The University of Michigan Historic Organ Tour XLVI

by Richard Peek

A recent trip to Europe afforded my family and me an opportunity to hear, see, and in one instance, play organs ranging from the early Baroque to the present day. The first one we encountered was a one-manual Bazzani organ in the resort community of Cavallino, Italy, dating from 1891. Its builder, Giacomo Bazzani, was the youngest son of Pietro Bazzani, also an organ builder. Pietro learned organ building with the great Venetian organ builder Callido, who learned building organs from Nacchini, so the organ at the Church of Santa Maria Elisabetta represents a tradition dating back to the 17th century.

 

The specification is

Principale 8' Bassi (C - c#) 

Principale 8' Soprani (d - f3) 

Ottava 4' 

Decima Quinta 2' 

Decima Nona 11⁄3' 

Vigesima Seconda 1' 

Vigesima Sesta 2⁄3'

Vigesima Nona 1⁄2' 

Voce Umana 8' 

Viola 4' Soprani 

Flauta 4' Bassi 

Flauta 4' Soprani 

Ottavino 2'

The manual compass is C - f3. The pedal stops are

Tromboncini 4' 

Trombone 8' 

Contrabassi 16' con Ottave (8')

The compass of the pedals is 18 notes starting on low C. In the lower octave of both manual and pedal a short compass is used as follows: bottom white note sounds C; next white note plays F; first black note plays low D; next white note plays G; next black note plays E; next white note plays A; the next back note plays A#, and the next white note plays B. From there the sequence is normal. The pedal board is tilted upward from  front to back at an angle of about 25 degrees.

There are no mechanical aids except for the usual tiratutti, which brings on all the upper ripieno. This is done by means of a hitchdown pedal, so it is possible to draw on the 8' Principale treble and bass with perhaps the Flauta 4' treble and bass or Ottava 4' for a mezzo forte, and then bring on the whole ripieno quickly for a forte.

The church itself is not large, seating perhaps 200, but built with hard reflective surfaces so that the full ripieno with the pedal contrabassi 16' and 8' really fills the space admirably.

I had lots of time with this instrument since I was playing a recital, and of course the classic Italian literature suits it perfectly. The sections from Zipoli's Sonate d'intavolatura came off especially well on this instrument. The manual touch is very sensitive, much like that of a German Brustwerk.

The next organ was in the tiny Austrian village of Reutte, close to the German border, near King Ludwig the Second's castles of Schwangau, Neusch-wanstein and Linderhof. In our case we had planned a trip to Linderhof and then to the Monastery of Ettal just a few miles beyond. Renting a car from our hotel, the charming Hotel Maximillian, we set out for Linderhof, driving along the Plainsee, which was indeed awe-inspiring with its deep emerald color at the base of the German Alps.

We arrived just in time for the 11:00 English tour, which took only a half hour since Linderhof was Ludwig's smallest and most livable castle. In the first room we came to a gilded instrument that we assumed was a piano, but that we were told is a combination harmonium-piano which Ludwig commissioned in the hope that his hero Richard Wagner would visit him and perform his music on it. However, this never happened.

After the tour, those of us strong enough climbed a steep hill to reach the Venus Grotto, which is a representation of the Venusberg scene from Wagner's Tannhäuser. Appropriately, we were treated to a recording of the composer's "Hymn to the Evening Star" from Tannhäuser.

Driving on to the historic monastery of Ettal, we arrived just as a visiting organist was trying out the 1753 organ built by J.G. Hoerthrich with a beautiful  gilt casework by Simon Gartner dating from 1768. The sound of the instrument was indeed impressive as the organist pitted the divisions of the organ against each other with the full principal chorus in the pedal. As we left he or she was playing Mendelssohn's "O for the wings of a dove" on a particularly full and rich 8' flute.

When we returned to the hotel and went to the dining room, I noticed an organ console on the wall to the left of the dining room's front door. Set on top were six principal pipes of tin, with the mouths fairly deeply nicked. There were also several pictures of a man playing this console. After dinner I borrowed paper and pen to copy down the organ's specification. The hotel receptionist asked me if I was interested in organs, and I told her that I was an organist, whereupon she said her father had played this organ for fifty years and those were his pictures on the top of the console. She also said he would be happy to take me by their church. A day later that's exactly what we did.

About 9 pm we drove over to the Catholic Church of St. Peter and St. Paul, an imposing 500-year-old edifice that we had passed on the way to Linderhof. It is a Baroque church with excellent acoustics. Herr Koch  told me that since disposing of the 1817 organ, they had signed a contract for a new Vershuren instrument of 31 registers. He said, very proudly, that it was a 4-manual and that there would be six solo stops such as oboe, clarinet, etc. on one of the manuals.

They were using an electronic instrument in the meantime and he invited me to play it. After improvising briefly, I played a memorized piece and then invited him to play. He did so and I had a chance to listen to the ambience of the building. The touch of the Viscount instrument was very hard--so hard that it was difficult to play legato.

Readers may be interested in the specification of the old organ since it sheds light on early 19th-century instruments. The builder was Franz Reinisch of Steinach, Tirol, and it was his opus 158. The Hauptwerk includes

Bourdon 16' 

Prinzipal 8' 

Prinzipalino 8' 

Hohlflöte 8' 

Salizional 8' 

Oktav 4' 

Flöte 4' 

Quint 22⁄3' 

Superoktav 2' 

Mixtur 11⁄3' 

Trompete harmonic 8'

The Schwellwerk:

Geigen-Prinzipal 8' 

Gedeckt 8' 

Quintaton 8' 

Prästant 4' 

Rohrflöte 4' 

Waldflöte 2' 

Cornett 2' 

Zimbel 1'

There was a blank knob on the Schwell and I asked Herr Koch if there was an 8' Oboe on the division  but he said there wasn't. However, between his rudimentary English and my elementary German there was much room for misunderstanding, so we can only surmise what the blank represented. The pedal:

Violonbass 16'

Subbass 16'

Echobass 16'

Oktavbass 8'

Choralbass 4'

Posaune 16'

There are a number of mechanicals as well as a crescendo pedal and a Schwellwerk pedal.

Leaving the colorful Tyrol landscape behind, we boarded the train for historic Nuremberg. There we headed for Pachelbel's church, St. Sebald. Again we were in luck. A student was practicing the large organ, which was placed to one side of the choir facing the altar. In addition to the main organ, there is a one-manual organ on wheels. It can be used anywhere in the large church: as a separate instrument, or connected to the main instrument to act as a rückpositiv. There is also a four-manual console on a cable connected to the main organ. The organ builder is Willi Peter of Cologne.

The organist was practicing the six Schübler Chorales as we were studying the various treasures of this historic edifice, so we had a chance to listen to the solo voices of the instrument. Just as we were about to leave, the organist began a composition wherein a subsidiary division plays imitative counterpoint mf, only to be interrupted at regular intervals by the full ensemble including a 32' reed and a 32' Prinzipal. The effect was electrifying and we sat down until this composition ran its course.

Before we take our leave of this great church we should remember that it house the oldest organ in Germany, the "Traxdorffsche" organ that was placed in a loft at the back of the church until its destruction in the bombing of Nuremberg in 1945.

On this somber note, we walked down to the Old Market to admire the "Schöner Brunner" (beautiful fountain), a 14th-century Gothic fountain which is a symbol of Nuremberg. Close by is the lovely Frauenkirche, a small church erected during the reign of Emperor Karl IV, that served as a court chapel from 1352 until 1361.

Noting that there would be a recital that evening, we resolved to return to hear the 3-manual Klais instrument. Our efforts were well-rewarded. The recitalist was Waclaw Golonka of Prague, winner of a number of organ contests including the Wettbewerb in Pretoria (1998). His program consisted of works by Couperin, Pachelbel, Bach, Segar, and Duruflé. He is an unassuming player, but every challenge was conquered with ease, and the music reached us with no idiosyncrasies to block its beauty. One could only hope that he will play often in the United States.

Our hotel was in the St. Lorenz district, so one morning I wandered into the impressive St. Lorenz Church. Like St. Sebald, this building is a reconstruction following the bombing of World War II, but it is well done and to the casual eye it certainly looks like a Gothic masterpiece.

The organist was practicing Liszt's Prelude and Fugue on BACH while I wandered through the medieval treasures of St. Lorenz. However, in consideration of our ears, he played mf, so I cannot comment on the present organ, but it is undoubtedly significant that the church is in the midst of a drive to raise funds for a new instrument, which is to be built by Klais.

Reluctantly leaving this interesting city, we headed east to another reconstructed city, Dresden. The star of the Dresden organ world is the Silbermann instrument in the Catholic Hofkirche. The organ was unfinished in 1750 when Gottfried Silbermann fell from a scaffold in the church and died shortly thereafter. However, his son Johann Andreas Silbermann and his former journeyman Zacharias Hildebrandt completed it in 1755. During World War II the pipes were removed for safekeeping and after the war the instrument was reconstructed by Messrs. Jehmlich, a Dresden firm.

Today the interior of the church shows no evidence of the damage done by the war and a fine Anton Mengs "Ascension" hangs over the high altar, balancing the restored façade of the organ in the rear gallery.

We were fortunate to be in Dresden on a Saturday when there was an organ vesper service at 4 pm at the Hofkirche. As we entered the large church we were surprised at the large audience. Organ recitals are well attended in Europe!

The attendees at the service were well served. Opening with a toccata by George Muffat, the recitalist, Andreus Meisner of Altenburg, continued with music by Bruhns, Bach and Rheinberger. There was no admission charge but donations were accepted at the door as we left.

The impression which this instrument made was one of brilliance and warmth--plenty of bright mixtures, but also warm and full 8' tone. In studying the specification, we were struck by the  presence of a Schwebung (celeste) on the Hauptwerk. Probably because of the generous supply of 8' stops, the Rheinberger sonata came off remarkably well. The 8' flutes had quite a bit of "chiff."

As we walked back to our hotel, we came upon another important church in the life of Dresden, the Kreuzkirche. Restored after the bombings of the Second World War, the exterior looks fine. The interior, however, has been only roughly plastered over.

In the rear gallery there is a large mechanical action organ by Jehmlich, and there is a small encased organ in the front. The church is the home of the Kreutzchor, a fine men and boys choir, and there is a very busy musical schedule at this church. Some weeks there are two or three musical activities programmed.

Our next stop was another musically active city, Lübeck. One can only be impressed by the imposing Holstentor towers as one enters the old town. With Buxtehude's towering Marienkirche and the equally historic Jacobikirche, Lübeck is a paradise for organists.

We came first to the Jacobikirche. With its two historic organs it is one of Germany's most treasured sites. In the back gallery is a large Arp Schnitger, famous from the many recordings that have been made upon it. We were delighted that an organist was playing this instrument as we soaked up the atmosphere of this edifice. After several Bach works, the player switched to Reger, which worked well on the instrument.

We were sorry not to hear the Stellwagen organ on the side of the church, equally as famous as the rear gallery organ, but we were able to find a recording of Buxtehude's organ music played on both instruments by Armin  Schoof (Motette CD-10831).

The Marienkirche, Buxtehude's church, was almost completely destroyed by an air raid in 1942. Both organs were lost. Rebuilding was begun in 1947 and completed in 1980. The two new organs occupy the same spots in the church as they did in the original church, namely a large mechanical organ in the rear gallery and a smaller one, the "Danse Macabre" organ, on the side of the church above the "Danse Macabre" chapel. The rear gallery instrument is by Kemper & Sohn from Lübeck. The "Danse Macabre" organ is by Wilhelm Fuhrer of Wilhelmshaven and dates from 1986. The large organ in the rear gallery has five manuals with 101 sounding voices.

We did briefly hear the side organ after a noonday service, and purchased two CDs of the organs. Both are played by the organist of the church, Ernst-Erich Stender. The one on the Kemper instrument is "Max Reger, the organworks," Vol. I (Ornament 11447). The second, on the "Danse Macabre" instrument, is "Great Organ Works" by J.S. Bach (Ornament 11445). Herr Stender plays 30 to 40 recitals a year on these two instruments with different programs!

In the "Briefkapelle," the most im-portant of the side chapels, there is an organ which came from East Prussia. Built in 1723, it has been in Lübeck since 1933.

There is another church near the Marienkirche which was also destroyed in 1942 and which has been rebuilt. However, it is no longer used for worship, but for musical programs and art exhibits. At the St. Petrikirche one can climb its towers to get a panoramic view of this ancient free city. There is a small  encased organ in what used to be the sanctuary.

