quintilian, figures are simply deviations from normal speech intended to make one's oration more effective. By the seventeenth century, composers not only employed figures to express the text but also to move listeners to particular passions according to the Doctrine of Affections. To avoid problems of marking every musical event as a figure and trivializing the procedure, let us employ a working definition for our purpose: a figure is any departure from established musical syntax that arouses the affections.5 Not every dissonance is really a figure, but only those that express a particular emotion or inflect the music in a noticeable way. Now we can briefly examine three influential theorists of the musica poetica tradition and identify a few of their figures in three Buxtehude praeludia, BuxWV 142, 146, and 149.

Joachim Burmeister

And if we examine music more closely, we will surely find very little difference between its nature and that of oratory.  For just as the art of oratory derives its power not from a simple collection of simple words, or from a proper yet rather plain construction of periods, or from their meticulous yet bare and uniform connection, but rather from those elements where there is an underlying grace and elegance due to arrangement and to weighty words of wit, and where periods are rounded with emphatic words so, this art of music . . .6

Joachim Burmeister (1564-1529) served as cantor to St. Marien in Rostock and taught at the Gymnasium there. He developed a relatively systematic approach to identifying figures which aided his teaching of composition and reflected the Lutheran tradition of praeceptum, exemplus, et imitatio. He cites numerous late sixteenth-century vocal works and demonstrates how specific musical figures in the Lassus motet In me transierunt contribute to an effect much like that of successful oration. Elias Walther's dissertation of 1664 leans heavily on Burmeister's treatise and even analyzes the same Lassus motet, thereby revealing Burmeister's continuing influence in Lutheran Germany. By this point, Walther does not even define musical figures suggesting that their use had become commonplace.

For the most part, Burmeister's treatise Musica poetica (1606) transmits Zarlino's theories, and thus, Burmeister's ideas are strongly linked to late sixteenth-century styles. Burmeister's explicit development of a rhetorical theory, however, distinguishes him from his sixteenth-century predecessors.  Burmeister's figures focus on imitation and repetition. (See Diagram 2.)  Burmeister derived most figurative names from rhetorical sources. Thus, many terms maintain a strong association with the original rhetorical meanings, though some are uniquely musical. To reflect the traditional rhetorical division of figures into those applied to words and those applied to sentences, Burmeister placed musical figures in three categories: (1) Figurae harmoniae, figures involving more than one voice; (2) Figurae melodiae, figures involving one voice, and (3) Figurae tam harmoniae quam melodiae. (See Diagram 2.) Let us consider a couple examples:

Noëma--This figure strikes the listener when the texture changes to a homophonic passage. Most later writers imply that these passages are composed of consonant sonorities. Burmeister describes its effect: "When introduced at the right time, it sweetly affects and wondrously soothes the ears, or indeed the heart."7 For the performer, this suggests not only a sensitive touch but also a sweet registration and calm tempo. In the Praeludium in f#, mm. 14-27, Buxtehude places such a passage between the foreboding exordium and the brooding fugue. (See Example 1.) In this case, suspensions and chromaticism further modify the figure's effect within this dark piece.

Pathopoeia--Throughout the final fugue of the Praeludium in g, chromatic pitches contribute a heightened emotional affect; the pathopoeia is "suited to arousing the affections."8 Consider m. 126, where Buxtehude temporarily introduces Bb minor with half-steps outside the reigning mode.  (See Example 2.)

Aposiopesis--Returning to the Praeludium in f#, mm. 20-27, we find that the musical texture breaks off with a notated silence in m. 24. (See Example 3.) This figure, the aposiopesis, foreshadows motives that seem to lead only to silence throughout the praeludium. Burmeister suggests the topic of pieces employing this figure: "The aposiopesis is frequently encountered in compositions whose texts deal with death or eternity."9 Burmeister borrowed this term from rhetoric: "What is aposiopesis? It is when, because of an affection, some part of a sentence is cut off."10 Performers should consider exaggerating the stop for this effect.

Christoph Bernhard

Stylus Luxurians is the type consisting in part of rather quick notes and strange leaps--so that it is well suited for stirring the affects--and of more kinds of dissonance treatment . . . than the foregoing. Its melodies agree with the text as much as possible, unlike those of the preceding type . . . It [Stylus Theatralis] was devised to represent speech in music . . .  And since language is the absolute master of music in this genre . . . one should represent speech in the most natural way possible.11

Christoph Bernhard (1627-1692) was cantor for Johanneum in Hamburg from 1664-74 and co-director of the famous Collegium Musicum there with Matthias Weckmann. Later, Bernhard returned to Dresden where he had studied and worked with Schütz for many years. In the Tractatus (c. 1660), Bernhard describes three main seventeenth-century compositional styles: Stylus Gravis, Stylus Luxurians Communis, and Stylus Theatralis. Bernard not only distinguishes these styles by their venue, but more importantly, by their use of specific figures. These figures primarily depend upon dissonance treatment and modern styles which employ more sophisticated, implicit voice leading. While Bernhard emphasizes smaller details of dissonance treatment, the earlier Burmeister basically describes texture and a larger scope. Bernhard does emphasize proper reflection of the text in music, but he does not associate specific figures with affects nor does he explicitly show how to do this. Rather, Bernhard instructs his students to study works of respected composers in each of the styles. One may assume that composers use particular figures for different affects depending on context. In any case, Bernhard's brevity and prose suggest that the application of these figures is relatively obvious to the reader.

Please consider the following figures from Diagram 3 in Buxtehude's praeludia:

Passus duriusculus--This Latin term literarily means a "harsh passage" or "difficult passage." The subject of the second fugue in the Praeludium in e, mm. 47-49, contains a descending chromatic passage. (See Example 4.) The difficulty of this short span in the subject is heightened by on-beat chromaticism, and suggests a "difficult" touch and a slower tempo.

Saltus duriusculus--In this same passage, we also find a "harsh leap" or "difficult leap" called the saltus duriusculus between C and G-sharp, and between G and D-sharp. A more striking example can be found in the first fugue of the Praeludium in f# entitled "Grave," mm. 29-31. (See the leap down from D to E-sharp in Example 5.) Here we find a striking example of compound melody which Bernhard calls Heterolepsis, an element of the theatrical style. Buxtehude's fugues normally do not venture into this highly dissonant style, and these figures contribute to a morose affect.

Inchoatio imperfecta--Although Bernhard defines this term in strictly musical language, the figure carries not only structural value but also affective meaning to a German Baroque listener. (Remember that dissonances utilize ratios far from perfection, and thus, elicit darker affects in the listener.) The opening of the Praeludium in g begins with an inchoatio imperfecta: the first note, F#5, forms a dissonance with the  implied g minor chord of the first measure. (See Example 6.) The opening toccata also surprises the listener when he/she discovers that it is not a toccata, but instead a ground bass variation where variations precede the bass ostinato. Strangely, the ground bass continues alone at the end of the section in abbreviated form.

Abruptio--Bernhard discusses how this figure ruptures a melodic line by the unexpected insertion of a rest. Once again, returning to the homophonic noëma of the Praeludium in f#, mm. 14-23, the passage resumes after the aposiopesis (the breaking off), but quickly disperses into a brief stylus fantasticus section where the melodic lines are interrupted with rests (mm. 27-28), reflecting the distress that Buxtehude mollifies with the Noëma. (See Example 3.)

In his discussion of melodic composition within Der vollkommene Capellmeister (1739), Johann Mattheson (1681-1764) divides figures into embellishments added by the performer, Figurae cantionis, and rhetorical figures incorporated by the composer, Figurae cantus. Mattheson deemphasizes the mathematical derivations and instead encourages a natural expression concentrated on melody, not counterpoint. The rise of the Empfindsamerstil led to the decline of the musica poetica tradition because expressivity of the performer and ornamentation surpassed the concern for a rationally trained composer to evoke categorized affections.

In summary, these writers seem to address different aspects of musica poetica. Burmeister initiated serious inquiry of the rhetorical model in musical analysis and composition. He described a method of formally dividing compositions by use of figures. Most of his figures deal with musical textures. Bernhard provided a vocabulary of figures based on dissonance treatment. He also demonstrated how these small-scope figures define various seventeenth-century styles. Mattheson was concerned with the structural relationships between composition and oratory, i.e., how composers distribute musical ideas to impart the best rhetorical effect.

Dietrich Buxtehude and Musica Poetica

Now we ask: was Dietrich Buxtehude (1637-1707) aware of these theories? As I have shown, musical figures and basic knowledge of rhetoric were taken for granted. Furthermore, many cantors taught rhetoric and Latin while fulfilling their musical duties. Buxtehude served as organist at Marienkirche in Lübeck. Because only sixty kilometers separate Hamburg and Lübeck, Buxtehude traveled to Hamburg where Bernhard worked. Kerala Snyder has even demonstrated that Buxtehude modeled a piece after an obscure work by Bernhard. Furthermore, Snyder states "Buxtehude would certainly have been familiar with the system that Christoph Bernhard expounded in his treatise 'Tractatus compositionis augmentatus.'"12 Other treatises were also readily available. For instance, George Buelow states that Kircher's "Musurgia universalis, one of the really influential works of music theory, was drawn upon by almost every later German music theorist until well into the 18th century. Its popularity was greatly aided by a German translation of a major part of it in 1662."13 Early in Buxtehude's career, this compendium certainly would have been available in Hamburg and probably in Lübeck as well.

So far, we have studied a few figures that contribute to the affect of three Buxtehude praeludia in minor keys.  But how closely do his preludes follow the organizational precepts of oratory? Let us briefly examine the typical disposition of Buxtehude's praeludia.

After an opening flourish comparable to an exordium in a speech, Buxtehude's preludes generally alternate between free sections and imitative sections, analogous to confutatio and confirmatio sections. A variable number of confutatio/confirmatio sections probably would lead Burmeister to simply lump these together into the "body." The final free section, or  peroratio, provides a successful conclusion through repetition (to recapitulate an argument) and the strictly musical devices of pedal points and tonal closure.

Snyder compares the opposition of free sections and fugues to that of prelude and aria. This apt analogy captures fugal entries as an amplification technique of confirmatio sections that conveys a single affection in agreement with the pieces' mode and overall affect.14 Free sections often use stylus theatralis while fugues tend to employ less dissonant styles. Although Buxtehude's works follow a definition of stylus phantasicus somewhere between that of Mattheson and his predecessor Kircher, Mattheson's directions guide performers particularly well on the performance of the free sections: these pieces follow "all kinds of otherwise unusual progressions, hidden ornaments, ingenious turns and embellishments . . . without actual observation of the measure and the key, regardless of what is placed on the page . . . now swift, now hesitating, now in one voice, now in many voices, . . . but not without the intent to please, to overtake and to astonish."15 In other words, these free sections display an improvisatory and unpredictable character, often with the purpose to astonish the listener. Certainly opening sections fulfill Mattheson's description while interior free sections tend toward more melancholy moods, especially in the three minor key pieces this article examines.

The Disposition of the Praeludia in g, e, and f#

The fully worked-out fugues and other hallmarks of Buxtehude's mature style lead Snyder to date the Praeludium in g before 1675. (See Table 5.)  Lawrence Archbold uses these same characteristics to support a later dating.16 Despite differences among scholars here, all agree this praeludium displays Buxtehude's best work.17 The canonic voices in the manuals opening the exordium make the delayed ground bass entrance surprising. Transformations of this theme pervade the entire work, perhaps a legacy of the composer's inventio stage. This flashy start precedes a ricercar fugue that takes its theme from the previous ostinato to create a sort of textural modulation into the first confirmatio. (See Example 7.) As usual in Buxtehude's praeludia, the first fugue disintegrates after significant development. The following free section contains the only example of strict continuo style in Buxtehude's organ works.  This confutatio leads back to the tonic while subtly reintroducing the main theme, like an orator who skillfully employs opposing points-of-view to his advantage during a rebuttal. Marked Largo and with dotted rhythms, the last fugue then boldly announces yet another version of the piece's theme with a variety of stylus theatricus figures to emphasize its dark character. Even Archbold cannot resist calling the last fugue "the most stately, even elegaic of Buxtehude's fugues." The peroratio concludes with figurative repetition via a free ciacona and appropriate pedal points.

Like many other scholars, Philipp Spitta described the Praeludium in e as "one of his [Buxtehude's] greatest organ compositions. . . ."18 (See Table 6.) This work was probably composed in 1684 because of tuning considerations. According to Snyder, the heavy emphasis on counterpoint links it with early works of the 1670s when Buxtehude assimilated the writings of Bernhard, Theile, and Reinken. The Praeludium in e opens with a free, figural exordium, but three fugues dominate the work. The well-developed first fugue displays a canzona-like subject with three distinct motives, and it concludes with a brief noëma derived from the subject's eighth notes. The second fugue is "the most contrapuntally elegant, and at the same time one of the most expressive fugues in all the praeludia. Brossard . . . would undoubtedly have called it a fuga pathetica [with its leaps, chromaticism, meter, and strict contrapuntal procedures]."19 The following free section is imaginative and quite rhapsodic with highly ornamented passage-work often juxtaposed against slow, unadorned notes. Characteristic of Kircher's affection amour, the harmonies here seem to wander (between the dominant and subdominant areas). The contrapuntally "lax" but vigorous fugue that constitutes the fifth section is a gigue that quickly dissolves into a concertato texture and ends with a short flourish. The capricious character of the Lombard rhythms at the very end may harken back to the canzona-like first fugue.