The other large church in downtown Lübeck is the Dom. While not as large as the Marienkirche, it is impressive in its own right. An enlargement of the chancel in the Gothic style in the 14th century transformed this Romanesque church.

A side placement of the large 3-manual Marcussen organ focuses the tone toward the congregation. While we were not able to hear the organ, we found an interesting CD of it played by Hartmut Rohmeyer, entitled "Johann Sebastian Bach--Orgelwerke I, Der Junge Bach" (ambitus amb 97 863).

There are other things to see in Lübeck besides organs and churches, of course, such as the interesting Dutch architecture and the "Buddenbrooks" house associated with Thomas and Heinrich Mann, and we heartily recommend Lübeck as a stop for the discerning tourist. Everything is within walking distance.

 Leaving this picturesque city, we headed for our last stop, Eisenach. Eisenach is, of course, the birthplace of J.S. Bach and we headed straight for the Bachhaus. After an individually guided tour of the house (they give you a sheet in your own language to help), we gathered in a small recital hall to hear some of Bach's music. A young man talked briefly of the significance of Bach's music and then played examples of it, on two small organs dating from Bach's era. The first was a Swiss instrument of three stops dating from 1750, in which the air was pumped by the foot of the performer. The second was a German instrument of four stops dating from 1722. In this instance he called upon a member of the audience to hand pump the bellows. He then played examples of Bach's clavier music upon a clavichord and a harpsichord from the 18th century. Interspersed with the keyboard works were taped examples of Bach's orchestral and choral works. After this, we walked down the street to the Lutherhaus where we listened to examples of Luther's chorales in 16th-century and modern settings, and saw where Luther studied Latin.

A block away we came upon the impressive parish church of St. George where Bach was baptized and where Luther preached in 1521, even though he had been banned from the Holy Roman Empire for his beliefs.

On the left wall a plaque traced the history of the Bach family members who had served as organists of this church. Even though they were not immediate members of Bach's family (they were cousins from the Erfurt branch of the Bach family), it served to remind us of the importance of the Bachs in the sacred and secular music of the 17th and 18th centuries in central Germany.

As we left Eisenach to head for Frankfurt and home, we felt that in this musical pilgrimage we had come a lot closer to the life and times of such giants as Johann Pachelbel, Dietrich Buxtehude and J.S. Bach.                 

 

Richard Peek is a graduate of Michigan State University and the School of Sacred Music at Union Theological Seminary. He served Covenant Presbyterian Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, as Minister of Music for 47 years and is now Minister of Music Emeritus. He has written articles for The Diapason, The American Organist, The Tracker, and Reformed Liturgy and Music, and has written numerous organ and choral works.

 

June 30-September 21, 2002

Sarah Mahler Hughes

Sarah Mahler Hughes is Associate Professor of Music and Chair of the Department at Ripon College in Ripon, Wisconsin. She teaches courses in music history, counterpoint, and women in music as well as organ, piano, and harpsichord, and she directs the Collegium Musicum. The recipient of scholarly/artistic and global studies grants from the College, she traveled to Italy and Germany in July and August 2002 to play historic organs.

On July 28, 2002, I had the good fortune to play a recital on two historic organs as part of the 15th annual International Festival of Historic Organs in Valsesia in the Piedmont region of Italy. Mario Duella, the founder and artistic director of the Festival, had invited me to participate as part of a reciprocal arrangement. From its beginnings in 1978 as a local event with five concerts, the Festival has become international in scope and this summer included 25 recitals on 26 instruments in 22 towns in the valley of the Sesia River. This region northwest of Milan is incredibly beautiful, with Alpine peaks, clear air, and rushing streams. Tourists come from every part of Europe to enjoy the scenery and miles of hiking trails. But the riches of the region are cultural as well as natural, and the former include centuries-old churches laden with art, precious artifacts, and organs.

Organbuilding in the Valsesia area began in the 1600s with artisans from Milan.1 Native builders began to flourish in the first half of the 18th century and even the smallest parish churches contained organs by the 19th century. Restorations and alterations seemed to begin soon after the organs were installed, and the two processes continued hand in hand until the mid-twentieth century. The number of organs in Valsesia increased steadily for three hundred years, beginning in 1601. A 38-year hiatus before and after World War II marked the only interruption in organbuilding activity. Restorations began again in 1975 and continue today. The most recent restoration, by the Novarese firm Krengli, is that of an instrument (1821) by Luigi Maroni Biroldi at the Church of Santa Croce in Rassa. Mario Duella played the dedicatory recital on August 2.

Mario Duella lives in Pray, one of the Valsesia towns, but his grandmother came from Rassa, farther west. He has a great love for his native region and is concerned about preserving the organ culture of the area. His efforts to call attention to instruments in need of repair has resulted in many successful restorations during the past 15 years. These instruments are then featured on the concert series he began. The Festival is supported by the Piedmontese regional government in conjunction with the Cultural Association for Historic Organs in Piedmont, a non-profit group. Other government bodies, principally the Province of Vercelli and the Mountain Commune of Valsesia, also lend financial support.

My recital began in the ancient Cappella di Santa Marta, an oratory in the church of San Giacomo in Campertogno, on an 18th-century organ (maker unknown) that was restored by Italo Marzi in 1981. The instrument has 50 keys (C1 to F5) on one manual with a pull-down pedal. Both manual and pedal have a short octave. The seven stops include a Principale 8', Ottava 4', Decimaquinta 2', Decimanona (11/3'), Vigesimaseconda (1'), Voce Umana, and Flauto in Ottava 4'.  The most memorable registrations are the Principale with Voce Umana, a hauntingly beautiful sound unique to Italian organs, and the Flauto in Ottava 4', which has a very pure sound. On this instrument, I played Sweelinck's variations on Onder een linde groen, a toccata by Bernardo Pasquini, and All'Elevazione and All'Offertorio by Domenico Zipoli. The meantone tuning made the dissonances of the Offertorio extremely pungent. Hearing them, one can understand why medieval theorists characterized tritones as the diabolus in musica.

After this initial portion of the program, we moved through a corridor into the sanctuary proper which houses an electropneumatic organ (1937) by Krengli. One of the last organs built before the war, this instrument is one of the most recently restored (2000) by the same firm. The organ comprises two manuals of 61 keys (C1 to C6) and a full pedal division. The stoplist is as follows:

 

Grand'Organo

                  16'          Principale

                  8'             Diapason

                  8'             Dulciana

                  8'             Flauto

                  8'             Unda Maris

                  4'             Ottava

                  21/2'      Duodecima

                  2'             Ottavino

                                    Cornetto 3 file [ranks]

                                    Ripieno 6 file

                  8'             Tromba

Organo Espressivo

                  8'             Principalino

                  8'             Bordone

                  8'             Viola da Gamba

                  8'             Concerto Violini

                  4'             Flauto Armonico

                                    Ripieno 3 file [mixture, 3 ranks]

                  8'             Oboe

Pedale

                  16'          Contrabbasso

                  16'          Subbasso

                  8'             Basso

 

The organ's tonal design reflects both the orchestral taste of the early 20th century and traditional Italian sounds. As one would expect from so many 8' ranks, the sound is both dark and rich in fundamental tone but weak in the upper partials. Other features of the organ include graduated general and divisional pistons (marked piano, crescendo, forte, ripieno) instead of programmable ones, and separate pistons for adding reeds and strings. Blue-tipped stop tabs indicate pedals, pink-tipped ones, manual stops. (It is difficult not to connect this distinctive feature with the Italians' gift for fashion and design.) For this final part of the recital, I played  Romantic and contemporary repertoire: Mendelssohn, Prelude and Fugue in G; Bossi, Scherzo in g, op. 49 no. 2; Brahms, Es ist ein Ros' entsprungen, op. 122 no. 8, and O wie selig, op. 122 no. 6; Estrada, Chacona, Aspiracion; and Billingham, My Lord, What a Morning and I've Just Come from the Fountain. The acoustics were wonderful, a case of bare stone walls and bare floors creating the perfect atmosphere for the powerful sound of the full chorus, on the one hand, and the sensuous oboe stop, on the other.

The audience for this event was large and appreciative. Many faithfully attend the concerts in the series out of love for music and pride in their region's instruments. One man traveled 50 miles on mountain roads to hear this organ! The ushers for the recital were local women dressed in the traditional costumes of the Valsesia region, and as an extra bonus, they distributed prettily wrapped candy to the concertgoers. Perhaps this is an idea worth exploring for American audiences; i.e., strengthening the association between sweetness and organ music.

Many people contribute to making the Festival a success. Those with whom I came into contact were friendly and helpful at all times. I, a foreigner with minimal Italian language skills, was welcomed as an honored guest. Everyone, including the parish priest who wished me coraggio before I played, the church secretary who unlocked doors and gave me a ride back to Rassa after my practice session, the ushers and friends who accompanied us to dinner at a trattoria  after the concert, and above all, Mario Duella, his wife, Franca, and son Luca, who turned pages and assisted me with registration changes, was very hospitable. For those unable to experience these unusual instruments live, three CDs are available: Storici organi della Valsesia (1994; instruments by Vegezzi Bossi, 1911; Mentasti, 1872; and Lingiardi, 1875); Festival internazionale storici organi della Valsesia (1997; an anthology from the first 10 years of the Festival); and Storici organi della Valsesia (2001; instruments by Biroldi, 1822; and Krengli, 1937). For information on next season's Festival, contact Mario Duella at <[email protected]>.

 

Note

1.                    

Cesa, Alessandra et al. Organi e organari in Valsesia: Quattrocento anni di attività organaria. Borgosesia: Idea Editrice, 1997.

 

Regione Piemonte

Provincia di Vercelli

Comunità Montana della Valsesia

Associazione Culturale Storici Organi del Piemonte

XV Festival Internazionale Storici Organi della Valsesia

Borgosesia, Chiesa di Sant'Antonio, Alessandra Mazzanti (Italia)

Campertogno, Cappella di Santa Marta e Chiesa di San Giacomo, Sarah Mahler Hughes (Stati Uniti)

Borgosesia, Chiesa di Sant'Anna al Montrigone, Bernard Brauchli (Svizzera)

Foresto, Chiesa di San Giovanni Evangelista, Robert Grudzien (Polonia)

Valduggia, Chiesa di Santa Maria, Robert Grudzien (Polonia)

Riva Valdobbia, Chiesa di San Michele, Karl Maureen (Germania)

Rassa, Chiesa di Santa Croce, Mario Duella (Italia)

Alagna, Chiesa di San Giovanni Battista, Helmuth Luksch (Austria)

Mollia, Chiesa di SS. Giovanni e Giuseppe, Dietrich Oberdorfer (Italia)

Carcoforo, Chiesa di Santa Croce, Carlo Barbierato (Italia)

Scopa, Chiesa di San Bartolomeo, Ansgar Wallenhorst (Germania)

Brugaro, Chiesa di Sant'Antonio Abate, Stefano Rattini (Italia)

Varallo, Chiesa di Santa Maria delle Grazie, Luc Ponet (Belgio)

Piode, Chiesa di Santo Stefano, Giovanni La Mattina (Italia)

Crevola, Chiesa di San Lorenzo, Giorgio Fabbri (Italia)

Balmuccia, Chiesa di Santa Margherita, Roberto Padoin (Italia)

Rastiglione, Chiesa di San Michele Arcangelo, Sandro Carnelos (Italia)

Scopello, Chiesa della Beata Vergine Assunta, Jean-Marc Pulfer (Svizzera)

Rossa, Chiesa di Maria Vergine Assunta, Roman Perucki (Polonia)

Borgosesia, Chiesa di Santa Marta, Mario Verdicchio (Italia)

Ghemme, Chiesa di Maria Vergine Assunta, Jean-Paul Imbert (Francia)

Romagnano Sesia, Chiesa Abbaziale di San Silvano, Mario Duella (Italia)

Bornate, Chiesa di Santa Maria Assunta, Emanuele Cardi (Italia)

Serravalle Sesia, Chiesa di San Giovanni Battista, Andrea Macinanti (Italia)

Varallo, Collegiata di San Gauderizio, Winfried Engelhardt (Germania)

 

For information: Associazione Culturale Storici Organi del Piemonte, tel/fax 01576735, e-mail: <[email protected]>, web: <utenti.tripod.it/storiciorgani>.