Probably written in the 1690s, the Preludium in f#  emphasizes free sections. (See Table 7.) After a brief flourish, the exordium presents an unadorned passus duriusculus in quarter notes accompanied by right hand arpeggios. This figure and the dissonant key of f# minor in unequal temperaments present a particularly gloomy and somewhat inward character.20 The following noëma provides brief but limited relief because of dissonances and an aposiopesis. The first fugue, marked Grave, continues the dissonant discourse with its figures and dotted rhythms. When the fugal texture dissolves, a second fugue marked vivace interjects into the final cadence with a variant of the subject from the first fugue. Although of a livelier nature, the saltus duriusculus in the second fugue subject still reminds the listener of the principal affect. This faster fugue quickly dissolves into motivic interplay, temporarily escaping to the parallel major. The following free section is the most adventuresome harmonically of Buxtehude's praeludia: it explores g-sharp minor--an especially remote and dissonant key; the melodic material seems to trail off, rhapsodically speeding up and then slowing unpredictably; and melodies suggest thoughts that lead nowhere. But Buxtehude fuses this final confutatio to the succeeding peroratio with a pedal note. The peroratio repeats an extremely loose ostinato, presenting motives from previous sections, in a virtuosic display of stylus phantasticus.

Summary

 We must conclude that Buxtehude must have been familiar with Bernhard's ideas. He may have also known Burmeister's groundbreaking treatise Musica poetica. Especially in Buxtehude's praeludia, the rhetorical figures of Burmeister suggest various touches and large-scale effects while the small rhetorical figures identified by Bernhard accumulate, fashioning affects with various types of dissonances. Buxtehude cast the three praeludia above into minor keys to project darker affects than his rhetorical figures suggest. The contrast of thematic material and figures seems to divide internal sections into alternations similar to supporting arguments and rebuttals found in rhetoric. Outer sections introduce and conclude pieces magnificently. The strong correlation between so-called Toccata Form and rhetorical organization may even explain why this form flourished in the Lutheran stronghold of northern Germany during the seventeenth century.  n

In my article "Current Streams in Polish Organ Music"  (The Diapason, May 1995) I mentioned the Organ Sonata of Aleksander Glinkowski as one of the most interesting contemporary compositions written for organ in Poland in the 1980s. Indeed, comparing the Sonata with contemporary organ music in Europe, one can consider it an outstanding piece belonging to the concert repertoire and challenging to every virtuoso of the organ. So why is this piece unknown and relatively seldom performed even in Poland? The answer is simple: the Organ Sonata of Glinkowski, written in the very difficult--for Poland--time of 1981, is still not published. The composer, Aleksander Glinkowski (1941-1991), studied composition at the Music Academy in Katowice and later in Paris. His professor in Katowice, Boleslaw Szabelski (1896-1979), represented the generation of neoclassically oriented composers, but made a spectacular turn to dodecaphony in his last works. In Paris in 1972-1973 Glinkowski studied with Iannis Xenakis. Until his premature death he lived in Katowice, teaching composition at the Music Academy. Very modest, introverted and diffident, he didn't publicize his compositions, so his name is not widely known although Glinkowski represented the best values of Polish contemporary music: intensity, modern technique, fertile sonoristic invention, and sense of form. His Koncert wenecki (Venetian Concert) for oboe and orchestra was awarded a prize in the Artur Malawski Competition in Cracow in 1972.

The organ is constantly present in music of Glinkowski. As a
first attempt he composed Inicjacje
(Initiations) for string quartet, organ and percussion (1966); later, his Passacaglia for organ solo (1968) and Aisthesis for organ and orchestra (1969) appeared. Only the Passacaglia
style='font-style:normal'> was published as Polska wspólczesna
miniatura organowa (Contemporary Polish
Organ Miniatures, PWM Cracow 1975), together with other compositions that
received awards in the Organ Music Competition in Kamien Pomorski in 1968. The Organ Sonata of Glinkowski was performed for the first time in 1983 in Katowice by Zygmunt Antonik, and later, several times it was played in Poland, Germany and Switzerland by both Zygmunt Antonik and Marta Szoka. Everywhere, the audience was strongly impressed by the monumental architecture and unusual character of this music.

For a long time the form of the sonata was strictly
connected with tonality and the rules of tonal harmony. In the 19th century an
intensive expansion of harmony in the romantic sonata had its basis in the
development of instrumental texture--especially in the area of piano music. The
situation of the sonata in the 20th century is much more complicated. But among
so many types of contemporary sonatas at least two ideas still hold: one is the
principle of the transformation of thematic material, and the second concerns
the development of an idiomatic (for any instrument) instrumental texture. The Sonata of Glinkowski demonstrates that even with the most modern musical language (aleatorism, sonorism etc.) it is possible to respect both principles. In this piece the composer examined all specific organ attributes. There are so many organ compositions written recently by composers who are used to thinking about organ technique as the synthesis of a highly developed pianism with the addition of some elements of pedal technique. Glinkowski took the idea of his Sonata just from the organ console--both manual and pedal techniques are inextricably intertwined--considering not only the variety of dynamic and color levels, but also the phenomenon of echo in the church interior--the natural environment for the organ. His Sonata was written for a large tracker organ, the "cathedral" type. Moreover, the composer displayed a real mastery of using rests.

The Sonata is a real
challenge for every concert organist. The highest virtuosity consists of a
variety of manual and pedal techniques, including linear and figurative
configurations as well as many types of chords and clusters. The figurative
element is for Glinkowski not only a part of manual technique, but also a type
of texture. Thanks to this special texture he could obtain new sound qualities.
In general, in the whole Sonata
there are many examples of an extremely fast figurative motion and ostinato
technique. As a result, we have here an impression of a static sound-stream,
although the shape of the figurations varies. These so-called sound-streams, or
sound-strands, make the organ sound similar to the sound quality of electronic
music. The strong influence of the aesthetics of electronic music in
contemporary composition is observed not only in organ music, but the organ,
with its idiomatic attributes, is an especially convenient instrument for these
kinds of experimental ideas.

The two most obvious signs of the influence of electronic
music include: first, the extreme extensions of singular static sound (one
tone, singular chord, or a sound-strand) with no equivalent of the metric or
rhythmic factors; and second, the transformation of sound by adding or
subtracting sound colors (in the organ: registers). The typical electronic
sound-strand that modulates by inducing or by putting out overtones, could be
easily imitated with organ sound and varying registration and articulation. Volumina by György Ligeti is one of the best examples here. In the Sonata of Glinkowski the interior pitches of the sustained sound-strands are changeable; the varying sound color and pitch are a source of internal vibration. Let's examine the beginning of the Sonata. (See Example 1.)

There are here five different figurative models. By very
fast movement--all models are repeated or changed freely--the perception of
individual pitches is nearly impossible. Also, the perception of changes
between models is very difficult, especially since the recommended registration
(upperwork without 8' registers) transfers the whole sound-strand very high.
One can say about this as a special "textural convention" that pure
motion becomes the main tectonic and expressive factor. The term "textural
convention" was introduced by Boguslaw Schäffer, a prominent Polish
composer and theoretician from Cracow, in his fundamental work,
"Introduction to composition" (Cracow 1976). But in the Sonata of Glinkowski the fast, aleatoric figuration, although dominant , is not the only type of texture.

Since elements such as melody and harmony are strongly
limited, dynamics and textural changes serve as the basis for form building.
The three parts of the Sonata are
unified by one fundamental motif. So we have here another example of formal
development. The motivic cell is built of two perfect fifths separated by a
half-tone. For instance: G/D + A-flat /E-flat. This serves as the main material
for all important themes, linear figures, chords, structures etc. It is used as
follows:

1. In its elementary form as a linear structure (Example 2);

2. As a strongly dissonant chord: (Example 3). This
syncopated chordal structure is set against linear configurations. Although
both of the structures are built with the same material, the contrast of
rhythm, dynamics and texture is very emphatic. The half-tone and perfect fifth
are also used for other types of chords (Example 4) and for clusters. The
diatonic, or pentatonic cluster with the ambitus of a perfect fifth displacing
the half-tone steps appears in Part III of the Sonata
style='font-style:normal'> (Example 5).

3. As model of figuration, also in parallel fifths or
doubled in fifths and octaves (Example 6).

4. As an ornament--for instance as a trill (See Example 6).
Two principal structures based on the motif of the fifth-half-tone--vertical
(chords, clusters) and horizontal (for instance: figuration)--organize the form
of the Sonata. They contrast strongly,
especially in Part I; somehow we can find here the reflection of the classical
rule of thematic dualism. In Part II the motif appears only in the line of the
figuration. The whole Part II is unique, a long pedal solo cadenza which
contains three sections. The first and third sections, symmetrically, are
filled by a continuous chromatic course of figuration (See Example 7). This
kind of figuration is typical of the toccata or etude; to this writer, it is reminiscent also of the Final of Chopin's B-flat minor Sonata
style='font-style:normal'> (See Example 8). There, too, the extremely fast
stream of tones is perceived as pure motion. But besides the textural
similarity, both fragments of the Chopin and Glinkowski Sonatas present the same
type of expression: dark and dramatic, if not tragic.

The second section of Part II is very slow, soft and quiet.
The motion stops; instead of a single line of figuration, the static
tone-strand occurs. The 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6 tone harmony appears, but also in the
pedal solo. The composer requires here strict legato playing and a very special
registration (4' or 2' flute solo) (Example 9). In this episode the tension is
much lower thanks to the strong dynamic and tectonic contrasts with the first
and third sections, but soon the course of figuration returns.

The very beginning of Part III of the Sonata
style='font-style:normal'> is reminiscent of the character of the slow part in
classical sonata construction. The diatonic cluster d1-a1
style="mso-spacerun: yes">  accompanies the linear theme with a
special rhythmic pattern (See Example 10). Part I refers to the classical
sonata-form, Part II is simply an ABA' scheme (a ternary form), and Part III
develops gradually. The permanent expansion of dynamics, of structural density,
the growing level of textural complication and speed, finally culminate in a
spacious cluster of tutti. This is also the climax of the whole Sonata. At the
ending coda the diatonic cluster and the main motif return again (See Example
10).

Though the Sonata is
a rather long piece (ca. 25 minutes), thanks to its symmetrical form the
listener has the impression of a very coherent, monolithic work. The
contemplative character of the slow parts alternates with the dramatic dynamism
of fast, figurative or chordal sequences. In these ways, the Organ
Sonata of Glinkowski demonstrates the
vitality and attractiveness of sonata principles even for contemporary
composers.

Finally, the notation of the Sonata
style='font-style:normal'> is partly traditional and partly modern. The
pitch--except some clusters--is strictly definite, as are the dynamics. The
duration of individual musical elements is approximate, however. The composer
used some rhythmic patterns, but also the proportional graphic intervals of
space/time and simple indications of duration. Glinkowski did not belong to that
group of composers who precisely specify the registration of their organ
compositions. On the contrary, he left a fairly large sphere of interpretation
up to the organist. He only indicated registration in a few places of the Sonata (e.g. in the slow episode of Part II, as mentioned above). The free choice of registration should be, however, considered together with tempo, dynamics, structural density and, last but not least, with the kind of organ and its disposition. Obviously, the aleatoric and cluster techniques and the notation result in a quasi-improvisatory piece, so any concert organist may create his own interpretation of the Sonata.

In the Three Motets of Serenity 2000), Nine Marian Anthems,and Five Motets in Honour of the Trinity (composed 2000; both still manuscripts), Mawby expresses more overtly than usual a deeply felt nostalgia for the earlier part of his life.31 The quoting of plainsong and composing chant-like melodies suggest his retrospective mood. Another clue is that all these works are a cappella settings of traditional Latin texts, the four-part mixed choir frequently dividing, sometimes into as many as eight parts. The Nine Marian Anthems and Five Motets in Honour of the Trinity  are written for specified days of the Catholic Church's Year, but the Three Motets of Serenity may be performed on any occasion deemed appropriate.

The Three Motets of Serenity are dedicated to the memory of Cardinal John Heenan, Archbishop of Westminster between 1963 and 1975, a period that coincided with most of Mawby's tenure of the Master of the Music position there. For SSAATTBB choir, they are based on three of Mawby's favorite plainsong tunes, which he describes as "superb, evocative and compelling [and] . . . central to the motets."32 In performance they should be treated as serene "musical prayer[s]," should sound unrushed, and display a chant-like meditative quality.33

Organ Music

Mawby had written no organ solos by the age of fifty-five, but Kevin Mayhew had a hunch that there was an as yet untapped vein of talent in that direction in the composer, and offered to publish any that he might care to produce. He had a strong background in organ, having been a fine organist as a boy, and, as was noted earlier, had majored in the instrument at the Royal College of Music. During the years as a church musician he had, on occasions, played for services, and had written many choral works with organ accompaniments. Thus it is not surprising that Mayhew's insight proved correct. What was unexpected was the heavy flow of pieces that poured from Mawby's pen once he started in 1991.

Unique among English organ composers, Mawby has written almost exclusively for church services.34 This may be explained by the role the instrument has played in his life. When he worked for the Roman Catholic Church, he occasionally performed on the organ, but primarily he was a choirmaster, and assistants usually played the instrument. Thus, he tends to see the instrument as a major adjunct to worship, as the provider of accompaniments for vocal music, the creator of "walking music," the furnisher of music to fill awkward silences, and generally supply background music at appropriate mo-ments in services. At the same time, though, he appreciates and values highly the traditional solo repertoire of the instrument. "Organ music," he says, "has a unique power which can move people deeply."35

The scores indicate that he thinks, broadly, in terms of a traditional large, four-manual, Romantic, orchestral instrument, such as the one built between the World Wars by Henry Willis at Westminster Cathedral.36 At least one enclosed division is necessary for the execution of the crescendos and diminuendos that are a part of Mawby's style. There should also be a supply of accessories, in order to realize the occasional terrace dynamics, the gradual orchestral-style piling up of power, and various other dynamic fluctuations within a piece. He quite regularly marks melodies to be soloed, without usually specifying specific stops. The one exception is that he sometimes marks entries of the tuba at climactic moments, a reflection of his lifelong love of the sound of the tuba at Westminster which is sui generis, a rank on thirty inches wind with an agreeable rasp about it, a sort of "edge." In the tradition of early 20th-century English organ composers,37 in loud passages he will sometimes call for a tuba solo in the tenor register in the left hand to roar out within a texture provided by the pedal and right hand. Less frequently, the tuba is given a soprano solo or plays chordal fanfare phrases.

Very prominent in his organ music are verbatim fragments of plainsong melodies or plainsong-like themes and phrases. This reflects his fondness for plainsong that he has felt ever since he sang the ancient chants for the first time at the age of nine.38 His organ works are usually between two to four pages in length, and are for performance by average to good church organists. Homophonic textures are the norm, as is the developing of material in a free, improvisatory manner that usually does not conform to one of the traditional organ forms. His music is almost completely free of the influence of the major organ composers past or present. Thus, there are no preludes and fugues, passacaglias, or sonatas, and hardly any of the other types of pieces favored by organists, such as toccatas, scherzos, intermezzi, and arias. Most of his pieces have been inspired by sacred texts or images, or have been written for situations in church services where organ music is useful, such as processionals, recessionals, and, as noted above, music to fill awkward silences during the service.

The first works, Quiet-Time: Fifteen Interludes for Organ (1991), follow, at least in spirit if not musical details, down the path blazed by his friend, Gregory Murray, in his monumental seven-volume collection of Short Organ Interludes for Liturgical Use (published between 1935 and 1987).39 Mawby's miniatures are untitled except for being numbered, are printed on two staves for an organ with two manuals and pedal, and employ modality, and plainsong or pseudo plainsong mel-odies. One may see an indication of Mawby's future mature organ style in the spirituality of the Quiet-Time interludes, but the pieces occasionally lack the flow and sense of inevitability that surrounds the better pieces that were written later.  Chords frequently fluctuate from four to five and six parts and sometimes more. Dissonances are frequent, quite often being those created by seventh and ninth chords, added seconds, and voice leading that is not always concerned with consonant vertical alignments.

With the trilogy Gregorian Calendar: Thirty Contrasting Pieces for Organ Based on Plainsong Melodies (1993), Gregorian Communion:  Twenty Pieces for Organ Based on Plainsong Melodies (1995), and Gregorian Processionals:  Twenty Pieces for Organ Based on Plainsong Melodies (1996) Mawby supplied a large collection of pieces for the organ in its role as a major adjunct to worship.

Gregorian Calendar comprises works of between two and four pages length for use throughout the liturgical year. Each season has one loud and one soft voluntary, and six shorter pieces for general use are attached at the end of the book. In the Foreword, Mawby says "the chant's rich variety of moods and modes [provided] a generous reference point from which to explore the inherent prayerfulness of the music." Entire Gregorian melodies are used as the basis of some pieces. Others, like the composition based on the All Saints Day plainsong Placare Christe Servulis, are built from one or more Gregorian fragments.

Placare Christe Servulis is developed from the first six tones of the chant. At the outset, the pentatonic plainsong fragment, set in 7/8 time, is enunciated four times, unaccompanied, in the rich soprano register of the tuba, and thereafter reappears periodically throughout the work, each statement being regenerated by some type of transformation. Characteristic of many of Mawby's organ pieces, in Placare Christe Servulis he writes what appears to be a newly-composed melody that is, in fact, derived from the plainsong motif introduced in bar one. Example 8 shows a version of this tune in the right hand part at bars 28-31. Reflecting the unmetered nature of plainsong, the main meter of 7/8, which Mawby usually divided in eighth notes as follows:  3 + 2 + 2 (see bars 32-33), is disturbed by regular changes of time signature, thus disrupting any lengthy impression of metric rhythm. This allows the plainsong style to pervade the piece, and also enervates the forward thrust of the music because it is rhythmically unpredictable. The triads are often larded with seconds and sevenths, less frequently ninths (bar 31), and, occasionally, elevenths (bars 32-33). These added tones create a different acoustical dimension from conventional triadic harmony, a more dissonant accompanimental foundation for his tunes. The off the cuff patchwork of contrasting ideas in Placare Christe Servulis, often heard over pedal points, suggests that the work was originally improvised and then written down.

The methods of Gregorian Calendar continued in Gregorian Communion  and Gregorian Processionals. This may be seen, for instance, in the dreamy improvisational chorale prelude on Adore te devote in Gregorian Communion. Although soloed statements of the opening line of the plainsong are heard near the beginning, and there is a presentation of the second half of the hymn tune near the end, the focus of Mawby's interest is in subtly weaving short phrases of the Gregorian melody into the delicately meandering, dreamy harmonies.  The essence of his use of ancient chants is that he likes one to hear snatches of motifs derived from the original theme, but only rarely quotes them unchanged and entirely. The accompanying left hand and pedal parts of the Adore te devote setting are concordant with the right hand much of the time, but extremely strident cluster chords occasionally result when preeminence is given to the horizontal movement of the parts.

With Hymns for Occasions for Manuals (One Hundred Special Arrangements) and More Hymns for Occasions for Manuals (One Hundred Special Arrangements) (both 1997) Mawby joined the ranks of such 20th-century English composers as Tertius Noble, Edward Bairstow, Eric Thiman, Henry Coleman, Harrison Oxley, Richard Lloyd, and Noel Rawsthorne, all of whom have contributed collections of varied keyboard accompaniments to hymn tunes sung by a church congregation. The above long list of composers suggests that the field was already crowded before Mawby added his arrangements, but some of the earlier collections were hardly usable because they never rose above the mundane and, by the 1990s, others had become old-fashioned.

Furthermore, Mawby's are different from the collections by the men listed above in that he provides more than simply a single varied accompaniment for each hymn. Each starts with an introduction for organ solo that captures the mood of the words and melody of the hymn, and this leads without break into two organ accompaniments for the congregational singing, the first a standard harmonization of the hymn tune, with first ending, marked dal segno, for repeating the same music for more verses, the second ending leading into the last verse, which is a more complex harmonization. Dovetailed into the end of the hymn proper is a concluding flourish of a few bars for the keyboard alone that is often a development of the introduction material. The organist chooses all or part of each arrangement as befits the occasion.

Much of the harmony is conventional four-part hymn style, but the composer is clearly attracted to the tension-creating attributes of dissonance, and he indulges with abandon his liking for this element in the varied accompaniments for the last verses. The end of the setting of  Crimond, shown in Example 9, illustrates the point. Several of the dissonances in this passage are traditional nonharmonic embellishing tones, such as the appoggiatura at bar 42 in the left hand part, and the suspension at bar 44 in the right hand, both of which resolve downwards by step. Dissonant clashes occur between the tonic pedal point and the manual harmony at bars 43-46, and there are numerous mildly dissonant seventh chords that are redolent of the musical theater style of Lloyd Webber.

Some of the touches of chromaticism that ratchet up the element of surprise and excitement in the varied harmonizations for last verses involve seventh chords. See, for instance, the secondary dominant seventh chord at bar 40, the diminished seventh chord at bar 41, and the half diminished seventh chords on the dominant at bars 44, 46, and 50 in Example 9. The major chord on the flattened mediant at bar 49 is a chromatic touch that some may feel is quite exhilarating.

Hymns for Occasions and More Hymns for Occasions are written with a sense of bold confidence and sheer enjoyment, coupled with thrilling, often unexpected delightful harmonic ventures, and they may well revive stale choirs and congregations who have become bored hymn singers.40

Given the above inspired arrangements of hymns, it is something of a disappointment that the composer has chosen to write almost all the twenty or so voluntaries on hymn tunes41 in the improvisational, homophonic, formally free style of the Gregorian trilogy discussed earlier. William Lloyd Webber was particularly fond of the style for some of his pieces based on hymn tunes.42 But he avoided the sameness of Mawby's compositions by sometimes using techniques and forms of the past, such as imitative counterpoint including canon,43 writing alla Bach,44 and casting the music in one of the chorale prelude forms.45 Yet this is not to say that one cannot commend some of the Mawby hymn preludes. Unto Us Is Born a Son (1994) and O Filii et Filiae (1995), for example, are vibrant and alive, and entirely convincing.

Unto Us Is Born a Son is so intensely joyous and melodious, and enriched with warm seventh chords and chromaticisms, that one might not notice the art concealing art, for the preexistent melody is subjected to continuous development, without any sense of it being an intellectual, technical study. The old Christmas tune traditionally associated with this text appears in a multitude of guises. Sometimes it is heard as a soprano melody with or without intervallic or rhythmic modification.  In one ruminative soft passage, there are vague reminiscences of the carol theme showing up fleetingly in a melismatic right-hand solo, accompanied by whole-note chords in the left hand, over a long pedal point. In the growing excitement leading to the closing apotheosis, parts of the Unto Us Is Born a Son melody appear in an inner part over an extended tonic pedal point. At the start of this passage, the first and third phrases of the preexistent melody are stated without break. Then the first two phrases of the hymn tune are presented in a particularly grand and "in the face" manner in augmentation, enunciated in stentorian, raspy tuba chords in the left hand, sandwiched between fortissimo accompanimental right-hand figurations and a pedal point in the feet. The last phrase of the carol tune is never stated in the work.

O Filii et Filiae is unique among the hymn preludes in that it is built around a full, uninterrupted statement of the preexistent melody. Mawby retains the modality and moderate pace of the ancient Easter plainsong tune, but removes the original free rhythms in favor of triple meter. A rhythmic, one-bar motif involving octave leaps in the right hand, over dotted half note left-hand chords, provides the material of the opening prelude, and returns in modified forms in interludes later.  In the first section, this leaping material frames presentations of the first and third lines of O Filii et Filiae in the mixolydian mode on G, followed by a repeat of the third line, now in the mixolydian on C. Next, via an eight-bar dominant pedal point that is ornamented by references to the leaping motif, there is a loud, majestic complete statement of the modal plainsong on C in manual block chords over dotted half notes in the pedals. In the third section, with a growing sense of excitement engendered by syncopations, more dissonance, and a gradual increase in organ volume, the ancient melody is presented a final time, broken into separate phrases and supported by a foundation of material derived from the preludial leaping motif.  The coda is both sublime and breath-taking: above a fortissimo fifteen-bar dominant pedal point, the left hand plays the first two lines of O Filii et Filiae in the tenor register on the solo division tuba stop, accompanied by chords in the right hand on the great manual. Finally, the last phrase of the hymn, marked Adagio, appears in the pedals, under a series of massive, held chromatic manual chords. A thunderous full organ C major chord closes the work.

Compline (1993) is an example of some fifteen pieces composed for the so-called "Reluctant Organist"--someone who can only play simple pedal parts consisting of mainly lower notes (which are easier for beginners to play) under a more difficult keyboard part.46 Such restrictions do not seem to have hampered the composer, for Compline unfolds naturally, with a restrained beauty and calm spiritual tone that is entirely appropriate for Compline, the final service before retiring in the Roman Catholic Church.  Two musical ideas are developed in a series of short alternating sections. The one idea is introduced at the start, and is a solemn, reverent theme in solid quarter and half note chords that are generally dissonant. Noticeably more concordant, the other idea is a faster moving, sinuous, melismatic, widely spaced theme.

The Weekend Organist: Service Music for Manuals (1997) is similar to the Gregorian Calendar, Gregorian Communion, and Gregorian Processionals in that it is a resource volume for church organists. The book comprises eighteen Fanfares, ten Processionals, seven Meditations, and nine Recessionals. The envisaged user is "the busy weekend organist who, while anxious to contribute to a vibrant weekly liturgy, has little time to undertake systematic and concentrated organ practice."47

In the Preface, Mawby suggests that the nine longer Fanfares could be used as an introduction to the hymns on special occasions, or might be played as greetings for an important visitor, or even to mark the arrival of the ordinary procession. They are in the nine most common major keys for hymns:  the first in C major, followed by one piece for each of the major key signatures from one to four sharps and flats.  A large two manual organ that includes a trumpet stop, reed chorus, and enclosed swell seems to be in the composer's mind.  Mawby has a fine grasp of the need, when writing fanfares, for a vibrant sense of dash, staccato articulation, repeated-note rhythms, triadic melodic motifs, and, perhaps in order to keep the audience alert, brief surprising chordal digressions here and there. The harmony is modern-sounding but tonal, with frequent progressions to unexpected chords, and is encrusted with traditional nonharmonic embellishing tones. One does not sense that the composer has labored long and hard on polishing, with the result that there is a pleasant easy flow about the music, which can be magnificent and emotionally stirring.