Tradition and Development

by Francesco Ruffatti

A concert by Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini and Gustav Leonhardt at the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna, held on October 27, 2000, provided the inspiration for  writing an article on the historical Italian organ, its tradition and development. My goal is to give a panoramic view of the subject, and anyone knows that when looking at a panoramic view much of the detail is lost. Still, such an attempt is worth carrying out because some general guidelines can in any case be drawn. To do so, it is necessary to go back a number of centuries and try to understand the original role of the organ in the musical world of Italian churches.

 

The Basilica of San Petronio is no ordinary place from the standpoint of organbuilding history. It enjoys the presence of two unique instruments: the oldest Italian organ in existence, built by Lorenzo da Prato between 1471 and 1475, roughly 20 years prior to the discovery of America by Columbus,1 and a later organ, built by Baldassarre Malamini in 1596. The instruments are located face to face in the area traditionally reserved for the choristers, behind the high altar.

The program notes for the Tagliavini-Leonhardt concert, written by Marc Vanscheevwijck, well explain the use for which organs of medieval and renaissance times were intended:

Alternatim performance practice, i.e., the performance of liturgical pieces alternating contrasting musical forces in the various versets of the sacred texts, originates in the old antiphonal singing of psalms of the first centuries A.D. In responsorial music a soloist or a small group of singers alternated with the larger choir. Sometimes they alternated plainchant with polyphonic settings of the text. Probably as early as the organ began to be used in church, the organist already improvised "versets," alternating with the choir singing the counter versets in Gregorian chant. Obviously, the schola never repeated the texts of the versets played by the organist, who improvised (and later composed) on the relative Gregorian melodies. The earliest source of such a practice is the Faenza Codex, compiled c.1420. During the following century this alternatim practice spread throughout Italy. Many alternatim settings, particularly of the mass proper, have been preserved, some of the most famous of which were composed by Girolamo Cavazzoni, Claudio Merulo, Andrea Gabrieli, and (in the 17th century) the Fiori Musicali of Girolamo Frescobaldi.2

 

Two aspects immediately come to mind:

1. The organ location, which for effective responsorial use had to be near the choir and not necessarily in a favorable position for the congregation,

2. A tonal structure suitable for dialogue with a small group of singers.

There was no need for a sound big enough to accompany the choir, simply because the organ was intended as a soloist. And accompanying the congregation was certainly not in the agenda, since people did not sing during liturgy in Italian Catholic churches until very recently.3

What effect did all of this have on the sound? Since power was not the issue, early Italian organbuilders developed their talents in other areas, and tonal quality became the priority. They created relatively small instruments, mostly with only one manual, with gentle, beautifully voiced stops. Wind pressures were in most cases quite low, down to 42-45 mm. at the water column, and the voicing techniques as well as the tonal design in general reflected such an approach.

Listening to music by Antegnati (also a famous Italian organbuilder), Segni, Veggio, Gabrieli and others performed on the beautiful organs of San Petronio gave me and the entire audience (a few hundred people all gathered in the large space behind the high altar, to be able to best hear the organs) a good perspective of the musical experience which was originally expected from such instruments.

It is my belief that the original DNA of ancient Italian pipe organs, as defined by their original use in the liturgy, played a decisive role in the subsequent evolution of the instruments. This was due to a strong sense of tradition among the vast majority of builders and to their reluctance to introduce changes to a practice which was considered successful. Examples to the contrary do exist, but any effort of generalizing, or extracting general rules from a complex reality, always ends up sacrificing notable exceptions.

In post-Renaissance times, organ use became widespread. All Italian churches had at least one organ and often one or two Positivo4  instruments in addition to the main organ. And a very significant change took place: in addition to being used as a solo instrument for improvisations and for the performance of written music, the organ also became an accompanimental instrument for the choir. Its location within the building also changed in most cases, taking into greater consideration the congregation as the beneficiary of musical performances: the preferred location for new instruments became a balcony facing the nave, which is still considered by many to be the ideal location for the best possible diffusion of sound within a building. Naturally, broader tonal resources had to be made available in order to accommodate this new function, but this did not cause a significant change in the original voicing practices. In other words, more stops were introduced and a Pedal division was added (normally consisting of one or two stops), but the basic tonal structure remained the same and no major changes took place in the sound: still low pressures and gentle voicing. After all, organs still did not need to be big or powerful, because they were not intended to support an entire congregation, just a choir.5

A further, major evolution took place as a result of the greater demands by the repertoire of the Romantic period. A great number of new stops were introduced: reeds of various types, more flutes, strings, even percussion: drums, cymbals, bells and the like. The organs built by the Serassi family of Bergamo towards the end of the eighteenth century and during the following century are a good example of the romantic Italian organ. The occupation of Bergamo by the troops of Napoleon (1796-1813) and subsequently by the Austrians (1814-1859) influenced organbuilding practices by introducing new musical models and, as a consequence, by contributing to the development of new devices and new sounds that would improve the performance of the music inspired by the teaching of Simon Mayr (1763-1845), by his pupil Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848) and by Gioacchino Rossini.6 The famous composer Felice Moretti (also known as Father Davide da Bergamo), a Franciscan monk and a family friend of the Serassi, composed music that was deeply influenced by opera. Also, Giuseppe II Serassi, the most innovative member of the family, introduced new devices aimed at facilitating the dynamic control of sound: the third hand, or mechanical super coupler, the fourth hand, or sub coupler, the expression shades, pedals for pre-set combinations of stops, an easier system for the coupling of the manuals (by means of a pedal and no longer by the sliding of the upper manual into position), settable combinations of stops, and the Tiratutti or Tutti for the Ripieno ranks.7

In spite of all of this, the ancient core of the instrument and the basic tonal concept behind it remained virtually unchanged for a good part of the nineteenth century. Low wind pressures were still the rule, as well as unforced voicing, fairly open pipe toes, and few nicks at the languids. As a consequence,   there was a broad harmonic development in the sound, allowing a very effective use of each stop in combination with others and forming an ensemble of rare cohesion and beauty. Pressures of sometimes less than 50 mm. at the water column naturally presented a real challenge, particularly for the voicing of reed stops, but this had the effect of encouraging builders to find original design and voicing methods to overcome the difficulties.8

At this point, it is necessary to define the tonal core of the organ which I have indicated as an element of continuity in Italian organbuilding throughout the centuries. Its main component is the Ripieno. The term does not translate to Mixture, but rather it defines a series of individual Principal scaled ranks of pipes at various pitches, creating a system of sounds at harmonic intervals, normally beginning with 8' pitch as the foundation of the manual.

The composition of a typical Ripieno with its traditional nomenclature follows:

Principale (I) 8'

Ottava (VIII) 4'

Decimaquinta (XV) 2'

Decimanona (XIX) 11/3'

Vigesima seconda (XXII) 1'

Vigesima sesta (XXVI) 2/3'

Vigesima nona (XXIX) 1/2'

Trigesima terza (XXXIII) 1/3'

Trigesima sesta (XXXVI) 1/4'

And occasionally:

Quadragesima (XL) 1/6'

Quadragesima Terza (XLIII) 1/8'

The highest pitch in the entire Ripieno is in most cases the note C at 1/8'. Beyond this limit a ritornello or break begins with pipes double the length, or one full octave lower in pitch.9

Table 1 is intended to give a clear and comprehensive idea of the tonal composition of the Ripieno. The method I am utilizing is unconventional and it consists of identifying each pipe by a number corresponding to its place in an ideal succession of notes starting with number 1 as low C of the 8' Principal. Low C at 4' will consequently be numbered as 13, low C at 2' will be numbered as 25 and so on. The highest pitch pipe in the Ripieno will be number 73, corresponding to the pitch limit of 1/8'. Once a rank reaches note number 73 it will break back and start a ritornello with note C#62 (or one full octave lower). To simplify matters, I am showing the first octave as complete (12 notes). The most common arrangement in Italian historical organs calls for a short first octave (8 notes, with C#, D#, F# and G# missing). Notes are identified by octave number, according to the Italian system, by which C1 corresponds to note C of the first octave, F3 to note F of the third octave, and so on. The chosen compass for our example is of 49 keys, C1 to C5. This system, by numbers rather than by footage, is intended to provide a more immediate idea of the repetition of equal size pipes throughout the compass for the entire Ripieno. Equal number means equal size pipe.

The conventional method is shown in Table 2. The Ripieno here is comparable, in pure terms of number of pipes, to a Principal chorus with 8', 4' and 2' stops plus a six-rank mixture. But by looking at Table 2 one can immediately appreciate the vast difference from such an arrangement. At note C#2 the first doubling or double pitch appears: pipes from the 1/2' rank (XXIX) and 1/4' rank (XXXVI) become of identical size. Consequently, between notes C#2 and F2 the tonal effect is not that of a six-rank mixture but rather of a five-rank mixture with one of the ranks doubled. This aspect becomes more and more prominent as we move up the keyboard, to the point that at note C#4 (key number 38) with all ranks from Decimaquinta (2') up drawn, only two pitches can be heard: 2', repeated 4 times, and 11/3', repeated three times. As one can easily appreciate, such tonal structure cannot be compared with that of a Mixture, or Fourniture or any other multiple-rank stop designed as a single entity. The Ripieno is simply different. It is conceived as a sum of individual ranks at different pitches, each separately usable in combinations with any other rank and all usable at once as a pleno.10

Obviously, this feature provides a great deal of flexibility in the tonal palette. From an organbuilder"s practical standpoint, it has two effects:

1. It forces the voicer to be extremely scrupulous as to the tonal balance, regulation and speech adjustment of each pipe even in the highest pitched ranks, since each can be separately used;

2. It makes tuning more difficult, due to the drawing effect on the equal pitched pipes when they play together. Only a tuner who knows how to deal with such a problem can obtain a stable tuning of the Ripieno.11

Tuning with double pitches was nothing new to ancient builders. In fact, pre-Renaissance and Renaissance organs, in Italy as well as in other European countries, often had double or even triple notes of equal length in the treble of the Principal, the Octave and sometimes the Fifteenth, to enhance the singing qualities of the instrument in the treble. This practice strangely survived, in some areas of Italy, all the way to the beginning of the 19th century. This proves that the difficulties connected with the tuning of multiple equal-pitched pipes never bothered Italian organbuilders too much.12

Other traditional stops forming the original core of the historical Italian organ include the following:

Flauto in Ottava (4'), normally tapered or cylindrical, sometimes stopped

Flauto in Decimaquinta (2') in the earlier instruments

Flauto in Duodecima (22/3')

The Terzino, or Tierce flute (13/5') was later added and, in the nineteenth century, the Flauto Traverso or Fluta (8', normally in the treble only).

Early strings appeared in the eighteenth century, at 4' in the bass and occasionally over the entire compass, but such stops were vastly different from what we think of as a string today. They had no ears, no beards, no nicks at the languids. These characteristics, combined with a very narrow scale, contributed to produce a sound with a very prominent transient at the attach and a cutting sustained tone, strongly imitative of early string instruments.

The Voce Umana or Fiffaro, a Principal-scaled stop at 8' pitch (treble only) was also used in the Renaissance and became increasingly more common in the Baroque and later periods. Its pipes were normally tuned sharp against the 8' Principal, except in the Venetian tradition and among a few builders in the south of Italy, where flat tuning was preferred.

The above description, as I have said earlier, represents a simplification of a much more complicated subject, and many examples exist that do not follow the rule.13 Also, all of those who are familiar with ancient Italian organs will agree that the tonal experience that comes from a Callido or a Nacchini organ is vastly different from that of an Agati or a Catarinozzi. They were expressions of very different artistic environments and the builders were very faithful to their own local traditions.

What happened in nineteenth-century Italian organbuilding is worth investigating a bit more closely. Early signs of rejection of the Italian romantic organ appeared. In 1824 the Cardinal Vicar of Rome promulgated an edict stating: "Organists may not play on the organ music written for theater, or with profane character, but only music that can encourage meditation and devotion . . . "14 Still, many of the major builders in the north, as well as many in other parts of the country, continued in their tradition of building instruments without changing their style.15 But at some point, foreign influence became a strong factor16 and the "new inventions," the Barker lever first and then pneumatic and electric action, came into the picture.17 Pneumatic action in particular and the new sounds, such as the "modern strings" and harmonic stops demanded higher wind pressures, and the organ sound became stronger and aggressive. But, as we all know, pneumatic action represented only a relatively short transition period in organbuilding history, and a further evolution of the instrument was soon marked in the following century by a perfected electric action and by the rediscovery, in the mid 1960s, of tracker action. This movement was immediately promoted by some of the major Italian builders18 and it became stronger and stronger over the years. The neoclassical instrument was created, based on mechanical action and on the re-discovery of the traditional sounds and voicing techniques. But, as it is often the case, the intent was not that of copying the past but rather of preserving the best of tradition within a new context which was calling for a new use of the organ: the support of congregational singing.

One may get the impression that it is impossible to extract a general trend from this entire process of evolution. Still, I believe that one common denominator can be found: the unforced, pleasing singing quality that has survived unchanged for over five centuries, and which effectively represents, in musical form, the character of the Italian language.

 

Notes

                  1.              The instrument consists of one manual and short pedalboard, as follows. Manual: F1-A4 without F#1, G#1; divided keys G#1/Ab1, G#2/Ab2, G#3/Ab3; Pedal: F1-D2 directly connected to the corresponding manual keys. The stoplist follows:

Principale contrabasso (24', façade) - doubled from C#3

Principale (12', rear façade - doubled from C#3, triple from Bb3)

Flauto in VIII

Flauto in XII

Ottava (doubled from Bb3)

XII

XV

XIX

XXII

XXVI-XXIX

Spring windchest, A = 470 Hz, meantone temperament; restoration by Tamburini, 1974-1982. The above information is the courtesy of Liuwe Tamminga, recitalist and organist at the Basilica of San Petronio.

                  2.              Concerning earlier use of the organ in western world churches, see Peter Williams (Duke University, Durham, NC) in his essay "The origin of the Christian organ with some particular reference to Italy," Acts of the International Symposium on "I Serassi--L"arte organaria fra sette e ottocento," Ed. Carrara, Bergamo, 1999, p. 12. Referring to the early Middle Ages, he writes: "I don"t know any evidence that organs were brought into church in order to accompany singing--whether it was the celebrant singing at mass, the lay people responding with their own acclamations, or the monks chanting their daily office in private or in public. All that one can be certain about is that organs were there to provide sound, and whatever later music historians may have assumed, it is seldom if ever clear what kind of sound they made, or for what purpose and at what point they made it. Only from the thirteenth century onwards the picture is clear . . ."

                  3.              While the practice of congregational singing at celebrations in Italian churches may have had its first examples at the end of the nineteenth century, it was during the Second Vatican Council that this practice was actually encouraged.

                  4.              A Positivo can be described as a smaller size "cabinet" organ, self-contained, whose casework is normally divided in two sections: the lower case, containing the bellows (normally two multi-fold hinged bellows activated by levers), and the upper case, which sits on top and which holds the keyboard, the windchest and pipes. It was almost invariably built without independent pedal stops,  and its pedalboard, when present, consisted normally of one short octave, whose keys were connected to the corresponding keys of the first octave at the manual by means of strings or wires. Although easily movable (sometimes large handles on the sides of the two sections of the case indicate this possibility), it is different from a Portativo, an even smaller instrument whose primary function was that of providing music during outdoor processions.

                  5.              Larger instruments are not unknown to historical Italian organbuilding. I will mention two examples of rare complexity:

a.) The instrument at the church of San Nicolo L"Arena in Catania, by Donato del Piano (1698-1785), with a total of five keyboards, divided between three consoles attached to the case (1 manual - 3 manuals - 1 manual) with the larger console in the center and one pedalboard for the center console, plus a separate small automatic pipe instrument activated by a rotating drum. This enormous, beautiful instrument, now in a poor state of disrepair (among other things, the pipes have all been removed and stored), includes pipework of extremely unusual shape.

b.) The great organ at the Church of the Cavalieri di S. Stefano in Pisa, built between 1733 and 1738 by Azzolino Bernardino della Ciaia (1671-1755) with the help of other organbuilders from different parts of Italy, with four manuals plus a fifth manual activating a harpsichord. This organ was later converted into a pneumatic instrument and subsequently electrified. Only a portion of the original pipework survives.

                  6.              See Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini, "Le risorse dell"organo Serassiano e il loro sfruttamento nella prassi organistica dell"epoca," in Acts of the International Symposium on "I Serassi--L"arte organaria fra sette e ottocento", Ed. Carrara, Bergamo, 1999, pp. 80-84.

                  7.              See Giosue Berbenni, Acts of the International Symposium on "I Serassi--L"arte organaria fra sette e ottocento," Ed. Carrara, Bergamo, 1999, pp. 22-24.

                  8.              The lower the wind pressure, the thinner the tongues must be to obtain promptness of speech. But thin tongues also produce undesirable side effects, notably:  a) A thinner timbre in general, with greater development of overtones and less fundamental; b) Uncontrollable sound at the bass register, where any reed naturally tends to become louder; c) Very weak trebles. To overcome these problems, a series of interesting methods were developed. I will mention a few:

a.) Wide and deep shallots to increase the volume of air excited by the tongue, with the effect of increasing the prominence of the fundamental in the tone;

b.) Double or even triple tongues at the low register, to control volume, timbre and stability;

c.) Variable tongue thickness at the treble, with the filing of the tip to obtain promptness while retaining a good volume of sound.

For a more complete description of voicing methods on low pressure reeds, with specific reference to the reeds of Serassi organs, see Francesco Ruffatti in "I registri ad ancia negli organi Serassi," Acts of the International Symposium on "I Serassi--L"arte organaria fra sette e ottocento," Ed. Carrara, Bergamo, 1999 pp. 144-150.

                  9.              When the lowest pitched stop on the manual is the Principal 16' the nomenclature remains the same, although all stops start one octave lower in pitch. The stoplist becomes:

Principale (16')

Ottava (8')

Decimaquinta (4')

Decimanona (22/3')

and so on. In essence, the organ is still seen as based on the 8' Principal, with the extension of a counter octave towards the bass (see my article on Gaetano Callido, December, 1999 issue of The Diapason, p. 17, Note 8).

                  10.           Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini in his article "Il ripieno," L"organo, Year 1, No. 2, July-December, 1960, Ed. Patron, Bologna, points out the difference between the Italian Ripieno and the northern European mixtures as follows:

"a) The classical Italian ripieno is divided into its constitutive elements, corresponding to separate stops, while the foreign mixtures, starting from a certain pitch (from 4', from 22/3', from 2', from 11/3' etc.) are condensed into one stop;

b) Both in the ripieno and in the northern mixtures a gradual "compression" towards the treble takes place, a compression which is more limited in the German and northern European organ, greater in the Italian organ. In fact a ripieno will have a "compressed" extension in the treble, reduced from 8' to 2', while in the Mixtur-Scharf scheme the treble is extended between 8' and 1';

c) The "masking" of the jumps produced by the breaks is done differently in Italy from abroad; in Italy, by the division of breaks into two different points, one for the octave stops and one for the quint stops; abroad by the partial or complete substitution of the break in quint and fourth with the one in octave.

The northern European mixtures, through a particular interpretation of the break and without any fear of going beyond the pitch limits in the bass and the treble as imposed by the Italian ripieno, tend to make the tonal "density" more uniform, by reducing the difference between the tonal richness of the bass and the treble. Part of such uniformity is sacrificed by the Italian organbuilder in favor of tonal beauty. This is why the use of the Italian ripieno is mostly chordal and for toccatas, while the northern European organum plenum, especially the German, can also perform a polyphonic role."

In c) Tagliavini refers to alternation of quint and unison breaks within the same rank in all ranks of the mixture.

The pitch limit of northern European mixtures and related stops is often C at 1/16', close to the limit of human hearing, one full octave higher than the Ripieno and this factor alone determines a dramatic difference in the sound from the Ripieno.

                  11.           Drawing is an acoustical phenomena by which the sound of a pipe is drawn or pulled into tune by the sound of a second pipe which is playing an interval close to being pure or in tune. This effect is stronger between unison pipes; when tuning the second pipe to the first, its sound will slide into tune as soon as its frequency approaches that of the first pipe, but before it actually reaches the same value, thus determining an apparent tuning condition. Adding a third pipe and trying to tune it to the two previous sounds becomes impossible if the first two pipes are in a status of apparent unison, because each of the two sounds will react to the third pipe differently, according to their real frequency value. The difficulties increase exponentially from note C#4 up in the example shown, where two groups of 4 and 3 equal size pipes respectively play at once. The procedure to tune the Ripieno is consequently different and definitely more complicated than that of a regular mixture stop, as it must take into account the drawing of equal length pipes.

                  12.           I am here mentioning two organs, built in Tuscany by the Paoli family of Campi Bisenzio at the beginning of the 19th century, both restored by Fratelli Ruffatti in recent years:

a.) the organ in the Church of S. Francesco in Pontassieve, near Florence, built by Giacobbe Paoli, which includes doublings at the Principale starting with note Bb3, at the Ottava from note F3 and at the Decimaquinta also from note F3;

b.) the organ built by Michelangelo Paoli in the Basilica of S. Maria, Impruneta - Firenze, utilizing the pipes of a previous instrument by Bernardo d"Argenta, 1535, which has doublings at the Principale starting from note F#3, at the Ottava from note B3 and at the Decimaquinta from C4. Having re-built the windchest entirely, the builder could have easily eliminated the doublings had he not believed in the validity of such tonal approach.

                  13.           As an example, Sicilian organs in the 18th century were often built with multiple Ripieno ranks activated by a single stop control.

                  14.           See "La riforma dell"Organo Italiano" by Baggiani, Picchi, Tarrini, Ed. Pacini, Ospedaletto (Pisa), 1990, pp. 9-10.

                  15.           The largest instrument built by the Serassi family, the "Organum maximum" with three keyboards and over three thousand pipes, was built in the romantic style as late as in 1882. This instrument was restored by Fratelli Ruffatti between 1983 and 1985. It includes many of the effects which were rejected by liturgists, such as the drum, a bell and other percussion.

                  16.           Ferdinando Casamorata (1807-1881), musician and music scholar, introduced the work of Cavaillé-Coll to the Italian musical scene by making public the work of J. A. De La Fage "Orgue de l"Église Royale de Saint Dénis, construit par MM Cavaillé-Coll père et fils, Facteur d"orgues du Roi." Rapport. II edition, Paris, 1846. See "La riforma dell"Organo Italiano" by Baggiani, Picchi, Tarrini, Ed. Pacini, Ospedaletto (Pisa), 1990, p. 12. He gave explanations and favorable comments on some of the most remarkable characteristics of the instrument, notably the variety of wind pressures, the Barker lever, the "strength" of the upper registers, especially the reed stops, etc., and presenting them as valuable innovations worth imitating.

                  17.           An important role in this process was played by George William Trice (1848-1920), a British merchant who became an organbuilder and established a factory in Italy. He built the first electric action organ in 1888 for the Church of S. Andrea, Genoa. Other notable instruments followed, among which the three-manual instrument for the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Genoa, inaugurated in 1890 with concerts by Alexander Guilmant and Filippo Capocci.

18.               

Tamburini and Ruffatti were the first major Italian companies, in the early 1960s, to resume building mechanical action instruments.

 

Francesco Ruffatti has been a partner since 1968 of Fratelli Ruffatti, builders and restorers of pipe organs, in Padova, Italy. Besides being the tonal director of the firm, he is actively involved in the research on historical Italian organs and the supervision of the many historical restorations performed by the firm.

Francesco Cera and Andrea Pinchi

Francesco Cera was born in Bologna, Italy. He studied organ and harpsichord with Luigi Ferdinando Tagliavini and later with Gustav Leonhardt at the Amsterdam Conservatory. Regarded as one of Italy’s leading early music specialists, he has performed as a soloist in international festivals and on historic organs throughout Europe. Cera has recorded harpsichord and organ works by 17th-century Italian composers (Rossi, Merula, Storace and Valente) for the Tactus label, to critical acclaim. The French label Tempéraments issued the anthology “Rome Baroque,” with music by Frescobaldi and Pasquini. Francesco Cera has recorded three CDs of Scarlatti’s sonatas (from a 1742 manuscript), and taken part in the performance of all the sonatas at the Festival in Ghent (Belgium). The ARTS label has recently issued his recordings of Bach’s French Suites and four Harpsichord Concertos (with I Barocchisti, Diego Fasolis, conductor). From 1991 to 1994, Cera was a member of the ensemble Il Giardino Armonico. He directs the Ensemble Arte Musica, with whom he performs an Italian repertory spanning the period of Gesualdo’s madrigals to 18th-century cantatas. He has led masterclasses and workshops at the Royal Academy of Music London, Académie d’Orgue de Fribourg, Accademia di Musica Italiana per Organo, the University of Illinois, Cornell University, Arizona State University, and Oberlin College. Since 2001 he has lived in Rome, where he is Honorary Inspector of Early Organs for Rome and the Lazio region. His website: www.francescocera.it.