Mawby says the nine shorter Fanfares should be played as prefaces to the Gospel reading on feast days, but they might introduce hymns at important services.

The Processionals and Recessionals are divided into three categories:  (1) loud two-page works; (2) quiet two-page pieces; and (3) short compositions that are mostly only three systems long.  Mawby envisages them as interchangeable, and may be shortened if necessary.

To some degree, in the Processionals and Recessionals, but especially in the quiet, two-page Meditations, plainsong's contours pervade the melodic material.  The Meditations are also endowed with a contemplative, spiritual mood that is the world of the Roman Catholic Church's High Mass, with its chiming altar bells, smell of incense and candles, and Gregorian chant. Optional cuts, marked by square brackets, are provided in the Meditations, to facilitate the tailoring of the length to suit a particular occasion.

A procession of majestic pseudo plainsong melodies dominates the joyful  voluntary Praise the Lord with Mighty Sounds (1997). Cast in ternary form, a celebratory mood is established immediately in Section A with detached, dense, chordal writing for full organ alternating with skipping plainsong-like interjections. After developing these ideas, a subdued middle section is ushered in with a short lyrical new melody that again suggests the influence of ancient Catholic chant. Initially this tune is soloed in the left hand, accompanied on another manual by detached repeated chords in the right hand, and then it undergoes development, with fragments of the piece's principal melodic material appearing here and there. Section A1 sees a return to the dynamically powerful, dignified ideas of the opening. These are developed briefly, after which, with the organ blazing away at full throttle, there is a closing cadential affirmation of Christ's majesty over his people.

Triptych for Organ (1997), Mawby's only large scale,48 technically difficult work, is for top recitalists. It requires a large Romantic orchestral organ with at least one enclosed division.  In using the term triptych Mawby was likening his three pieces to an altarpiece painting in three hinged-together panels, such as the 1432 Altarpiece by Hubert and Jan van Eyck in St. Bavo Cathedral, Ghent, which he loves.49 The three movements are titled "The Energy and Humanity of Christ," "The Mystery of Communion," and "Christ is Risen, Alleluia!" and are independent programmatic pieces that are related by their Christian theology but nothing more. The work's modality, pseudo chant motifs, free use of successions of different meters, and through-composed, improvisational style are vintage Mawby. Dissonances are much more pervasive and abrasive than usual, notably in the greater than usual use of cluster chords. Despite the religious titles of the movements, the composition is not in cyclic form, but similarities in the main motifs of each of the movements (marked with brackets in Example 10a-c) help to bind the work together thematically.

Marked Allegro feroce, the first movement opens with the principal idea, a five-tone motif, in the pedals (Example 10a). This eventually gives way to subordinate material consisting of a series of syncopated, detached, agitated, repeated-note, sixteenth-note patterns. The opening five-tone motif returns, transformed into a jaunty modal dancing theme, and then is truncated, against a backdrop of savagely dissonant cluster chords. Then a new, less dramatic subordinate melodic idea appears, duplicated at the fourth and sixth below, thus forming parallel first inversion triads. This material returns in various guises throughout the rest of the movement. As the triumphant close approaches, both the principal five-tone motif and the syncopated, sixteenth-note motif are brought together in a series of overlapping entries, against a backdrop of busy, high pitched, sixteenth-note figurations in the right hand. In the breathtaking lead up to the final chord, the first motif is dominant.

The second movement, marked Andante ma un poco rubato, is characterized by a rather static, spiritual atmosphere that Mawby first used in Mass in Honour of Christ the King (1967) and had turned to so effectively a number of times later.50 The structure is a series of smoothly joined sections in which the movement's chief motif (which is similar to the first movement's principal motif) undergoes a series of transformations, against slower moving ethereal-sounding chords. First, it is reiterated like an ostinato in the pedal. Then it turns into a wide-ranging, serpentine, high-pitched, fragmented solo (Example 10b). At the approach to the climax the motif is obsessively repeated, after which it returns to the pedal.

A similar motif to the first movement's principal idea opens the finale, and this is followed by a bridge passage of agitated sixteenth-note figurations that are also reminiscent of the beginning of the composition. Then a secondary idea, a rhythmic, wide-ranging melodic fragment for a solo reed in the style of a pompous heraldic fanfare, is introduced. With deep, highly emotional religious fervor, the composer alternates the movement's principal motif and the solo reed fanfare idea in an extended, wildly ecstatic movement of metamorphosis. Mawby, as if overcome with enthusiasm, and drawing upon his whole arsenal of improvisational effects, seems to lose himself in what is the most extensive display in his organ music of colorful, sonorous, acoustical effects.

After so many pieces of between two to four pages length written principally for church service use, Triptych's larger canvas  is a major departure for Mawby.  Its positive attributes are the fluency of the writing, the vivid pictorialism, and the courageous daring the composer demonstrates in experimenting on a much larger canvas than before. But the composer's improvisatory, through-composed methods, that work well in shorter structures, are put under unbearable stress in here.

The 20th-century English Catholic composers of significant church music are probably Edward Elgar, Edmund Rubbra, Lennox Berkeley, Anthony Milner, and Colin Mawby. Unlike the others in this group, Mawby has concentrated almost entirely on writing liturgical church and organ music. He has a keen appreciation of, and affection for, religious texts, and responds to them creatively and with finesse. This factor, combined with his superlative mastery of the techniques of writing for voices, accounts, at least in part, for his best church works probably being unequaled by other living English Catholic composer. In the organ works, plainsong has perhaps been allowed to be too influential, and preoccupation with loosely evolving, improvisational development of material monopolizes the scores. Salient positive features of his organ compositions are the excellent under-the-fingers style and feeling for what sounds well, and the music's appropriateness for the occasions for which it has been written--its ability to beautify and bring into focus the moods of the various situations that call for organ music in church services.

The conviction, inspiration, sincerity, and warmth of expression in his church and organ music, are expressions of the two paramount galvanizing forces in Mawby’s life:  his love of God, and devotion to the Roman Catholic Church.

Carolyn Shuster Fournier expresses her gratitude to Pierre Cogen and to Ann Labounsky for providing material and advice for this article, to Marie-Christine Ugo-Lhôte for the loan of her father’s collection of the review L’Orgue, to Mifa Martin for having read through the text, and to the Ruth and Clarence Mader Memorial Scholarship Fund for its grant in 2006.
An international concert artist, Dr. Carolyn Shuster Fournier is titular of the Aristide Cavaillé-Coll choir organ at La Trinité Church in Paris, France. She has written several articles for The Diapason. In October 1983, she was privileged to perform Jean Langlais’ Double Fantasy for Two Organists with the composer, in his concerts during his last tour to England: at the Royal Festival Hall in London (on October 26), at the Salisbury Cathedral, and at the Christ Church Chapel in Oxford.

The Sainte-Clotilde Tradition1 is based on the lineage transmitted in a teacher/student relationship from Franck to Tournemire to Langlais.2 Especially beginning with Charles Tournemire, these organist/composers, as well as many of their substitutes (among others, Maurice Duruflé, André Fleury, and Daniel-Lesur), the choirmaster Maurice Emmanuel,3 and other titular organists at Sainte-Clotilde—notably Joseph Ermend Bonnal, Jean Langlais, and Pierre Cogen—had an intimate, spiritual understanding of the Gregorian chants used in the traditional Catholic liturgy. This was manifest in their deeply poetic and colorful interpretations, and in their use of Gregorian chants in their improvisations and compositions. They all served their art with humility. This article is dedicated to Pierre Cogen, a French organist-composer in the Sainte-Clotilde Tradition.

Pierre Cogen’s musical formation under Jean Langlais’ guidance

Pierre Cogen (see illustration 1) was born in Paris on October 2, 1931. From 1944 to 1951, he studied at the Petit Séminaire de Paris in Conflans.4 He sang in the Schola choir, directed by the Abbot Jean Revert.5 Such a framework provided Cogen with a musical training in the ancient, pure classical tradition—in a church choir school that sang Gregorian chants as well as the classical polyphonic choral repertory. At the age of 14, Cogen began to accompany this choir on the 12-stop Cavaillé-Coll organ6 in the school chapel. Each year, Jean Langlais was invited to give a concert on this instrument. When Cogen heard him improvise brilliantly on the Gregorian Sunday mid-Lent Introit, Laetare Jerusalem, he was moved so deeply that he immediately requested to become his student. At the age of 19, Cogen studied privately with him, taking lessons either on the two-manual harmonium with a pedalboard in Langlais’ home, on the Cavaillé-Coll organ in his class at the Paris Institute for the Blind, or on the chapel organ at Cogen’s school.
After graduating from this school in 1951, at the age of 20, Pierre Cogen studied for one year with Edouard Souberbielle at the César Franck School in Paris, during Langlais’ first tour to the United States. This distinguished and cultivated professor helped Cogen to solidify his technique. Cogen then continued to take private lessons with Langlais, studying organ interpretation (especially of the works associated with the Sainte-Clotilde Tradition), and also harmony, counterpoint, fugue, and improvisation (notably of the fugue). Cogen also studied harmony with Jean Lemaire and took preparatory courses for the exam that would qualify him to become a music professor with Eliane Chevalier (Marie-Madeleine Duruflé-Chevalier’s sister) and Raymond Weber. After obtaining his Certificat d’Aptitude as a music education professor, he taught in Paris, in public schools and at the private Alsatian School from 1961 to 1993. In the meantime, from 1952 to 1966, he directed a children’s choir, Les Petits Chanteurs de Championnet, which sang four-voice a cappella music from Palestrina to Langlais. It toured, notably to Germany in 1964 and 1965.
From 1952 to 1979, in exchange for numerous lessons, Cogen assisted Langlais’ wife Jeanne7 as a musical secretary, notating Langlais’ compositions onto paper and proofreading them for publication. In 1954, he helped Langlais prepare his edition of C. P. E. Bach’s Six Sonatas.8 When Langlais urgently composed his Salve Regina Mass for the Christmas Eve midnight mass at the Notre-Dame Cathedral in 1954, his wife notated the text during the day; each night, Cogen prepared the separate vocal scores. Among other compositions, he notated Langlais’ In Paradisum (Triptyque grégorien) in a hotel in Haarlem, during the International Improvisation Competition in 1978. In 1971, Pierre Cogen decided to complete his musical training, in both organ and improvisation, as well as in counterpoint and fugue. He therefore enrolled at the Schola Cantorum—in Langlais’ organ class from 1971 to 1973, then in Yvonne Desportes’ fugue class from 1974 to 1976—obtaining the Prix de Virtuosité in organ and improvisation in 1973, and Superior Diplomas in harmony, counterpoint and fugue in 1975–76. During the first term of 1973, when Langlais took a leave of absence for illness, Cogen took lessons with his substitute, André Fleury, studying his Prélude, Andante and Toccata, acquiring a more dreamlike interpretation of the Prélude and a more flamboyant spirit in the Toccata. Fleury insisted upon absolute precision and rigor in carrying out registration changes. Cogen greatly appreciated his honesty, his rectitude of character, and his constant friendship.9
In July 1975, Pierre Cogen participated in an improvisation academy in Nice with Pierre Cochereau, driving from Paris to Nice with the American organist George Baker. When Cogen improvised an “Elevation,” Cochereau immediately put him at ease, with his customary simplicity and warmth. Cogen recalls that they began with modulation exercises, all types of canons and toccata formulas, developing numerous forms: the sicilienne, various suite movements, and, of course, the fugue. Among the advice that Cogen retained:

Carry out your effects tactfully. Don’t say everything initially!
Interweave all of the elements, one upon another.
Don’t abuse the use of major and minor scales.
Establish the tonalities of your development.
Beware of your repeated chords, too many arpeggiated formulas.
How can you return to the principal tonality? And the 6/4 chord!10

In 1979, Pierre Cogen obtained, by competition, the Aptitude Certificate for Teaching Organ and Improvisation (C.A.) in the national French conservatories. In 1984, he created the organ class at the Maurice Ravel Conservatory in Levallois, near Paris, remaining there until his retirement in 1993.