Born into a family of organ builders, Andrea Pinchi learned the rudiments of the art of organ building as a child from his paternal grandfather, Libero Rino. After receiving a scientific degree in 1987, he officially joined the family business, refining his knowledge under the direction of his father, Guido, and participating in the construction of important organs, working especially on pipe design and pipemaking. From 2001–2003 he was managing director of Stinkens Italia Srl, a company that has made thousands of pipes worldwide, and especially for U.S. organbuilders, over the years. In 2001, with his sister Barbara, he founded the historic organ restoration firm Ars Organi, which has carried out restorations of great interest, such as those of the 1509 organ of Mastro Paolo Pietropaolo in the Chiesa Museo di San Francesco in Trevi (Umbria), the 1615 Antonino La Valle instrument in Santa Maria Assunta in Sclafani (Sicily), the 1759 Conrad Werle organ in San Giuseppe in Leonessa (Lazio), and currently, the two-manual 1769 Aloysius Galligani organ in the Chiesa del Suffragio in Foligno. He has considerable experience in the field of organology, thanks to the teaching and guidance of Dr. Oscar Mischiati, with whom he worked closely from 1981 to 2004 in his family’s restoration business. Pinchi supervised the cataloging of the organs in the diocese of Foligno for the Umbria region; he has published numerous articles on organology. He has participated in organbuilding meetings both in Italy and abroad; he is president of L’Associazione “Aloysius Galligani,” which deals with historic organs of the Umbria region. He is owner, with his siblings Barbara and Claudio, of Fratelli Pinchi , a company founded in 1930, which has built over 440 organs in Italy and other countries; among the most significant are those of the Duomo in Arezzo, Kusatzu Concert Hall in Japan, Tempio Don Bosco in Asti, and Padre Pio Basilica in the Renzo Piano-designed San Giovanni Rotondo—a four-manual, 100-rank mechanical action instrument. He has supervised the temperament and tuning of many historic organs for recordings made by Archiv-Deutsche Grammophon, Camerata Tokio, Discantica, Opus 111, Quadrivium and Tactus. He does design work both for the family firm and for foreign organ builders.

After more than thirty years and hundreds of instruments restored with the highest technical qualities, the restoration of historical organs in Italy still holds surprises and offers us opportunities for growth and knowledge. In the last few years, our view of the antique Italian organ has become even larger and more diversified, not simply in the general structure of the instruments, but mostly in the tonal concept adopted throughout Italy over the centuries by organbuilders.
In the church of Santa Lucia, in Serra San Quirico, an old village in the mountains near Ancona (Marche region), it was possible to discover a particularly rare instrument. It is an organ dated 1676, signed by Giuseppe Testa, a famous organbuilder from Rome. Scholars knew about the existence of such an organ, but since no evident signature was ever found, its attribution was still uncertain, also considering that it was in quite a different style from that which defined the organs made in the Marche region.

Background of the instrument
During the restoration process, conducted by the Ars Organi company, located in Foligno and owned by Andrea and Barbara Pinchi, an inscription on the top of a languid was found: “Io Giuseppe Testa Romano feci in Roma Anno 1676” (“I, Giuseppe Testa, Roman, made this in Rome in the year 1676”). Giuseppe Testa is surely to be considered the most important organbuilder in Rome in the mid-17th century; he maintained the organs in the basilicas of San Pietro and Santa Maria Maggiore, and built numerous organs now placed in the churches of Rome. Unfortunately, many of the instruments he built that are still extant have been greatly modified throughout the centuries; thus, there is little historical evidence of his work. This is why the organ in San Quirico is of such extraordinary importance: an organ by Giuseppe Testa that was quite well preserved.
Most of the elements are still original: 95% of the pipes, the keyboard and pedalboard, casework, windchest, even the stool for the organist! Particularly beautiful are the three central pipes of the façade, modeled in a spiral, typical of the Roman school. In the 19th century, drawknobs and bellows had been changed and were rebuilt during the recent restoration job, modeled after originals from the Roman School of the period. The pipes had suffered some bad nicking, but many pipes were still intact in the mouths and helped furnish the model for the general voicing of the instrument. The reason this instrument is about 200 km from Rome is that the Marche region, in the 17th century, belonged to the Papal States, and the reason for the choice of Santa Lucia in San Quirico is probably due to the fact that this village is on the way to the Sanctuary of Loreto.

Stoplist and sonorities
The stoplist of the Testa organ presents different elements of originality. There are two 8′ Principals, of which the second is of sweeter tone; the first inner pipes were made in metal, and so they have been rebuilt this way. There are two flutes, one 22⁄3′ and the other 2′ (called by the builder Flautino), instead of the more common 4′ one. A 16′ Controbassi in spectacular chestnut wood, from C1 to C2, is coupled to the keyboard (the pedalboard is simply linked to the keys without an independent stop). The rarest stop is the 8′ Voce Umana, from F2. This well-known Italian stop, designed to beat in combination with the Principal, was widely used in northern Italy since around 1550, but it had never been used in Rome nor in other parts of central Italy until the beginning of the 18th century (apparently in Rome, Frescobaldi did not have the Voce Umana for his Toccate per l’elevazione). Therefore, this stop in the organ of San Quirico is the oldest that we know of among all the instruments built in Rome in the 17th century, and perhaps suggests that this stop was known by the organists of the Eternal City (we hope this hypothesis will be confirmed by other discoveries in the future). The effect of the drum is interesting and unusual; activated by the last pedal in the pedalboard, without its own pipes, it acts on the D1 and F1 notes of the keyboard.
The organ by Giuseppe Testa in Serra San Quirico offers us the possibility of finally hearing the tonal concept of this very important organbuilder from Rome, whose personality and craftsmanship are well evident not simply in the manufacture of the pipes and the mechanical parts, made with great knowledge, but also in the sound itself. At the time of the organ’s construction, Rome was an important center for organ music; it was dominated by Bernardo Pasquini, follower of the master Girolamo Frescobaldi. Many organists from Germany came to Rome to learn the latest organ style.
The measurements and the proportions of the pipes are such that their effect can be well appreciated by the ear. The sound is quite clear, bright and full of harmonics, even if not completely transparent but matched with a good fundamental and with generous speech. The main Principal is, along with the 22⁄3′ Flute, the stop with more fundamental, though it maintains a light character. The second Principal is sweeter than the main one but not dark. The 4′ Octave marks a tonal separation from the main Principal, because of its narrower scaling; that is why it is more penetrating and clear. The five ripieno ranks follow the same style of the 4′ Octave, and their sound is similar to strings, very open and brilliant.
The Voce Umana has a sound that matches better with the main Principal than with the second. The 22⁄3′ Flute is among the most surprising stops of the organ: its sound is strong, round and projects well in the church. It is only a hypothesis that the size of the other 2′ Flute recalls the Roman organs of 16′ that had 2′ and 11⁄3′ flutes. Its timbre is different from the 22⁄3′ one, less round, but does not lack sound. The 16′ Controbassi is also very clear and does not have a booming effect in the acoustic.
The restoration by Ars Organi has had the delicate responsibility to re-establish the original pitch with the best approximation possible, and to recreate the original sound of the instrument through an in-depth study and patient work of voicing, achieving surprising and very convincing results. This organ allows us to discover the sound conceived for the organ works of Bernardo Pasquini, and to execute with great taste all the literature of the 17th-century Italian masters as well as the German composers who took their inspiration while in Rome.
—Francesco Cera
Translation by Zoila Donati

The first time I saw the organ in the magnificent church of Santa Lucia, in 1987, I was aware that I was looking at an organ of rare beauty belonging to the Roman School, but I had no idea I was looking at the last masterpiece produced and signed by Giuseppe Maria Testa!
Obviously, whenever a restoration job is undertaken, one dreams of making an extraordinary discovery, like a hidden handwritten paper inside the windchest, or under the first key—or under the languid of the first front pipe! All of this, with other little discoveries, has allowed us to reconstruct the original look of the instrument.
The restoration work began in 1998 and ended in 2007. At the end of this job we produced an in-depth publication. I will later highlight the most important aspects regarding the tonal material.
Throughout three centuries the instrument has undergone numerous interventions, some of which have been particularly serious, such as converting the instrument to equal temperament, raising the pitch to 426 Hz at 11°C, tampering with the drawknobs, the modifications of the pedal windchest and the substitution of the original bellows. However, the original pipes were all present, even if they were seriously altered by the falling of the rackboard and by interventions made with little attention. The tops of the front pipes and of the internal ones had been cut and scrolled. Some feet of the façade pipes had dents that could easily be seen, and some toeholes had been altered and closed. A substantial number of factory-made pipes had been used to fill in or replace a few original pipes, which were considered impossible to save.
From a tonal standpoint, everything seemed to coincide with the original model, although a lot of the pipes in the ranks had been mixed, and not all of them played where they were supposed to. Even the pipes of the 2′ Flautino had been used in the 22⁄3′ Flauto in XII, and in their place in the 19th century someone had put a 4′ Ottavino. The first four pipes of the Principale Primo (front), originally made in metal, had been replaced in the 1800s with pipes made of fir. The 16′ Controbassi stop in chestnut, originally stopped, had been opened and doubled in its length with fir.
The survey has highlighted all the elements of the primary nucleus, then they have been rearranged according to the original numbers. By doing this, all the pipes that had been moved started to play, as they should have, consistently with the right balance between diameters and lengths. All operations providing the correct rearrangement have also restored uniformity of the thickness of the pipe metal, especially in the principals: very thin in the Principale Primo and Voce Umana, and much more robust in the Principale Secondo. The thicknesses of the metal of the Flauto in XII are much more substantial and they grow proportionally towards the high notes.
The bevel of the languids varies greatly according to the stops. The lab analysis produced the following results: front pipes 97.9% tin; inner pipes 98.4% lead. Following the preliminary phase, the pipes have all been cleaned and restored to their original conditions. During the last intervention the instrument had been retuned to 426 Hz at 11°C, and the temperament modified to equal, which made it necessary to lengthen all the pipes.
Once we collected all the non-original pipes, we proceeded building 154 pipes out of 471 (33%) using the same models, alloy and measurements of the originals. The pitch has been restored at 415.7 Hz at 14°C, humidity at 52%, while keeping in mind the pipes of the 16′ Controbassi, which maintained traces of the plugs inside, and the original metal pipes, which preserved unaltered voicing and length of the bodies. The temperament is again meantone ¼ comma.
The characteristics of the nicking are rather common to all the stops and count on average seven nicks per languid. For the Principale I, Principale II, the Ottava and the Voce Umana, the nicking is done all the way to the pipes of ½′.
The greatly varied bevel of the languids of the different stops and the differentiated scaling speaks by itself to the knowledge of Giuseppe Testa, who knew how to design the instruments he made with incredible taste and attention. The principals are differentiated in diameter and metal thickness. The ripieno ranks present a complex and elaborate mix of diameters that are narrow for the high notes and more generous in the low notes.
The Flauto in XII was thought out and realized with very clear principles, with diameters that start out rather narrow to widen later towards mid-keyboard, doing the same thing with increasing pipe metal thickness. This is the physical rendering of a wooden recorder, with its dynamic characteristics. All operations have been supervised and directed by the Italian authorities appointed to supervise all restorations in the Marche region, in this case Professor Maria Claudia Caldari and Maestro Mauro Ferrante.
Also part of this restoration were Andrea and Barbara Pinchi, Ivan Dumitrak, Marco Dominici. Assistant for voicing: Francesco Cera. Historical-philological research: M° Mauro Ferrante, Ispettore Onorario della Soprintendenza delle Marche; Prof. Paolo Peretti, Organologo e Musicologo, Conservatorio di Bari.
—Andrea Pinchi

The Organ
Keyboard 45 notes, short octave, C1–C5
Total width 653 mm

Pedalboard 10 notes, short octave, C1–C2 plus drum pedal

Stoplist
8′ Principale I
8′ Principale II
4′ Ottava
2′ Quinta Decima
11⁄3′ Decima Nona
1′ Vigesima Seconda
2⁄3′ Vigesima Sesta
1⁄2′ Vigesima Nona
8′ Voce Umana
22⁄3′ Flauto in XII
2′ Flautino
16′ Controbassi, stopped

The Brick Gothic Phenomenon in Northern Germany

by Aldo J. Baggia

What strikes one immediately in the north of Germany is the uniformity of the style of architecture of the major churches. Throughout Schleswig-Holstein and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern the cathedral-size edifices have certain things in common. They are all massively-built gothic churches with high arching naves, some of which are well over a hundred feet in height, and they are made of brick. This last element creates a significant difference in feeling from the churches of the south of Germany or from the great French cathedrals whose soaring features have a more delicate nature about them. The use of bricks makes for a monumental effect that is striking from within and without. The Nikolaikirche in Wismar has a vaulting of 37 meters, which is the second highest in Germany after that of the Marienkirche in Lübeck, which rises to 40 meters. The steeples of the Marienkirche in Lübeck reach the height of 125 meters and are the center-pieces of the Lübeck skyline which emphasizes a row of seven church towers in the island core that is the city center. The Marienkirche of Stralsund in Ostvorpommern is 96 meters long with a vaulting of 32 meters, and the Baroque organ of 1659 is the last work of one of Lübeck's most famous organ builders, Friedrich Stellwagen. Not only is it his last work, but it is one of his largest organs (III/51) in a case that is absolutely spectacular, which rivals that of St. Bavo's in Haarlem, Holland. One cannot help but be inspired without even having heard a note from the instrument. This feeling is reproduced in the other brick gothic churches, where the combination of a formidable organ case blends so well with the aesthetic value of the architecture.