Titular at the Sainte-Clotilde Basilica in Paris

Beginning in 1955, Cogen began to substitute for Langlais at the Sainte-Clotilde Basilica when his official assistant, Pierre Denis,11 was not available. The Grand Orgue gave solemnity to the church services, and prepared and prolonged the atmosphere of the liturgical chants during the masses, vespers, weddings and funerals. When Langlais asked him to substitute for him, Cogen played for three Sunday morning masses: the 9:30 a.m. high mass was in Latin and Gregorian chant; the two others, at 11 a.m. and noon, were low masses. At the high mass, Cogen played the Prelude, the Offertory, the Elevation, the Communion, and the Postlude. During the low masses, he played continuously while the celebrant recited his prayers in a “low” voice. During the church services, Cogen based his improvisations and his choice of repertory on the appropriate chants of the liturgical year. For the vesper services, after playing a processional entrance, he improvised fifteen verses, first for the repeated antiphons that follow each of the five psalms, then, in alternation with the choir, for the verses of the hymn and the Magnificat, and then again for the antiphon.
In 1972, Pierre Cogen played the organ regularly, becoming Langlais’ official assistant. During this period, he only played two Sunday morning masses, at 11 a.m. (preceded by a long prelude) and at noon. Although the vespers were no longer held, he still played for weddings and funerals. At the beginning of 1973, when Langlais fell ill, Cogen played for all of the services. When Langlais resumed his activities, he dedicated to Cogen the fourth of his Cinq Méditations sur l’Apocalypse: “Oh oui, viens, Seigneur viens, Seigneur Jésus.”12
On January 31, 1976, at Langlais’ request, Pierre Cogen was named as a co-titular organist at Saint-Clotilde. He still played for the same number of masses. Even more important, since he had unlimited access to the organ, he became well integrated into the Sainte-Clotilde Tradition, playing much of its related repertory. On the occasion of his nomination as co-titular organist, Langlais presented him with Léon Vallas’s biography of César Franck13 with the following inscription (see illustration 2).
From 1978 to 1985, in addition to the two morning masses, Cogen played for a traditional low mass in Latin every Sunday at 6:30 p.m. (except in the summer). On May 17, 1987, Cogen accompanied Langlais’ Messe Solennelle for four-part choir and two organs15 while Langlais played solo pieces during a televised Sunday morning mass that celebrated Langlais’ 80th birthday. In April 1988, when Langlais resigned at the age of 80 due to a bad heart condition, he was named “Honorary Organist at Sainte-Clotilde.”16 Cogen succeeded him as titular, and Jacques Taddei was also named as titular, joining the list of their illustrious predecessors:

1863–1890 César Franck17
1890–1898 Gabriel Pierné
1898–1939 Charles Tournemire
1942–1944 Joseph Ermend Bonnal
1945–1988 Jean Langlais
1976–1994 Pierre Cogen
1988–present Jacques Taddei

After his nomination, Cogen dedicated his Offrande to Langlais and premiered this work during the 11 a.m. Easter Mass at Sainte-Clotilde on April 3, 1988, the day he succeeded Langlais as titular. At the beginning of this piece, a beautiful pentatonic melody is harmonized with refined simplicity (see illustration 3). After Langlais’ death on May 8, 1991, Cogen and Taddei, with other instrumentalists and choirs, played for his funeral on May 30.
From 1988 to 1991, in addition to his service playing, Cogen organized organ concerts at Sainte-Clotilde every Friday after the noon mass. These concerts continued until the church was closed in 1992 for restoration work. When it reopened in 1993, Cogen and Taddei only played for the 11 a.m. mass, but a song rehearsal that immediately preceded the mass prevented them from playing a prelude. On June 21, 1994, Cogen retired at the age of 62, after 39 years of service to this parish (21 years as a substitute organist and 18 years as a titular). On April 2, he played there for the last time—for the Easter Vigil and the midnight Easter mass, ending it with the following postlude: Langlais’ Incantation pour un jour saint, which combines the Lumen Christi chant from the Easter Vigil and the Litanies, which had been sung by the congregation during the vigil to implore heavenly aid.

International concert organist and recording artist

As a concert organist, Cogen had the privilege of premiering several of Langlais’ pieces. On December 30, 1979, he inaugurated his Noëls avec Variations, Op. 204, at the Saint-Louis des Invalides Church in Paris. On November 18, 1985, he premiered Langlais’ Talitha Koum, Op. 225, at a second concert that celebrated Langlais’ 40 years of service as an organist at Sainte-Clotilde. On Sunday, December 13, 1987, at Sainte-Clotilde, Cogen premiered, with Claire Louchet, soprano, Langlais’ Antiennes à la Sainte Vierge, Op. 242, for one voice and organ.
On February 1, 1987, Pierre Cogen performed at the Madeleine Church in Paris, along with François-Henri Houbart and Georges Bessonnet, in a concert that celebrated Jean Langlais’ 80th birthday. On February 15, 1987, Langlais’ 80th birthday, he attended Cogen’s recital at the Notre-Dame Cathedral. Cogen performed Langlais’ Chant de joie, Rosa mystica, Triptyque, and Dans la lumière, an extract from L’Offrande à une âme. At Sainte-Clotilde, Cogen also performed in several memorable organ concerts: one was held in Tournemire’s honor on November 16, 1989. It is particularly moving to note that Cogen heard Langlais play for the last time during this concert—a moving rendition of the second of Tournemire’s Sei Fioretti, which had been dedicated to him 57 years earlier, in 1932!18
Also at Sainte-Clotilde, Cogen played in two concerts that celebrated the centenary of Cesar Franck’s death in 1990 and in several recitals that were held in Langlais’ memory in 1991. On Good Friday in 1989, 1990 and 1991, Cogen was privileged to perform at Sainte-Clotilde Tournemire’s Sept Chorals-Poèmes pour les Sept Paroles du Christ, Op. 67. Father Choné, the church priest, introduced each piece with a commentary of the Gospel.
Cogen also rendered homage to his two predecessors by recording their works on the Sainte-Clotilde Grand Orgue:
1. Langlais’ works (carried out in the composer’s presence): Incantation pour un jour saint, Ave Maria, Ave Maris Stella, Offrande à Marie, Suite medievale (a 33 rpm record published by Tempo FR 760310), 1976;
2. Langlais’ Première Symphonie, Suite folklorique, Triptyque by Cybélia (CY-867), 1986; 3. Tournemire’s Sept Chorals-Poèmes pour les Sept Paroles du Xrist en Croix, L’Orgue Mystique (the Assumption and the Epiphany Offices) (CD, Cybélia, CY-883), 1990. In 1997, he also recorded Langlais’ Suite médiévale, Suite brève, and Suite française on the organ at the Church of the Holy Spirit in Mannheim (CD, Aeolus, AE-10081).

Pierre Cogen’s organ works

After retiring from his post at Sainte-Clotilde in 1994, Pierre Cogen was able to devote more time to performing and to composing. His compositions were inspired by Tournemire’s poetic language and by Langlais’ colorful harmonies. The influence of the Sainte-Clotilde Tradition is also manifest in Cogen’s use of modal tonalities, Gregorian chants, and the imitation of bells. Several of Cogen’s organ works were commissioned, notably by the Austrian organist and composer Thomas Daniel Schlee, by two organists in Switzerland, Eva and Marco Brandazza, and by the Austrian organist Herbert Bolterauer. In the following list of Cogen’s works, the titles are given in French, along with information concerning their dedications, their premieres and their publication. A brief description of each piece provides the composer’s remarks concerning his works.

1. Deux Chorals, dedicated to his dear master Jean Langlais, composed as birthday presents for him; they were premiered privately, on Langlais’ house organ, on February 15, 1974 (the second choral) and in 1977 (the first choral): “Es ist ein Ros’ entsprungen,” 1977; “Herzlich tut mich verlangen,” 1974.
Published in Paris: Combre (C 5464), 1993 (6'30").
The association of these two chorals recalls two vital extremities, one’s birth and death, as Cogen explains.
The first choral, with its inherently intimate character, uses the famous Praetorius Christmas carol in a clear, contrapuntal style, with particularly soft registrations (Gambe and Voix Celeste, Bourdon 8', with a soft Pedal Flute). The melody, in long note values in the soprano, is accompanied by a discreet movement of eighth-notes in the inner voices, while syncopated rhythms in the bass line (played on the pedal) lull the upper voices.
Cogen was studying improvisation with Langlais when he composed the second choral. Langlais had insisted that the pedal part should not stagnate in the lower notes. His student followed his advice far beyond his master’s wishes, since the pedal sings entirely in the upper range on the following stops: Flute 4', Nasard 22⁄3', Larigot 11⁄3' and Piccolo 1' (registration that was dear to Messiaen in his Banquet céleste). The choral melody, resolutely sustained with homophonic writing, is confined to the manuals (Bourdon 8', Voix Humaine and tremolo on the Swell or, if this is not available, on 8' foundation stops that can sufficiently balance the opposing chant in the pedal). If the pedalboard does not contain a G3, it is possible to play the entire pedal part an octave lower on a registration based on 2' stops.

2. Nocturne sur un thème populaire Breton, 1976, dedicated to Michèle Vermesse, his future wife; premiered by Ann Labounsky in a concert at Sainte-Clotilde in Paris on May 21, 1979.
Published in Paris: Combre (C 5396), 1992 (7'30").
Recorded by Hans Leitner at the Passau Cathedral in 1995, in Klangfarben der grössten Kirchenorgel der Welt, CD 118, Symicon, Passau, and by Ulrich Karg at the Saint-Vith Church in Belgium, 1999, in Organs in Wallonie, a province of Liège, Blawète Records, Liège.
The theme of this nocturne is a Breton hymn proposed to Pierre Cogen as an improvisation theme to conclude a concert given at Douarnenez (in the southern Finistère) on August 17, 1975. This evening hymn affirms a faith as solid as the granite that is exposed to harsh atmospheric conditions; it is presented as such in the old Breton night legends (ankou, korrigans, etc.). Cogen tried to bring this atmosphere to life in this symphonic, three-part Andante: following the triple exposition of the theme, interspersed with mysterious bell tolls, a sombre and anguished central section develops certain fragments of the theme; then a re-exposition is calmer and more lyrical. This piece finishes with a reminder of the bell tolling: at the beginning and the end of this work, two chords are superposed in the lower keyboard range, solely on the Nasard 22⁄3' and the Tierce 13⁄5' stops.

3. Chorale “Erbarm dich mein, ô Herre Gott,” 1978, unpublished (5').
In an ecumenical approach, Pierre Cogen had planned on writing several suites that would combine Lutheran chorales with Gregorian themes. This is the only work that was completed. In a particularly slow tempo, the chorale theme passes successively from the lower to the upper ranges, from pianissimo to triple forte with dense polyphonic writing, whereas the Gregorian theme, Miserere mei, Deus, serves as a countrapuntal element.

4. Deux Hosannas sur des textes grégoriens: I. Hosanna in exsilio, 1980, to François Tricot; II. Hosanna Escalquensis, 1982, to Jeanne Langlais, in memoriam.
Published in Das neue Orgelalbum II, Vienna: Universal Edition (UE 17480), 1985 (7'30").
The first piece begins with an excerpt of the Sanctus from the Missa Orbis Factor. Then, a two-part development built around a group of four descending notes is followed by a recapitulation with a canon at the seventh and a brief coda. The fear-stricken character of the music alludes to the title of the piece: we are not in heaven (in excelsis), but in this world of banishment (in exsilio), to which the Salve Regina alludes.
In the second movement, the theme, a fragment of the Missa Cunctipotens Genitor Deus in the second mode, appears three times. A fugato, based on a fragment of the theme, introduces the development section. A large-scale rallentando leads to a mysterious carillon: that of the Escalquens Church (near Toulouse), where Jean and Jeanne Langlais are buried. This carillon is played very slowly (see illustration 4, page 28). The bell tolling and the thematic fragments are developed with a crescendo, leading to a brilliant, luminous presentation of the theme in a canon at the interval of a fifth.
5. Psalmodie, composed at Cernay la Ville on December 31, 1985, dedicated to his mother.
Published in Pedals Only, Vienna: Universal Edition (UE 18601), 1988 (5').
The author could have inscribed an epigraph under the title of the piece, citing the passage in the Gospel of St. Luke (chapter I, verse 39), following the text concerning the Annunciation: “Mary left hastily to visit her cousin Elizabeth in the mountains.” At the beginning of Psalmodie, a series of three groups of three quiet F-sharps on the Flute 4' stop recall the Sainte-Clotilde church bells when they toll for the Angelus.19 As Cogen explains, after this introduction comes a three-voice fugue, whose joyful subject is none other than that of the psalmody in the eighth mode, sometimes used to sing the Magnificat. After several expositions and divertimenti, the movement is accelerated while the subject is compressed through several canons (strettos), leading to the tutti, a radiant B-major chord. Two codas are proposed, with solo pedal or with the addition of the manuals.

6. Offrande, 1988 (initially composed in 1963 for an a cappella four-voice choir with the title Le Lotus d’Or), dedicated to his dear master Jean Langlais; premiered by Cogen during the 11 a.m. Easter Mass at Sainte-Clotilde on April 3, 1988, the day he succeeded Langlais as titular.
Published in Paris: Combre (Collection Horizon), 1990 (3').
Recorded by Andrew Cantrill, at St. Paul’s Cathedral in Wellington, New Zealand.
This is a unique piece: Cogen’s only work from the 1960s, when he was strongly influenced by early twentieth-century composers such as Debussy, Ravel, Stravinsky, Bartók, and Milhaud. It is based on a Birman folklore melody in the pentatonic mode and is structured according to its four original strophes. The melody initially appears in the soprano on the Swell Oboe 8', accompanied by the left hand on the Positive Salicional 8' and a soft 16' and 8' in the Pedal. In the second strophe, a trio, the melody appears in the left hand on the Positive Cromorne, while the alto is played by the right hand on the Swell Cornet, with a Grand Jeu de Tierce in the Pedal. In the slightly agitated third strophe, the melody in the soprano is sustained by the two voices in the alto, which develop in imitation before sounding together in parallel thirds. The work finishes peacefully on the Swell Gambe and Voix Celeste stops that accompany the melody on the Great Bourdon 8'. As Cogen indicates, the absence of the B and E notes in the pentatonic melody allowed him to truly modulate: while the first and the last strophes maintained their “white” key signature, the B-flat intervenes in the second strophe and joins the E-flat in the third one.

7. Fantaisie sur une Antienne for organ with four hands and pedal, 1988, finished at Cernay-la-Ville, near Paris, on November 4, 1989, dedicated to Claire and Thomas Daniel Schlee; premiered by Cogen and Schlee in a concert that celebrated 50th anniversary of Tournemire’s death, at Sainte-Clotilde on November 23, 1989, along with T. D. Schlee’s Prisme, also a work for four hands and pedal.
Published in Vienna: Universal Edition (UE 19550), 1988 (7').
Recorded by Eva and Marco Brandazza at the Schloss Church in Bad Mergentheim (Germany), in Ite, missa est, Organum Musikproduktion, Öhringen, 1996; and by Sylvie Poirier and Philip Crozier on the Casavant organ at the Très Saint Sacrement de Jésus Church in Montréal, Canada, in Historic Organs of Montreal, CD 1.
Pierre Cogen’s fantasy contains three main sections of polyphonic writing—Lento, Andante and Allegro—that alternate with freely expressive recitatives. The Lento section sounds like a funeral march on the soft 8' foundation stops, After progressing from the lower to the upper registers, a heavy pedal note imitates a bell-like toll on low C. The Andante presents a fugue whose vigorous rhythmical theme appears in the alto, then in the tenor and in the bass. In the final Allegro, a litany-like dialogue on the foundation stops with the mixtures, the composer presents the Gregorian antiphon on which this piece is based: the “Ego dormivi” from the Easter matins, which Tournemire used several times in his L’Orgue mystique, notably in his Paraphrase Carillon. Cogen’s work ends majestically on the full organ.

8. L’Epiphanie du Seigneur, 1991, in homage to the painter, Werner Hartmann, dedicated to Geneviève and Daniel Hartmann; premiered by Pierre Cogen on November 10, 1991, for the tenth anniversary of the death of this painter, at the Parish Catholic Church in Gerliswill-Emmenbrücke, near Lu-cerne, Switzerland. Unpublished (14')
Werner Hartmann’s series of large paintings (5.60m x 1.90m) of the Epiphany of the Savior, which inspired this piece, are located in the choir of the Catholic church, Pfarrkirche Gerliswill, in the Gerliswill-Emmenbrücke district of Lucerne. They depict the three miracles related in the Epiphany Gospel: the star followed by the Wise Men (who ride on horses instead of camels), the water changed into wine, and the descent of the Holy Spirit during Christ’s Baptism. While looking at these paintings, Cogen was struck by their link with the Gregorian antiphon in the first mode, the “Tribus miraculis” from the Magnificat of the Second Vespers of Epiphany. Since this work is based on this theme, it may be sung as an introduction.
According to Cogen, in the first movement, “The Star, the Three Wise Men and the Manger Scene,” mysterious and stark sonorities (due to the light discord on the Nazard stop) recall the night and the starlit sky. The central part of this movement recalls the Wise Men (who travel on horseback to follow the star that led them to the cradle). At the end, a slow descent leads to a lulling movement, a sweet evocation of the manger scene.
In the second movement, “The Wedding at Cana and the Baptism of Jesus,” light flutes sound a discreet carillon, while the rustic reed stops introduce a folk melody full of Mediterranean light. The development, initially calm, becomes more intense, leading up to a brief and turbulent agitato that represents the servants’ astonishment when the miracle takes place. Then, the melody is transformed into a Grand Plein Jeu—solemn and hieratic—the manifestation of the Divine Presence. This fragment finishes with the first notes of Ubi caritas et amor, Deus ibi est.
The Baptism of Jesus by John, a penance baptism, begins with low notes and rustic sonorities that depict the universe filled with minerals and the dry desert where John the Baptist carried out his mission. This long tension is resolved in less dissonant harmonies, the first fruits of the salvation announced by John the Baptist. The quotation of the Veni Creator recalls the descent of the Holy Spirit onto Jesus. The work concludes in a luminous atmosphere with the initial Gregorian theme—that of the antiphon Tribus miraculis.

9. L’Exaltation de la Sainte Croix, Diptyque for Organ, 1994, dedicated to Monseigneur Jean Revert, Honorary Choirmaster at the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, for the 50th anniversary of his ordination to the priesthood; premiered by Pierre Cogen at the Notre-Dame Cathedral on Palm Sunday, on March 27, 1994. Unpublished (11')
According to Cogen, this work is a grand Gregorian paraphrase in the spirit of similar pieces by Tournemire and Langlais. The title refers to the Feast of the Holy Cross. The melodic material is taken from several liturgical antiphons and hymns from the Holy Week, in particular, the antiphons Ecce lignum Crucis, Crucem tuam adoramus, and the hymn Vexilla Regis. A Meditation on the Mystery of the Cross, an instrument of Christ’s torture but also a symbol of the Redemption, this work is in the form of a diptyque in two connecting parts:
I. After an introduction inviting one to the Adoration of the Cross, a somber procession intones the hymn Vexilla Regis in the lower ranges of the organ. This first part ends peacefully, in expectation of the Resurrection.
II. At the very beginning of the second part, the atmosphere changes. A theme of exaltation, Exaltavit illum, first in the upper range of the organ, gives birth to a fugato. Profiting from secondary episodes, the theme of the hymn Vexilla Regis winds its way into the low ranges before powerfully bursting forth. The work concludes with a fanfare, recalling its various themes.

10. Lucernaire for two organs, “Paravi lucernam Christo meo” (Ps. 131/132, v. 17), for the Christmas season or for a celebration of the Light, 1994, commissioned by Eva and Marco Brandazza and premiered by them on January 10, 1995, at the Jesuit Church in Lucerne, Switzerland (with Eva on the choir organ and Marco on the tribune organ). Unpublished (17')
Recorded by Eva and Marco Brandazza (see item 7 above).
Underneath the title, the composer placed a verse of the Psalm 131 (132): “I have prepared a lamp for my Christ.” According to Cogen, this expectation and coming of the Light, an idea that repeatedly occurs in the Christmas season liturgical texts, guided him during his preparations, from the antiphon O Oriens (for the winter solstice) and the Lumen ad revelationem gentium of the Feast of the Purification, until the hymn Jesu, Redemptor omnium and its verse. By referring to these texts that were sung during the vespers of the Christmas season, the composer thought of structuring his work in the manner of an evening service, notably the one that was formerly referred to as Lucernaire, because one lit lamps during this service. In addition, the composer did not neglect to bring out the similarity between the Latin word lucerna, the lamp, and the name of the city of Lucerne.

11. Cortège, 1996, in memory of Adrien Maciet, the organ builder; Herbert Bolterauer premiered it on November 8, 1996, at the Mariahilf in Graz, Austria.
Published in Paris: Combre (C 05909), in Enluminures. Dix Pièces pour orgue sur un thème donné, 1999 (5').
Herbert Bolterauer, the organist at the Mariahilf Church in Graz, Austria, had requested nine different composers to write a short piece on a theme by Alexandre Schrei. The title of this collection, Enluminures [Illuminations], refers to the way the composers, through the variety of their styles, were able to “illuminate” the various aspects of the thematic material. Since Cogen’s piece is a memorial one, he chose a writing style that is essentially contrapuntal, quasi-vocal. He begins his piece in a slow and grave tempo: Schrei’s theme initially appears when the pedal enters. The piece intensifies until its conclusion. According to the composer, each interpreter can choose either to maintain its restrained character throughout the work, or to increase the sonorities, leading to a maximum of sound at the end of the piece.

12. Psalm “De Profundis” for organ and brass, 1998, in memory of his father-in-law, Edouard Vermesse; Pierre Cogen premiered it on July 17, 1998, with the brass ensemble Hexagone and the solo trumpeter Pierre Dutot, at the Abbatial Church in Guîtres, France (in Gironde, near Bordeaux). Unpublished (8')
This piece develops the various aspects of Psalm 129 (130), from its initial distressful plea to its message of the Lord’s kindness and redemption expressed in verse seven. It uses various Gregorian melodies: the antiphons from the Requiem and the Christmas Vespers, the Offertory from the twenty-third Sunday after Whitsun, and the chorale Aus tiefer Not schrei’ ich zu dir (the Lutheran equivalent of the De profundis).

13. Introduction, Thème et Variations sur “Innsbrück, Ich muss dich lassen” (Variations on a song by Heinrich Isaac), 1999–2002, dedicated to Thomas Daniel Schlee; on July 8, 1999, Cogen premiered an excerpt of this work at the parish church in Igls-Innsbruck; he then premiered it in its entirety on June 18, 2002, at Saint-Sulpice in Paris, France.
Published in Paris: Combre (C 06460), 2006 (13').
In 1996, when Cogen gave a concert in Igls, in the immediate vicinity of Innsbruck, he was inspired to compose a work on Isaac’s tune known as Innsbrück. The association between its name and that of the river Inn inspired him to write an introduction followed by five variations on this theme. As in most variations, this work enables the performer to present the various tonal colors of the organ. An initial Andante introduction develops several motives of the theme, on the foundation stops and the Swell Trumpet 8¢; the theme is then presented un poco più vivo, on the 16', 8', and 4' foundation stops. After the addition of the manual mixtures and the Pedal Basson 16', Isaac’s theme is entirely presented on the full organ, with harmonies reminiscent of those of the fifteenth century, when the melody was originally composed. The following five variations present the various colors of the organ:
Variation 1: an Adagio presents the theme in the lowest part of the pedalboard, using the Swell Bourdon 8', Voix Humaine 8' and tremulant, with the Pedal Flutes 8' and 4' and, if possible, the mutation stops forming the Grand Jeu de Tierce;
Variation 2: an Andante, with the theme played by the left hand, in a light character, on the Gambe stops;
Variation 3: a lyrical movement that dislocates the theme, using dissonances and “harsh” sounding reed stops, such as the Great horizontal Trumpet 8' with the mixtures;
Variation 4: a Moderato movement on the Swell Gambe 8' and Voix Celeste, with a canon between the alto (played by the right hand) and the soprano (played on the Pedal Flute 4');
Variation 5: a vigorous Fugue, Allegro ma non troppo, that begins on the Swell 8', 4', and 2' foundation stops with the mixtures; a progressive crescendo leads to the triumphal return of Isaac’s song, in a “resolutely modern harmonization” (P. Cogen).
A coda concludes this work on the full organ, resounding an open fifth: D–A.

Jan-Piet Knijff teaches organ, historical keyboard instruments, and chamber music and is organist-in-residence at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College/CUNY. He holds the DMA from The City University of New York as well as the Artist Diploma from the Conservatory of Amsterdam and is an Associate of the AGO. He won second prize at the Hindemith-Micheelsen Organ Competition (Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 1996) and has performed the three organ sonatas and the Concerto for Organ and Chamber Orchestra on both sides of the Atlantic. His organ teachers have included Piet Kee, Ewald Kooiman, and Christoph Wolff. Visit JP’s website at or contact him at [email protected].

This is the second in a series of “organ lessons” by Jan-Piet Knijff. The first, “Bruhns’s ‘Little’ E-minor,” appeared in the January 2006 issue of The Diapason, pp. 22–24.

Introduction

Like it or not, almost all organ music of any significance (and a lot that has no significance at all) was written by composers who were also organists. One of the major exceptions (along with Brahms, who was no organist either) is Paul Hindemith (1895–1963), arguably one of the giants of twentieth-century music. Hindemith wrote a handful of excellent works for organ: three sonatas (1937–40), the Kammermusik No. 7 (Concerto for Organ and Chamber Orchestra, 1927), and finally the Organ Concerto (1962). The three sonatas have long been an essential part of the organ repertoire, although probably more so in some cultures than in others.1 The Kammermusik, a very appealing work, has been recorded by a number of organists, but is not often heard in concert, undoubtedly for practical reasons. The 1962 Organ Concerto is very rarely heard.
An outstanding violinist, Hindemith became concertmaster in Frankfurt at age 20, working with conductors such as Mengelberg, Furtwängler, and Scherchen. He soon had enough of orchestra life and, as a performer, concentrated on the viola and the viola d’amore, making a career both in chamber music and as a soloist. His real vocation, however, was composition. Hindemith wrote in every conceivable genre: opera, oratorio, choral (both sacred and secular), solo vocal (including the cycle Das Marienleben [The Life of Mary]), orchestral, concerto, chamber music—often for instruments that had previously been treated in a stepmotherly fashion—and piano solo. Hindemith taught composition in Berlin and, after his emigration to the United States in 1940, theory at Yale University. He retired from the concert stage as a violist in 1939 upon hearing some of his own recordings; after World War II, he was increasingly active as a conductor, not only of his own works. The subject of this article is the second movement of Sonata No. 2 for organ, probably the most accessible of all of Hindemith’s organ music, both to the performer and to the listener. The work is available from Schott (ED 2559), Hindemith’s publisher; the second movement is found on pp. 10–12.