 

A common quote from a variety of sources is: "A Lutheran church must have a Bach organ." The implication would be that it must be a Baroque instrument with certain specifications and yet when one listens to Bach on a variety of organs, it would be difficult to make a definitive case for specifications, given the organs that are found in the typical North German Lutheran church, most of which are a far cry from what is labeled as a typical Baroque organ. I recall a recording by Nicholas Danby doing favorite works by Bach on the 1970 Marcussen organ (III/47) in the Cathedral of Lübeck. In the liner notes he wrote that he considered that particular instrument to be ideal for Bach's music because "of all the organs of our time, I find no other that matches its majesty and subtlety."1

One could add that the Cathedral's interior itself is quite majestic and subtle. I heard Peter Stenglein from Coburg play Bach's Toccata, Adagio and Fugue in C, BWV 564, on that organ and was impressed with the colors produced, but the instrument was just as scintillating in the final movement of Vierne's First Symphony, a piece which requires brilliance and power. Conversely a small instrument can produce marvelous effects in Bach, depending on the virtuosity and articulation of the organist. I think of Simon Preston's recording on DGG of some of Bach's major works, including the Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565, on the Kreuzbergkirche organ (II/24) in Bonn. There is a strength that easily matches the sound produced by much larger organs, but the style is a winning one.

It is clear that Bach appreciated larger instruments, including those that had features not normally associated with a Baroque organ. In the Oxford Composer Companions book on Bach (edited by Malcolm Boyd), it is stated that "The 18th century Thuringian organ is characterized by an increasingly generous number of 8' flue stops, including string stops of delicate but incisive timbre, with a slight purr or sizzle, and with a characteristic initial speech suggesting the bowstroke of a string instrument. The 8' flue stops, together with an ample number of 16' and 32' stops, provide gravity of tone."2 There tended to be relatively few reeds, but Silbermann was known for having powerful reeds, which he adopted after having studied with his brother, Andreas, in Strasbourg. His implementation of reed stops of power and brilliance had a considerable influence on organ building throughout Germany for generations.

Two instruments directly provide significant information on the question of a Bach organ because of the fact that Bach played and appreciated both of them. In the Schlosskirche in Altenburg, Thuringia, the Tobias Heinrich Gottfried Trost organ (II/36) was praised by Bach for its workmanship and the character of its individual stops. One can play his most ambitious works on it. Zacharias Hildebrandt built the organ of the Wenzelskirche (III/53) in Naumburg between 1743 and 1746. Both Bach and Silbermann examined the instrument and found it successful. This organ has many 8' stops, but also has a full array of 16' stops and mixtures. There is a full complement of high-pitch stops and even by today's standards would be considered a relatively large organ. The case is elaborately decorated and quite spectacular. The Totentanz organ (IV/56) in the Marienkirche in Lübeck is noted as a Bach organ and Ernst-Erich Stender, the church organist since 1972, has played the entire gamut of Bach's works on this organ with great success. If one examines this instrument, which was built by the Führer Orgelbau of Wilhelmshaven in 1985, one finds a broad base whose divisions have a diversity of stops, including a total of 13 reed stops which give the organ a shine and power that one usually associates with very large instruments. It does not have any 32' stops, but is abundant in 8' and 16' stops. This organ is capable of playing romantic and modern compositions with success, but is usually limited to Bach, Buxtehude and their contemporaries in concerts.

Romantic and modern compositions are usually played on the V/101 Kemper & Sohn organ that was installed in 1968. Interestingly enough, Ernst-Erich Stender played major pieces of practically all of the well-known composers for the organ in the summer of 1999 and this represented a considerable feat of virtuosity. Featured at different times were the works of Liszt, including Weinen, Klagen, Sorgen, Zagen, the Prelude and Fugue on BACH, Ad nos, ad salutarem undam, Reubke's 94th Psalm, Franck's Pièce héroïque, and Choral No. 3 in A-minor, plus works by Vierne, Widor, Langlais, Alain, Reger, Jongen and Messiaen. This is a daunting show of virtuosity on the part of the organist, and the instrument produces a sound that is significant in size, color and brilliance. The organ sits so high in the West Tower that one can barely make out the organist when he takes a bow after a concert. This has to be the highest loft in the world and just thinking of the 40 meter vaulting in the nave puts one in awe.

In pursuing the work of the three Friedrichs--Ladegast, Friese and Stellwagen--it is noteworthy to see how their organs dove-tail with the style and architecture of the churches for which they were built. The Ladegast organ in the Schweriner Dom was basically untouched by the Second World War and was restored in the late 80s by Schuke VEB of Potsdam. This organ, IV/84, has essentially the same specifications as the organs in the Cathedral of Merseburg and the Nikolaikirche in Leipzig and represents Ladegast at the height of his powers. We know that Franz Liszt's major pieces and Reubke's 94th Psalm were first performed on the Ladegast organ in Merseburg Cathedral, and this is interesting because the installation was early in his career. There is a similarity with Silbermann's experience in Saxony in that he was given the contract for the large organ of the Freiberger Dom after having had very little experience. A recent recording by Christoph Schoener on the Mitra label of Liszt's Ad nos, ad salutarem undam and Reubke's 94th Psalm on the organ in Schwerin gives ample testimony to the fact that it matches or surpasses the Merseburg organ in color, brilliance and power. And in comparing these performances with all the other recordings that I know of the pieces, I would say that they hold their own comfortably with the competition. In a concert in July 1999, Andreas Liebig, an organist from Oslo, played Liszt's Prelude and Fugue on BACH, and the organ responded brilliantly. The acoustics of the cathedral are very good,  and one senses a warmth as well as a monumental quality to the sound. The organ was dedicated in 1871, some sixteen years after the dedication of the Merseburg instrument, which brought Ladegast instant fame.

That organ was built with 81 stops on four manuals and pedal and with its 5686 pipes was the largest in Germany at the time. The Hauptwerk had 20 stops, the Oberwerk 16, the Brustwerk 14, the Rückpositiv 11 and the Pedal 20. Liszt was so impressed with reports of the organ that he immediately sought to hear it. The Leipzig music critic, Dr. Franz Brendel, a champion of the North German school, wrote on August 31st, 1855, in the "Neue Zeitschrift für Musik," of which he was the editor, "that this instrument opened a new phase in organ-building, in which things have been achieved here that had never been attained on any other organ."3 In his review of the dedication he wrote "it was the unanimous feeling that this is a musical instrument that establishes the organ-builder as an outstanding master. The character of this work is different from any other organ. Insofar as power and fullness (body and depth, using all the stops) it is clearly the best; however it is also unique in the softer and peaceful stops. There is a euphony and mellowness to it that we have not yet heard from other organs. The sound is, to describe the main point in a couple of words, poetic nature."4

The large organ has retained the Baroque case of 1716, but was rebuilt by Schuke of Potsdam in 1984. Most of the restoration work in the former East Germany has been done by two companies in the north, Schuke of Potsdam or Wilhelm Sauer Orgelbau of Frankfurt/Oder and two in the south, Eule Orgelbau of Bautzen and the Gebrüder Jehmlich Orgelbau of Dresden. Obviously there are other companies, but it is interesting to note how many times these four firms have been mentioned since the time of the Second World War with respect to building new organs or restoring historic ones.

Following Merseburg, Ladegast moved from strength to strength and in the large organs he showed what he had learned from other sources, having particularly profited from studies with Cavaillé-Coll in France. Clearly additions were made to his art in the construction of the Nikolaikirche organ in Leipzig (IV/84) in 1862. Here he introduced the Barker lever and divided the wind chests of three manuals into two compartments, which made the playing easier and made a difference in the wind pressures as well as bettering the air intake. Johann Gottlob Töpfer's book of 1855, Theorie und Praxis des Orgelbaus, laid down principles for the specifications of pipes, wind chests, bellows and wind trunks, and Walter Ladegast writes that this organ was the first large organ that put Töpfer's principles into practice.5 This organ has had rebuilds and additions by the Wilhelm Sauer Company of Frankfurt/Oder and now has 94 stops.

   The other major organs that Ladegast built and which still exist include

1. The Marienkirche in Weissenfels (III/41) in 1863. This is where he had his workshop.

2. The Schlosskirche in Wittenberg (III/39) in 1864. The organ was rebuilt and enlarged to IV/56 in 1993-1994 by Eule Orgelbau of Bautzen. Knobs in different colors indicate the origin of the stops--red for the original ones, light red for the rebuilt ones, two Sauer stops are brown and the new Schwellwerk is in black. As such, one can play the organ with only the original specifications if one wishes.

3. Stadt-und Kathedralkirche St. Jakob in Köthen (III/47) in 1872. This organ was restored in 1993-1994 by Christian Scheffler.

4. Kreuzkirche in Posen, now Posnan, Poland (III/43) in 1876. This organ has not been altered.

5. Stadtkirche St. Marien in Ronne-burg (III/32) in 1879. The organ was restored in 1992-1993 by Rösel & Hercher Orgelbau of Saalfeld.

6.  St. Johann's in Wernigerode (III/33) in 1885. This organ was an example of his using cone chests as opposed to the slider chests that he had used in his earlier organs. There was a full restoration by Schuke of Potsdam in 1989/1991 with a view to putting the organ back into its original condition.

7. The Kirche "Zu unserer lieben Frauen" in Mittweida (III/42) in 1888. In a rebuild in 1931 by the Jehmlich Brothers of Dresden, the case and pipes were used.

I did not mention the organ of the Grosser Saal der Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde (III/52) in Vienna, which was installed in 1872, because it was replaced by a Rieger (IV/71) in 1907, which was replaced by an even larger organ (IV/100) in 1968 by Walcker of Ludwigsburg.

  We have to look at the organ of the Schweriner Dom to see what would have to be considered his magnum opus because it is now the largest of those that are in as close to an original state as possible. This instrument of 5197 or 5235 pipes, depending on the source, has 84 stops divided over four manuals and pedal and sits high in the West Tower of the Cathedral. It is an impressive sight and the sound surrounds one in the nave and is characterized by brilliance in the reeds and tremendous power in the 32-foot pedal stops. The key action uses the Barker lever, and  a combination action allows crescendo/

decrescendo. The pipes are 97.8% original (according to the report that the Schuke Company had written at the time of the restoration) and the tin pipes were "built according to Silbermann's principles."6 This last quote has been mentioned in a number of sources and stresses the point that Ladegast used Silbermann as his model with respect to the fashioning of the pipes. This instrument is capable of playing the entire literature and is equally as effective in Bach as it is in the moderns. A number of recent recordings give ample testimony to this point.

Schwerin is the home base of Friedrich Friese, who is little known outside of the region. Friese built primarily smaller instruments, and the II/31 organ of the Paulskirche in Schwerin, whose restoration was completed by Kristian Wegscheider at the end of June, 1999, is a good example of a medium-sized organ which produces airy sound that has heft and which is comfortable in romantic as well as baroque music. The celebrations in the summer of 1999 included a series of six concerts in which one of the Mendelssohn sonatas was played as part of the program. There is brightness at the top and the strings sing. The Paulskirche is a large brick church whose acoustics rival those of the Cathedral.  A number of other churches in Mecklenburg have Friese organs and they tend to be two-manual instruments with 20 + stops. In Schwerin itself, there is also the organ (II/33) of the Nikolaikirche, better known as the Schelfkirche because of the section of the city in which it is located, which was restored within the last few years and which typifies the clear sound of a Friese organ.