Overview

The movement has a very clear and simple structure, which, however, may not be terribly obvious at first sight. And once they get “stuck” in “learning the notes,” many musicians have a tendency to overlook the large structure of the work: they can’t see the forest for the trees, so to speak. In this particular movement, Hindemith’s manual indications (Oberwerk and Hauptwerk—Swell and Great, if you like) are the key. Why not take a look (don’t start playing right away) at the beginnings of each section where the hands are playing on a new manual: mm. 1, 10–11, 20–21, 38–39 (page turns don’t help in getting an overview of a piece!), 57, 60, 63, 64–65. The first thing that may catch your eye is that the pedals don’t play when your hands are on the Oberwerk; this, of course, is handy, because it saves you from having to adjust the pedal registration in performance. Next—and perhaps you want to play the first four to six notes of the soprano of each section—you will notice that the soprano in each Hauptwerk section simply repeats that of the Oberwerk section preceding it. In other words:

mm. 1–10 Oberwerk A
10–20 Hauptwerk A'
20–38 Oberwerk B
38–56 Hauptwerk B'
57–60 Oberwerk C
60–63 Hauptwerk C'
63–64 Oberwerk D
64–66 Hauptwerk D'

The Hauptwerk sections can be considered varied repeats of the preceding Oberwerk sections. But, though the harmonization and inner voices may be quite different, you’ll find that—with the exception of a pick-up note or two and an octave transposition once—the soprano of the Hauptwerk section is exactly identical with that of the preceding Oberwerk section. In fact, it may not be a bad idea to play through the soprano only of the piece (just the top notes in the right hand) to realize this for yourself and find out where those little changes are made: two pick-up notes are added in m. 10; the last three notes of the first section (mm. 9–10) are transposed up an octave at the repeat in mm. 19–20; and the pick-up notes are changed from b - g# in m. 20 to f# - g# in m. 38. Finally, Hindemith wrote out a rallentando at the end: the dotted-quarter ending in m. 64 is stretched out to dotted-half notes in m. 65–66.
Of course, the end of the B section above (mm. 32–38) is a shortened and varied reprise of section A, this time finishing on the tonic E. The overall form of the movement, then, is something that’s often referred to as a “rounded binary,” in this case followed by a little coda, and could be summarized as follows:

||: X :|||: Y X' :|| Coda.

Tempo and Character

Hindemith wrote another short keyboard piece very similar to the second movement of Sonata No. 2: the second “Interludium” from Ludus Tonalis (Hindemith’s equivalent of Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier).2 The time signature here is also 6/8 with the characteristic dotted-eighth rhythm appearing frequently, particularly in the first half of a measure. The metronome mark is the same (50 to the dotted quarter); the tempo indication is “Pastorale, moderate.” I think we can safely consider the sonata movement as a little “pastoral” (literally: “shepherd’s song”) as well.
The German tempo indication ruhig bewegt means “quietly moving” (literally “quietly moved”); if you wanted an Italian equivalent, it would probably be andante. The character of both the “Interludium” from Ludus Tonalis and the organ sonata movement is very reminiscent of the siciliano, the slow dance in 6/8 (or 12/8) with the dotted-eighth-note pattern in the first half of the measure, found in so many Baroque pieces. A good example from the organ repertoire is the first movement from John Stanley’s Voluntary in D minor, op. 6 no. 1. It’s almost impossible to miss the right tempo for the Stanley movement; and approximately the same speed will work well for either Hindemith piece. (The indications langsamer and noch langsamer, found towards the end of the organ movement, mean “slower” and “even slower” respectively.)
The metronome mark for the sonata movement tells you to play 50 dotted quarters per minute; and when you think about it, that means that the dotted quarter is something like a very slow second. But of course, this does not mean that Hindemith expected you to take out your metronome, put it on 50, and play the whole piece with the blessed machine ticking away. Use the metronome to get an idea of what the tempo is like; hum the tune along for a measure or two, get the feeling, and put the machine away. If you want to make sure that you know “how the piece goes,” listen to a recording (perhaps one of those listed below). To make sure that you play the whole piece in (approximately) the same tempo, jump from fragment-here to fragment-there maintaining the same “flow.” But nobody’s heartbeat is perfectly regular, and no musical performance should be either: “The metronome mark is only valid for the first measure of a piece.”3

Registration

Hindemith did not indicate any registration beyond the manual indications and a simple piano and mezzoforte. If one stays with the manual indications (playing with hands on the same keyboard, alternating between Swell and Great), I think one would in all likelihood want to avoid reeds. Often a registration with flutes 8 and 4 on the Swell and foundation stops 8 and 4 on the Great works well. In an ideal world it may be nice not to couple the manuals; in practice, coupling often works well on organs with electric action. On a tracker, you will probably want to avoid the coupler, as it may make the action heavier than you might like for this movement. In the pedal, use a registration with 16 and 8, strong enough to make the “theme” in mm. 54–56 clearly heard; but not so loud that the pedalpoints in mm. 39–53 become overpowering.
Although the manual indications Oberwerk and Hauptwerk seem to refer to a Baroque or “Baroque-ish” type of organ, the movement works well on pretty much any organ with at least two manuals. As long as you have pedals, it can also be played effectively on a one-manual organ by simply adding a stop for the mezzoforte sections.

Beginning to Play

Whether I am learning a keyboard piece or teaching a new piece to my choir, I often like to begin with getting an idea of the end of the piece (or movement): this is the goal of the journey, and it’s usually a good thing to bear that in mind from the start. In this case, take the last four measures. Take the time for the grace notes (with the beautiful g-natural!); they are best played before the beat, which means that, in the penultimate measure, the c#' in the alto still sounds during both grace notes! In the same measure, notice Hindemith’s written-out rallentando (a dotted half note instead of a dotted quarter). Also, notice how the left hand on the Great brings the first three notes of the little melody in augmentation (in this case, three times as slow); something you would like to point out in a paper for your music theory class, I think!
I see two possibilities for fingering in the last two measures [Example 1]. If you choose the second option, pay attention that the tied-over b in the left hand does not stick around after playing the c# in the right; and make sure that the thumb moves as smoothly as possible from the c#¢' to the d . As for the pedal in this measure, the important thing is to get your right foot on the A; to me, the easiest way to do that is by alternating toes, starting with your right foot on the e.
Now that you have an idea of where the piece is going, take a look at the beginning, mm. 1–5. I love how the right hand begins on its own, then is joined by the left hand in a little duet; Hindemith adds an alto and tenor only for the “cadence” in mm. 4–5. Make sure to play nicely legato in both hands; but of course, the b¢ in the middle of m. 2 (not the grace note) must be clearly separated from the note before (by shortening that note) and from the grace note following (by shortening the note itself) at the same time. Think of it this way [Example 2]. But don’t allow the left hand to go along with the articulation of the right! Here is my fingering for the chords in mm. 4–5 [Example 3]. Of course, frequent finger substitution helps to obtain a nice legato; but if an index finger on the b in the left hand produces too much tension in your hand, use your thumb instead. In that case, you try to make the thumb’s “journey” from c#' to b (quite a trip!) as smooth and short as possible; try to avoid “hurried” movements, however.
Now that you have learned both the end and the beginning of the movement, why not put the two together to create a kind of “summary” of the piece: glue the beginning of m. 5 to the middle of m. 63; or, even more concisely, glue the beginning of m. 2 to the end of m. 64. During your work on the piece, you want to come back to your little summary from time to time; it helps you to avoid “getting lost” in the notes.

Section A

After the long opening phrase discussed above, the movement continues with a number of shorter gestures: the beautiful unison passage in mm. 5–7 (a nice contrast with the four-part harmony in mm. 4–5) is followed by the motif with the repeated c#¢¢ in the soprano, and the sentence concludes with the Phrygian cadence on f# in m. 10. It is important to bring out Hindemith’s phrasing well; in practice, that means shortening the last note under a slur. Effective fingering can also help; here’s my suggestion for the unison passage [Example 4]. In m. 7, omit the c#¢ in the left hand, as you’re playing it with the right hand anyway. In the right hand, you want to nicely separate the soprano c#’s while playing legato in the alto [Example 5]. In the left hand, a “natural” way to get the right phrasing can be to use the same little pinky on the e and the A in m. 8 (the left hand starts with a thumb on the b in m. 7).

Section A'

The beautiful varied repeat of section A starts with five-part harmony; make sure to keep track of the sustained e in the left hand (mm. 11–12) and the sustained a¢ in the right (mm. 13–14). A few crucial fingers in the left hand: a middle finger on the last a in m. 12; silent substitution (2–1) on the a in m. 14, followed by a middle finger on the d; and index finger and ring finger on the chord in m. 18. Think of the pedal part as the double basses in your orchestra; isn’t that a beautiful line in mm. 11–15? The easier and smoother your feet move on the pedals, the better. Here are my suggestions for pedaling this and the next pedal passage [Example 6]. For smooth crossing-over of the feet, it’s usually best to put one foot further back when you’re crossing over in front, and vice versa. (In the music examples, this is indicated with a line underneath or over the toe-symbol.)
Very beautiful is the end of this section with the soprano transposed up an octave: take the opportunity to let those notes really sing. Notice, by the way, the only six-part chord in the movement, supporting the high a'' in m. 19; I recommend shortening the low a¢ in the right hand in order to move your thumb up to the c''.

Section B

As in section A, the right hand begins on its own, but is soon joined by the left hand in a little duet which seems to begin as a canon (twice: compare mm. 21 and 23–24). By sustaining the tenor note f in m. 25, Hindemith allows the texture to expand to three-part harmony, leading to the four-part “unison” A in m. 27. The right-hand descent that follows needs careful finger substitution [Example 7]. Mm. 32–38 can be considered a kind of recapitulation of the opening theme (in the “home key” E). After the “attempts” at a canon in mm. 21 and 24, Hindemith now brings the opening melody in canon, first in the alto (m. 34), then in the tenor (m. 36). Try singing along with the canon when working on this fragment! A fingering suggestion in the left hand: put your index finger on the e in mm. 32 and 34.
Here’s what I recommend for the right hand in mm. 36–38 [Example 8]. Linger on the pick-up for m. 36 as long as you can, as if you have glue on your fingers; and—using the same glue perhaps—glue the f#'-e'-f#' (all played with your right thumb) together as much as you can (in other words, make the journey as short and smooth as possible).

Section B'

This section is a very nice example of the use of pedalpoint: sustained bass notes, creating a kind of “envelope” of sound. Notice that the pedal F is released and then played again in m. 41 (in order to help clarify the phrasing in the right hand). Although the basic ideas from section B are all present in section B¢, the attempts at canon are now a tone lower: see mm. 39 and 42–43. In addition to the pedal part, Hindemith adds extra voices in the hands as well, creating a four-to-five-part texture in mm. 39–49; again, be careful with the sustained notes in the inner voices (the b' in m. 43–44 and the d in mm. 45–48); it’s easy to lose sight of them. Very beautiful is the open fifth d–a in m. 45 as opposed to the unison a in m. 27! The canons at the end of the section are given to different voices from before: first the tenor (m. 52), then the pedal (m. 54). I think there’s really only one option for the pedaling [Example 9]. It is a possibility to play legato from the pedalpoint D in m. 49 to the E in m. 50 while “taking a breath” in the hands; or, you can lift both in the hands and in the pedal—this to me is a matter of taste. Whatever you do, make a clear comma in the pedal before the entry of the canon in m. 54—this probably means inserting an eighth rest at the end of the long E in m. 53.

Discography

If you enjoy listening to CDs and you are interested in hearing some real-life approaches to Hindemith’s organ music, here are some recordings you might like to consider:
• Piet Kee Plays Hindemith and Reger. All three sonatas; Grote of St. Bavokerk, Haarlem (Netherlands); Chandos.
• The Art of Peter Hurford. Includes Sonata No. 2; Dom, Ratzeburg (Germany); Decca Argo.
• Hindemith: Organ Concerto, 3 Organ Sonatas. Anton Heiller, Elisabeth Ullmann; Brucknerhaus, Linz (Austria); Warner Classics.

Conclusion

The second movement from Organ Sonata No. 2 is probably the most accessible organ piece of Paul Hindemith. Though not exactly easy, it is not terribly hard to learn and though mildly spiced with the usual Hindemithian dissonances, the piece sounds friendly enough to appeal to an “average” audience, either in church or in the concert hall. On Sunday mornings, the piece could serve as prelude or as (part of) the music during the offering or communion. For young organists preparing for college auditions, the movement could be an excellent choice from the twentieth-century repertoire (provided that you have some more upbeat pieces from other style periods). Finally, for those whom I got “Hooked on Hindemith,” I would recommend the last movement (also Ruhig bewegt) from Sonata No. 1 as your next piece to consider. Perhaps we’ll talk about that one another time.

Olga Savitskaya was born in Minsk (Belarus) and earned a Ph.D. with a specialty in musicology at the Belarusian State Conservatory, where she is now assistant professor and music theory chair. A member of the Belarusian Union of Composers, she lectures on harmony, form and analysis, and polyphony. Her research interests include instrumental music of baroque period, Belarusian symphonic music, and modern composition techniques. Her publications include many books and articles.

The end of the 17th century through the beginning of the 18th century was a period of development for the trio sonata and its two varieties: sonata da chiesa and sonata da camera. Being formed in the works of Corelli, “the typical form of a church sonata of four contrasting parts: Grave (homophonic or imitative, C), Allegro (treated fugally, C), Adagio (homophonic, 3/2), Allegro or Presto (treated fugally or homophonic, C or 3/2)”1 appeared to be one of the most universal and flexible formulas of musical-logical development of the large instrumental concept in the baroque period. Influenced by the principles of the cyclic organization of the church sonata, the structure of the violin solo sonata and the concerto grosso evolved. Thus, the musical-historical phenomenon of the church sonata appears in the combination of two aspects: 1) as a genre during the 17th and early 18th centuries, moving from the bounds of church music into the sphere of secular concert music; 2) as a type of the baroque large instrumental form whose organizational principles (primarily crystallized in the genre of a church trio sonata) were adapted and developed at the end of the 17th century through the first half of the 18th century.
The highest achievements in this sonata form are connected to the prominent masters—Corelli, Purcell, Couperin, Biber, Buxtehude, Bach, and Handel, etc.—whose works in many aspects have defined both the character of the baroque era as a whole, and the national and regional schools that developed in this period. The Italian sonata, embodied in the sonatas of Corelli, undoubtedly had a great influence on composers throughout Europe. But much more notable is finding the “national appearance” of the sonata in England, France, and Germany.
One of the high points in the history of this genre is seen in the 14 trio sonatas for violin, viola da gamba and harpsichord of Dieterich Buxtehude, which were quite original when they were published in 1696.
The main features of Buxtehude’s sonatas are their general structure and non-specific number of movements, from three to seven. The sonata movements are mainly differentiated by tempo, style and degree of independence. The fantasy style of composition abounds in unexpected changes of rhythm, contrasted with strict fugues, improvisational interludes, and juxtapositions of different manners of writing. And though the contrast of polyphony and homophony as one of the basic traits of the sonata da chiesa retains its significance, fugues do not always take the central place. All this testifies to the fact that trio sonatas by Buxtehude are oriented not so much to the Corelli pattern, but to the German tradition of violin writing, where the principle of free thematic development and improvisational character of performing fuses with compositional techniques.
The fugues included in each of Buxtehude’s 14 sonatas are very different, ingenious, and exhibit the individual style of the composer, as well as a definite stage of evolution of this polyphonic form prior to the art of Bach.
The instrumental ensemble fugues reveal one of the bright sides of the complex, many-sided Buxtehude fugal style, which includes also his organ and vocal compositions. As V. Protopopov noted, their typical features are “vividness of themes, ease of motion, and a lack of concentrated philosophical musical images . . .”2 As a rule, the fugal subjects of trio sonatas are rather extensive, intonationally expressive, and based on the structure of core-development. The elements of dance music and style-intonation figures representing performing technique of stringed instruments give a special shape to them.
Two-voice fugues predominate, where the theme is expressed by solo instruments; the basso continuo functions as accompaniment (op. 1: no. 1 Presto, no. 3 Allegro, no. 5 Vivace, no. 6 Allegro; op. 2: no. 2 Allegro, no. 4 Allegro I, no. 5 Allegro I). However, three-voice fugues in which the harpsichord participates in concertante alongside the two soloists (op. 1: no. 1 Allegro; op. 2: no. 2 Vivace, no. 6 Vivace, Poco Presto, no. 7 Allegro) are also frequently used. In some cases three-voice fugues are used only in the exposition, subsequently replaced by two-voice fugues with accompaniment (op. 2: no. 1 Allegro).
According to the tradition of pre-Bach fugues, in Buxtehude’s trio sonatas the tonic-dominant alternation of subjects is mainly a result of the interchange of expositions and counter-expositions that becomes the basic structural characteristic. However, even in rather small and “simple” fugues, expansion of the texture and attention to the architectonical aspect of composition is obvious. An essential role belongs to episodes.
As an example we shall give the scheme of the three-voice fugue of the Sonata in F Major, op. 2, no. 7, Allegro I (Example 1). At the same time in trio sonatas of Buxtehude, fugues having two or three parts are also frequent. Such are the two-voice fugues of sonatas in C Major (op. 1, no. 5), E Minor (op. 1, no. 7), and A Minor (op. 1, no. 3).
All these examples show a definite development: from a fugue as the combination of expositions and counter-expositions by means of episodes to three-part fugue with functional differentiation of sections and exceeding the limits of tonic-dominant relations through modulation. Such development, which looks forward toward Bach’s fugues (especially chamber-instrumental), is not, however, the single one for Buxtehude.
The unrestrained imagination of the baroque artist and the aspiration to the new and unusual are manifested also in the interpretation of a fugue, resulting in expansion and complication of its structure and assimilation of the elements of other genres and forms. The structure and organizational logic of these Buxtehude fugues are not repeated, but as a whole one can see a similarity to his organ works, the successive line from which leads to grandiose Bach organ fugues. Let us examine specific examples.

Sonata in G Major (op. 1, no. 2)
Its structure emphasizes a cyclic three-part form, while the weakened role of polyphony and significant role of dance themes testify to the effect of an instrumental concerto. The principle of composition “in mixto genere” (in a mixed form) is in part I, the result of synthesis of two forms: a complex double fugue with a joint exposition and the concerto form.
Lively dance themes do not contrast but supplement each other in free development when complementary rhythms underline the linear independence of the voices, with homophonic duplication of the melodic motives in tenths and thirds. Development of themes in exposition and counter-exposition, which constitute a fugue itself, is divided by the episodes based on the new material in the manner of the homophonic ritornellos of the violin concerto. (Example 2)
In essence, in this work, and in the entire cycle, not only interaction of various musical forms takes place but also the more complicated synthesis of “the old” and “the new” genres: the church sonata, which has reached its full maturity, and the young instrumental concerto, which rapidly developed in Europe at the end of the 17th century.

Sonata in B Major (op. 1, no. 4)
Another combination features the interaction of a fugue and basso ostinato. In the Sonata in B Major (op. 1, no. 4) the element of ostinato seems “to be splashed out” outside of 32 variations of part I by subordinating a final fugue. In its middle section Buxtehude, being the master of musical rhetoric, specially combines two principles of organization—fugue and ostinato. At first the brief fugal subject is stated by the solo instruments. Then it dissolves in figurations, and its function in the thematic process temporarily transfers to the basso ostinato. The final section again affirms the fugue, but a reminiscence of the basso ostinato returns in the last bars of the coda.
The ostinato principle takes a special place in Buxtehude’s compositional technique. The German master’s adherence to ostinato seems to be consistent even against the background of its pervasive occurrence in music of the 17th century (perhaps only Purcell can be compared with him in this respect). Buxtehude makes use of basso ostinato in organ compositions: Chaconnes in C Minor (BuxWV 159), E Minor (BuxWV 160), Passacaglia in D Minor (BuxWV 161), Preludes in C Major (BuxWV 137) and G Minor (BuxWV 149); and in the cantatas Jesu dulcis memoria (BuxWV 57), Laudate pueri (BuxWV 69), Liebster, meine Seele saget (BuxWV 70), etc.
In the 14 trio sonatas, basso ostinato is almost as necessary as fugue (the ostinato is absent only in two sonatas). Its various forms can be divided into two groups—the less numerous so-called arias for basso-ostinato (Strophenbas arie), and the basic group, consisting of basso-ostinato forms of passacaglia type.
Basso ostinato is employed in lively (op. 2, no. 3 Vivace) and slow (op. 2, no. 3 Andante), outside (op. 2, no. 6 Allegro) and middle (op. 1, no. 1 Andante) movements. In some sonatas (op. 1, no. 4; op. 2, no. 5), the basso ostinato principle appears to be the predominant compositional idea and is implemented under different tempo and texture conditions.
A variety of basso ostinato uses derives from the character and structure of ostinato themes and the whole ostinato layer of basso continuo, thematic peculiarities of the high voices, structural-semantic interaction of the ostinato and upper voices, and, lastly, inclination to this or that type of composition—closed, precisely structured or free, and contrasting-compound.
At the same time all of these serve as the concentrated expression of the musical thinking of the composer. Thus, a fugue and a basso ostinato are the dominant constants of Buxtehude’s trio sonatas. The presence of a fugue is proof of observance of the major genre standards of sonata da chiesa, whereas the constancy and skilfulness of use of basso ostinato in the greater extent reflect the individual principles typical of Buxtehude’s style, which was based on the North-German tradition.

Other elements in Buxtehude’s trio sonatas
Other movements illustrate an extremely wide spectrum of genre, composition, and textural-timbral combinations. It is difficult and hardly reasonable to generalize the principles of cyclic organization in Buxtehude’s sonatas. The architectonics of any of them do not repeat exactly in any other, and each composition demands analysis of its individual logic. Besides a fugue and ostinato variations, these are small, without reprise, strophic, general and mixed forms. Among genre prototypes and patterns one finds the jig, chaconne, “echo,” chorale prelude, dialogue, toccata, “signal trumpet,” etc. The “formulas of imagination” acquire special significance, these indispensable attributes of improvisational style—passages, recitatives, arpeggio—creating, according to M. Lobanova, the “illusory, imaginary disorder” or the “intense pathetic development.”3 The sonatas combine genres, styles, affects and rhetorical figures.
In this “game of senses” the important role belongs to the thematic ties within the cycle. Strictly speaking, such ties characterize the sonata da chiesa, with its origins in the mono-thematic, multi-part canzona. But that sequence and ingenuity with which the thematic unity is realized in the sonatas of Buxtehude testifies that its role by no means is restricted to ensuring formal compositional integrity but acquires a distinct symbolic sense. Here it is reasonable to appeal to one of the central concepts of the baroque poetics being defined as the “witty conception.” The delicate, veiled differentiation of the themes in different parts of the cycle acts as a manifestation of baroque “wit,” whose purpose seems to display the obvious or hidden similarity, in what seemed to be on the surface, completely unrelated.

Sonata in C Major (op. 1, no. 5)
One of the instances is the Sonata in C Major, op. 1, no. 5. In this four-part cycle the first and the final fugues symmetrically frame the contrasting middle parts—an aria of a solo violin with a bass, and an ensemble jig (Vivace–Violino Solo; Allegro–Largo; Allegro–Adagio; Allegro).
Fugues are connected tonally. The source of their common material is the initial subject. Their motives and submotives, like the elements of a mosaic, are easily combined and rearranged to form new thematic configurations. The initial sections and the end of the final fugue are especially distinguished, serving to express a rhetorical idea of “connection,” the “concatenation” known under the name of symploce, or repetition (see Example 3).
The middle parts are also connected thematically: the motive of the second strophe of the aria with bass is unexpectedly “recalled” in the theme Allegro (Example 4). Finally, all thematic material of the sonata reveals as its basis a uniform intonational pulse, active, exclamatory (exclamatio) fourth (fifth) interval motion, a sort of the “intonational monad” as an indivisible core encompassing the whole world in it.

Sonata in A Minor (op. 1, no. 3)
The other example of thematic ties is found in the Sonata in A minor, op. 1, no. 3. The general idea is disclosed gradually, from movement to movement, revealing a semantic potential concealed within it.
In the melodic lines of the Adagio gradual downward motion (f-e-d-c-b-a-g#-a) covering a diatonic hexachord with adjoining introductory material is “summarized” by compact expressive formula saltus duriusculus (f-g#-a) (see Example 5a). Both elements are marked also in the themes of the Allegro: in the capacity of one of the motives of the fugue subject (hexachord by parallel sixths) and as the hidden voice of counter-subject (f-e-d-c-g#-a) (Example 5b). Further, the diatonic hexachord (including that which has been expressed by parallel sixths) becomes the thematic basis of the Vivace. Supplemented up to heptatonic, it is continuously exhibited in different voices, like a migrating cantus firmus in a chorale prelude (similar to its textual coincidence with the final phrase of Buxtehude’s organ chorale variations Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, BuxWV 223) (Example 5c). Descending scale-like motion is retained in the finale (Presto), but already against a background, not in the parts of melodic instruments but in the basso continuo. The most characteristic baroque style figure—passus duriusculus, appearing in slow modulation binding sections (Lento, Largo) as ascending and descending pieces of a chromatic scale—is brought to the forefront. Only in the final Lento is the semantic orientation of the general thematic process “explained.” The descending chromatic motion, trebled by imitations that embrace all verticals of the ensemble compass and saturated with rhetorical figures of grief (catabasis, passus duriusculus, catachresis, parrhesia), closes the sonata. (Example 5d)

Conclusion
Dieterich Buxtehude’s trio sonatas are among the high points in the history of the genre. Standing out against the background of the rich tradition of ensemble music at the end of the 17th–beginning of the 18th century, they testify to the exclusive originality of the North German model of the baroque sonata. Created in the period of, probably, the greatest “purity” of the style, the sonatas of Buxtehude embody the baroque world image itself—which has lost its Renaissance integrity, being woven of “incongruous combinations” of contrasts opening into infinity by the kaleidoscopic unsteadiness of existence and at the same time blessed by the supreme harmony of all-reconciling unanimity. ■