Another notable one is in the Georgenkirche in the city of Parchim, which is not too far from Schwerin. Here we have an organ (II/25) that is in a case which is quite similar to that of the Paulskirche in Schwerin. The church is not as large as some of the others, but still has an air of power because of the brick element.

Lastly we come to Friedrich Stellwagen, who is known in North Germany for two organs in particular. The small organ (III/31) in the Jakobikirche in Lübeck, which dates from 1636-1637, was a renovation project that included a new Brustwerk and Rückpositiv. Fortunately this church was not destroyed during the Second World War, and the organ survives with restoration work done in 1978 by the brothers Hillebrand. His last and largest work (III/51) was installed between 1653-1659 in the Marienkirche in Stralsund. This instrument has been maintained by different sources over the years and underwent a restoration in 1959 by the firm of Alexander Schuke of Potsdam in order to reclaim the original scalings of 1659. Further work has been done on the organ since then, and currently the church is undertaking a major fund drive to do a definitive restoration of the organ. Martin Rost, the organist at the Marienkirche, expects this project to be a very costly one and indicates that world-wide help would be appreciated. The account for the project at the Deutsche Bank in Stralsund is: 5440144-01 (Stellwagen-Orgel Stralsund).

Needless to say, this is one of the great organs in the world, one whose sound matches the incredible decoration of the case. If majesty were an adjective that one would apply to an instrument, it would certainly fit here. The first track of a recording that is available at the church tells the whole story.7 Martin Rost plays Nicolaus Bruhns' Prelude in e minor and one is struck immediately by the extraordinary sound that emanates from the organ.

Stellwagen came from Halle and moved to North Germany in 1630 and was considered the best student of Gottfried Fritzsche. Gustav Fock thought that he was the most significant conduit to Arp Schnitger, who is generally considered the most famous German organ-builder of the seventeenth century.8 Stellwagen added new stops to those introduced in the north and, in particular, was known for his Trichterregal (a type of horn or trumpet) in the Rückpositiv. Fock mentions that it was a "Schalmey construction, with a longer, slightly conical resonator and wide conical top."9  This stop is also found in the Jakobikirche organ in Lübeck.

One could easily continue with descriptions of other organs of importance in the area such as those in Güstrow (the Cathedral and the Stadtkirche), Greifswald (the Cathedral) or in the Nikolaikirche in Wismar, whose Mende organ (II/30) has a striking case and stands out because of the extraordinary mass of the interior of the church.

In Stralsund there is also the Nikolaikirche which has an historic Buchholz organ (III/55) of 1841 as well as a new Baroque-style organ (II/22) of 1986 by Schuke of Potsdam. This church has the dimensions of  the Marienkirche and the organs stand out impressively. In Rostock the Marienkirche was one of the few buildings in the heart of the city that escaped the bombing of the Second World War, and the elaborate case of the Paul Schmidt organ (IV/62) of 1766-1770 still stands. The organ was rebuilt and enlarged to 85 stops in 1983 by the Sauer Orgelbau of Frankfurt/Oder. The architecture of the church is in keeping with that of most of the large churches of North Germany and mirrors the same visual effects.

Not so far from Lübeck is the island city of Ratzeburg, which features the fortress-like Cathedral that contains an organ (IV/76) that has been widely recorded. The original organ was built by Rieger in 1978 and was subsequently enlarged and revoiced in 1993-94 by Glatter-Götz Orgelbau of Owingen. The Cathedral contains two smaller organs of recent vintage--the Choir organ (II/20) by Rieger (1972) and Michael Becker (1996), and the Becker Paradies organ (II/15) of 1985.

Suffice it to say that North Germany is a region that contains organs that would interest any aficionado and which make a visit worth while.10              n

 

Notes

                  1.              CBS Masterworks recording, CD MDK 45807, Bach Organ Favorites by Nicholas Danby.

                  2.              Oxford Composers Companions, J. S. Bach (Malcolm Boyd, Editor), Oxford University Press, 1999, p. 339ff.

                  3.              Friedrich Ladegast-Der Orgelbauer von Weissenfels, by Walter Ladegast, Weiding Verlag, Stockach am Bodensee, 1998, p. 54.

                  4.              Ibid.

                  5.              Ibid, p. 64

                  6.              cf. Notes from Mitra Schallplatten,  CD16245, Christoph Schoener an der Ladegast Orgel im Dom zu Schwerin.

                  7.              Die Stellwagen-Orgel von 1659 in St. Marien zu Stralsund, Discus STW 95906, Martin Rost spielt norddeutsche Orgelmusik, 1995.

                  8.              cf. Gustav Fock, Hamburg's role in Northern European Organ Building (Translated and edited by Lynn Edwards and Edward C. Pepe), Westfield Center, Easthampton, Massachusetts 1997.

                  9.              Ibid, p. 71.

                  10.           Other sources of information. All translations with the exception of the Fock were done by the author.

Die Orgelbauten der Residenzstadt Schwerin, Julius Massmann, Wismar, 1875. Commentary and additions by Hermann J. Busch and Reinhard Jaehn, Merseburger, 1988.

Wiedereinweihung der Ladegast-Orgel im Dom zu Schwerin, Evangelischer Presserverband für Mecklenburg, e. V., 1995

Die Schweriner St. Paulskirche und Ihre Orgel, im Auftrag der St. Paulsgemeinde Schwerin (Christian Skobowsky), 1999.

Einweihung der rekonstruierten Friese-Orgel in der Schelfkirche zu Schwerin, Kirchgemeinderat der St. Nikolai (Schelf), 1994.

Die Stellwagen-Orgel von 1659 zu St. Marien, Stralsund, Gemeindekirchenrat St. Marien, Stralsund, Rügen-Druck, Putbus, 1995.

Die Orgel der St. Marien-Kirche zu Rostock, Stiftung St.-Marien-Kirche zu Rostock, e. V.

Die Restaurierung der Mende-Orgel von 1845, Kirchgemeinde St. Nikolai Wismar, 1995.

Ratzeburger Dommusiken 1999, Ratzeburger Domchor (KMD Dr. Neithard Bethke), 1999.

CD, Orgelkonzert im Schweriner Dom, Jan Ernst spielt an der Ladegast-Orgel von 1871, Domkantorei Schwerin, 1997.

CD, Orgelmusik in St. Nikolai zu Stralsund, Evangelischer Kirchengemeinde St. Nikolai, Stralsund, 1998.

CD, Ornament 11445, Johann Sebastian Bach, Grosse Orgelwerke, Ernst-Erich Stender an der Totentanzorgel in St. Marien zu Lübeck, 1991.

 

Aldo J. Baggia is Chairman of the Department of Modern Languages and Instructor in French, Spanish, German, and Italian at Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. He holds a Bachelor's degree from Iona College and the MA from Middlebury College, and has completed graduate work at Laval University and Duke University. He has pursued postgraduate studies in France, Germany, Austria, and Spain, and travelled extensively in Europe. He has written reviews for Quarterly Opera Review, Opera, Opera News, Orpheus, Monsalvat, and The Diapason.

 

St. Marien, Stralsund

HAUPTWERK

                  16'          Prinzipal

                  16'          Bordun

                  8'             Oktave

                  8'             Spitzflöte

                  51/3'     Hohlquinte

                  4'             Superoktave

                  4'             Hohlflöte

                  2'             Flachflöte

                                    Rauschpfeife II-IV

                                    Mixtur VI-X

                                    Scharff IV-VI

                  16'          Trompete

OBERPOSITIV

                  8'             Prinzipal

                  8'             Hohlflöte

                  4'             Oktave

                  4'             Blockflöte

                  4'             Kl. Quintadena

                  22/3'     Nasard

                  2'             Gemshorn

                                    Scharff IV-VII

RÜCKPOSITIV

                  16'          Gr. Quintadena

                  8'             Prinzipal

                  8'             Gedackt

                  8'             Quintadena

                  4'             Oktave

                  4'             Dulzflöte

                  2'             Feldpfeife

                  11/2'     Sifflöte

                                    Sesquialtera II

                                    Scharff VI-VIII

                                    Zimbel III

                  16'          Dulzian

                  8'             Trichterregal

                  4'             Regal

PEDAL

                  24'          Gr. Prinzipal

                  16'          Prinzipal

                  16'          Gedacktuntersatz

                  8'             Oktave

                  8'             Spitzflöte

                  4'             Superoktave

                  4'             Nachthorn

                  2'             Feldpfeife

                                    Mixtur IV

                  16'          Posaune

                  8'             Trompete

                  8'             Dulzian

                  4'             Schalmei

                  2'             Cornett

 

 

Sarah Mahler Kraaz

Sarah Mahler Kraaz, DMA, is Professor of Music and Chair of the Department at Ripon College in Ripon, Wisconsin, where she teaches organ, piano, and music history, and directs the Collegium Musicum. She is an active composer and has performed recitals in the U.S.A., Scotland, and Italy. She is a frequent contributor of reviews and articles to The Diapason. Dr. Kraaz spent several weeks this spring researching and playing historic organs in Italy and Spain during a sabbatical leave.

  In a perfect world, we organists would always be able to play music on the instruments for which it was written. Putting music and organs from the same time and place together produces a beautiful synchronicity, the closest thing to time travel we can experience. Happily, this was recently my fate. What follows is a description of some music and instruments that have expanded my understanding of a particular musical tradition. They will continue to inform my performances.

On March 6, I played a recital of Italian music on the Vespers Series of the Giuseppe Gherardeschi Organ Academy in Pistoia (www.accademiagherardeschi.info). Pistoia is a small city in Tuscany approximately 30 miles northwest of Florence. The remains of a medieval wall circumscribe the old town whose Cathedral of San Zeno houses a silver altar dedicated to San Jacopo, thereby putting it on the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela in Spain. The cathedral, the former Bishop’s Palace, the Baptistry, and the Town Hall, all dating from the 13th–15th centuries, surround a central piazza that even today dominates the center of Pistoia. An open-air fruit and vegetable market, shops, restaurants, and cafes spread out from there in a web of narrow cobblestone streets. Wednesday and Saturday mornings are market days, when stalls appear in the centro selling everything from clothing to kitchenware. Bells from the many churches in the city mark the passage of time. Pistoia is off the beaten track for tourists. It’s a great place to visit if you want to mingle with Italians who live comfortably in the present while surrounded by the past. The city and neighboring towns are also home to a number of historic organs, most of them from the 18th and early 19th centuries.¹

 

Giuseppe Gherardeschi

A brief biography in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians² states that Gherardeschi was an organist, composer, and eventually maestro di cappella at the cathedral; except for a brief period of study in Naples, he spent his entire life in Pistoia. He began his musical studies with his father, Domenico (1733–1800), who was maestro di cappella at the cathedral, and continued with his uncle, Filippo Maria (1738–1808). The latter, also a Pistoia native, had been a pupil of Giovanni Battista (a.k.a. ‘Padre’) Martini³ in Bologna from 1756 to about 1761, when Filippo was admitted to the elite Accademia Filarmonica. Giuseppe completed his formal studies with Nicola Sala at the Conservatorio di Santa Maria della Pietà dei Turchini, one of three music conservatories in Naples. Upon returning to Pistoia, he married, fathered seven children, and became organist at the church of Santa Maria dell’Umiltà. When Domenico Gherardeschi died in 1800, Giuseppe inherited his position as maestro di cappella at the cathedral, a post he held until his death. In the tradition of the Bachs and Couperins and other families of musicians at the time, Giuseppe’s son, Luigi (1791–1871), and grandson, Gherardo (1835–1905), succeeded him. The Gherardeschi men all composed sacred vocal and instrumental music, much of which survives in the cathedral archives. Giuseppe did not confine himself to music for the church, however; five symphonies, all in the three-movement fast-slow-fast pattern favored by Giovanni Battista Sammartini and other 18th-century Italian composers, survive, as do numerous arias, chamber music, and oratorios.⁴

Umberto Pineschi’s edition of 

Gherardeschi’s organ works

That we know anything at all about the life and music of Giuseppe
Gherardeschi—and consequently, about the contemporary Tuscan organ—is due to the almost single-handed efforts of Umberto Pineschi. Organist, teacher, scholar, founder of the Gherardeschi Organ Academy, and now in “retirement” Director of the Scuola Comunale di Musica e Danza “Teodulo Mabellini” in Pistoia, Pineschi has worked tirelessly to locate, preserve, and restore organs in and around Pistoia. He edited the organ works of Gherardeschi for publication beginning in 1978. The first collection was followed by a second, third, and fourth, but as he confesses in the foreword to the newest edition (in Musiche Pistoiesi per Organo, published by the Fondazione Accademia di Musica Italiana per Organo in 2009), there was “no organized plan, since every time only the pieces considered interesting at the moment were selected.” Further, he adds, “Their context, often crucial for their understanding, was not taken in[to] account. Such a fragmented presentation of the Gherardeschi organ works did not allow one to fully appreciate both their lesson on the Pistoiese organ and the artistic relevance of the composer.”⁵ Pineschi here refers to the symbiotic relationship between organ music and the instruments for which it was written, in this case Pistoiese organs of the 18th and early 19th centuries. These deficiencies are addressed in the new edition, which is the basis for the discussion that follows.  

The present volume brings together all of Gherardeschi’s known compositions for organ, including some that have never been published. The pieces appear in the same order as in the manuscripts. Pineschi identifies several groupings by genre: 1. Sonatas; 2. Masses in C and D (Offertorio, Elevazione, and Postcommunio) and a Mass in E-flat that has versets for alternatim performance with the Ordinary; 3. Collections of versets; 4. Miscellaneous short pieces, including a colorful Sonata per organo a guisa di banda militare che suona una Marcia, two pastorales, and a fugue in G minor. Each piece has been assigned an opus number (a P followed by a number). Strict classification according to this scheme is impossible, however, since two of the sonatas (P.IV [1787]) are rondos and a number of the Mass movements (the Elevazione in D, P.I,5; the Offertorio in C, P.I,7) are sonatas. Elements of secular genres, including the concerto, aria, and symphony, also define and shape these pieces in a manner surely intended to entertain as well as sanctify the listeners.

Since the purpose of this article is to present an overview, rather than a comprehensive discussion, of Gherardeschi’s works, representative examples from each of the categories above will highlight important stylistic features of the music and the organs for which they were written, beginning with the sonatas. These all conform to the binary form and tonal design of the 18th-century keyboard sonatas of Domenico Scarlatti and others.

 

Offertorio, Mass in C: 

a representative work

The Offertory in an organ Mass is generally longer and more elaborate than other movements because it provides music during the preparation of the Eucharist. Gherardeschi takes advantage of these large dimensions by writing the Offertorio from the Mass in C as a sonata. The movement begins assertively with strong tonic chords in the left hand against clearly articulated right-hand rhythms in a 4-bar phrase. This antecedent phrase is answered by a consequent phrase in a reduced texture and registration, much like a dialogue between the tutti and solo parts of a concerto (Example 1). Indeed, Gherardeschi’s registration directions support this impression: initially, he calls for ‘[ri-]pieno con Trombe (trumpet)’ and ‘Timp[ano]’ in the pedal, which would be the equivalent of a full orchestra. The second phrase is labeled ‘p[ieno] senza ripieno [i.e., without the Trombe] e senza ped[ale]’. Without the trumpet (soloist) and pedal + timpani, the effect is of an echo. This alternation continues throughout both sections of the Offertorio. The texture is open, treble-dominated, and non-contrapuntal; occasional octaves in the manuals add a bit of dramatic emphasis at times. Harmonically, the music is predictable, with the first (A) section ending in the dominant key of G major. The B section opens in G minor, however, and moves to d, a, and F before returning via the dominant G to C.  

The energy, rhythmic drive, clear tonal design, and concerted style of the Offertorio reveal how steeped
Gherardeschi was in the music of Corelli, Vivaldi, and Sammartini. Written at the end of the 18th century, as Vienna and Paris were eclipsing Italy in the development of instrumental music, these pieces remind the listener of the connections among the various schools.

The concerto and symphony are not the only models for this music, however. Pineschi observes that the influence of opera and the theatre is clear in the Masses: “Indeed, the Offertori show the influence of the overture, the Elevazioni and the Benedizioni that of the romanza, while the Postcommunio echoes the always attractive spirit of the cabaletta; all, however, display whimsy, balanced proportions, and, above all, good taste.”⁶  

In fact, two of the three Masses in the collection, those in D and C, consist of exactly these movements, that is, Offertorio-Elevazione-Postcomunio. In modern usage, these may stand alone or be played in concert as a group of fast-slow-fast movements. The remaining Mass, in E-flat, is more complex because of versetti that alternate with chant. The Table of Mass movements summarizes the shape and content of the Messa in Elafá. One observes immediately the variety of tempos, meters, and registrations Gherardeschi uses in the versetti. The last aspect is the most important, for it tells us a great deal about the late 18th-century and early 19th-century Tuscan organ in general and the Pistoiese organ in particular. In this regard, the Mass resembles the other sets of versetti in the collection, all of which specify different stops as solos or in combinations.  

 

Registration

Gherardeschi frequently calls for “organo aperto” in his music. This means the complete Ripieno (Principale 8′, Ottava 4′, Decimaquinta 2′, Decimanona 11⁄3′, and two or three high-pitched ranks combined, the Vigesima seconda e sesta [1′, 2⁄3′] or seconda, sesta e nona [1′, 2⁄3′, ½′]), plus the Trombe (trumpet) 8′ and Cornetto.⁷ This combination, the equivalent of a full organ without flute stops, produces a clear and brilliant but not overpoweringly loud sound. “Pieno” refers to the complete or partial (i.e., 8′, 4′, 2′) Ripieno (Gherardeschi does not specify which). All the other combinations in the Messa call for specific principal and ‘da concerto’, i.e., solo, stops, including some divided stops (Musetto treble 8′; Clarone bass 4′; Trombe bass 8′). Stops divided between bass and treble registers have been a feature of Italian organs since at least 1664, when the Flemish Jesuit, Willem Hermans, built an organ for the church of Sant’Ignazio di Loyola (known in later times as “Spirito Santo” and since 1 February 2011, again as Sant’Ignazio) in Pistoia.⁸ They are advantageous on a small organ. In Pineschi’s words, “Gherardeschi’s clever use of the divided stops allows one to casually move from the bass section of the keyboard to the treble section and the other way round in such a way that the listener has no time to realize that.”⁹ He might have added that Gherardeschi must have possessed uncommon dexterity, given the lack of mechanical aids for registration changes and the fact that many of these occur in the middle of a piece. Perhaps he employed an assistant, maybe his son Luigi as organist-in-training. Pineschi suggests that these directions to change or add divided stops (which always occur at cadence points) reflect spontaneous changes made by Gherardeschi when he was improvising, as experienced organists did; the written version is for organists who were not as skilled or experienced in the art of improvisation.¹⁰

Of course, Gherardeschi’s registrations reflect and reinforce the character of individual versetti in the Messa; rhythms, tempos, and styles complete the picture. The first and last Gloria verses are of particular interest because they are cast as marches in duple meter with an abundance of dotted rhythms, repeated chords, triadic openings, trumpet-like solo lines, and liberal use of a “special effect” Timpano stop (from two to six wooden pipes, out of tune in such a way as to give a kettle-drum effect, operated by a pedal played by the right foot). The first Gloria verse begins with a fanfare in the manual accompanied by pedal and Timpano. In measure 5, another special effect (also played with the right foot), the Usignoli (Nightingale) stop, appears alternately with the timpani to simulate the trills of a clarinet¹¹ (Example 2a). Marches, whether for military bands or in concert music, were a common and popular musical genre in the 18th century.¹² As such, they connoted heroism, vigor, cheerfulness, and manliness.¹³ Gherardeschi was not the first composer to set the “Et in terra pax” couplet to a march; François Couperin had done that 100 years earlier in his Messe pour les couvents.¹⁴ Undoubtedly, the triumphal, affirmative nature of the text is a determining factor in the choice of musical style, but in the Messa there is more to the matter. Napoleon invaded Italy in 1790, defeating the Austrian army. The next 15 years were tumultuous ones in all the regions of the Italian peninsula, when French-initiated political and social reforms met with strenuous opposition from many Italians and the Church. The return of Austrian rule in 1815 after the Congress of Vienna, repressive as it was, was hailed as a return to order and normality.¹⁵ Gherardeschi composed his music against this backdrop of political turbulence amid constant reminders of a military presence. The Sonata . . . a guisa di banda militare even includes the “Janissary style” derived from Turkish military bands, a type of march in which cymbals, bass drum, and triangle are implied in the instrumentation (Example 2b, see page 28). Marches figured prominently in operas, symphonies,¹⁶ and secular keyboard music in the late 18th century, so it is not surprising to find them in organ music as well.

 

Versetti

In the preface of this volume, Pineschi lists the versetti as a third group after the sonatas and Masses. These works, though individually brief, are the most numerous and perhaps the most important for what they tell us about the Pistoiese organ of the time. There are two types of versetti, distinguished by their registrations. Versetti a pieno require the
[ri-]pieno, or full, sound, with only a tempo indicated at the beginning (the registration is implied) (Example 3a); versetti concertati require use of the ‘da concerto’ stops and have specific registrations provided at the beginning of each piece (Example 3b). From these, we learn the tonal design of the organs for which
Gherardeschi wrote his music.¹⁷ The ‘da concerto’ versetti are also labeled ‘solenni’, referring to their intended liturgical use in the Mass or other services, especially the Office of Vespers (e.g., the Magnificat). Versetti are written in all eight psalm tones, as one would expect. Interestingly, the versetti a pieno, P.II, are only figured basses; the organist must realize them in performance. Obviously this Baroque musical shorthand was still proving useful at the beginning of the 19th century.

 

Organs

Specifications for four organs that
Gherardeschi would have known appear in the preface to the Opere per organo. The first, by Hermans, was the prototype for the rest, which were built in the 1780s and ’90s by Antonio and Filippo Tronci and Pietro Agati. These instruments have been preserved and restored in Pistoia and Lucca. A similar organ built by Luigi and Benedetto Tronci in 1793 has been in the Cathedral in Pistoia since Pineschi rescued it from the chapel of the Rucellai villa, Campi Bisenzio (a small town between Prato and Florence), in 1998.  This is the instrument I played every day for five days in preparation for the Vespers performance. It is, amazingly, in its original condition. The specifications are as follows (For photos and audio clips of the Hermans and Tronci organs, visit The Diapason website,
Diapason.com>.):

 

Ripieno stops

Principale 8′ (first eight pipes are wood and play without drawing a stop because they are placed on a separate chest; the remaining pipes are tin, with C2 the major pipe of the façade)¹⁸

Ottava 4′

Decimaquinta 2′

Decimanona 11⁄3′

Vigesima seconda e sesta (1′, 2⁄3′)

 

‘Da concerto’ stops

Flauto 4′ (from C2)

Cornetto I (soprano 4′, 13⁄5′)

Cornetto II (soprano 22⁄3′)

Voce languente (the same as the Voce umana, soprano 8′)

 

Special effects: Timpano, Usignoli

Manual compass: 47 notes, C1–D5 with short octave at the bottom)

Pedals: eight notes (C–G), short octave, always coupled to manual

Divided registers between E3 and F3

 

As other writers have observed, having the ranks of the ripieno available as single stops (rather than as a multi-rank mixture stop) presents a multitude of registrational choices, many of which are subtly different. I enjoyed getting to know the sounds of all the stops individually and in various combinations. The Tronci keyboard has a uniform and light touch perfectly suited to the lively, graceful lines of 18th-century music. Using the short octave on both manual and pedal requires re-patterning of both cognitive and muscle memory. (What usually feels like a fifth is now a second, for example.) The short pedals are also quite different; one hardly needs organ shoes to play them, since only toes are used—heels remain on the floor. To sum up, playing an instrument like this, so different from a modern organ, requires total concentration, since all the senses—visual, auditory, kinesthetic—are involved in sometimes unfamiliar ways.

I hope this brief introduction—to the music of a composer who, in his own lifetime, was well known and highly respected in Tuscany, and to one of the organs he could have known—will encourage interest in both topics. This delightful, lively, and lovely music deserves to be better known on this side of the Atlantic. At present, the Opere per organo is only available from the editor, Umberto Pineschi, at . It is well worth the effort to obtain the book.