Facebook page with interesting organ information

[David Pinnegar]

Hi!

There's a group of organ professionals in the USA with a prediliction for ranting . . . who turn up some interesting information about organs from the darkest corners. . .

http://www.facebook.com/groups/172183246175497/?ref=ts

It's sad that the gems of information there will be buried in Facebook entries . . . but a couple of threads recently are worthy of more permanent discussion and scholarship.

It's worth keeping half an eye on the page and some issues go particularly to understanding important aspects of the instrument.

Best wishes

David P

Several of my esteemed colleagues have given presentations how Latin-school laws of rhetoric influenced the Preludia of Buxtehude, Lubeck, Bruhns, and their contemporaries. Each contrasting section was likened to fixed procedures for presenting and defending an argument. This isn't a new theory - in fact it was first postulated by Mattheson in the 18th Century. One of the best modern treatments of the topic is the doctoral dissertation by Leon Couch. He makes a serious attempt to address the questions of whether Mattheson actually talked any of this over with the composers he knew. It isn't conclusive, of course. Still, I've always smelled a rat here! Even if the composer did have these ideas in mind, what on earth does that tell us about how we should play them? Crouch even recorded a CD of this repertoire, and the accompanying program notes are a very annoying attempt to MAKE these pieces fit that pattern. So, how are the musical results? Sometimes, a grandiose cadential passage, complete with pedal - on obvious place for a big plenum - is relegated to a dinky Gedeckt with Tremulant. Other times, the music makes reasonable sense, and Couch is a good player. At a recent AGO regional, one of my other colleagues gave a presentation about Buxtehude works. Unfortunately, it was mostly a Here's This Piece - Then There's That Piece presentation, not addressing performance issues much. I asked about the rhetoric issue, and the presentor commented that that theory has been pretty well discredited. For my part, I never did believe the theory, but am curious to hear what players who play that repertoire REALLY convincingly - Stephen Tharp, for instance - think of the Mattheson rhetoric theory - and just HOW does that have a practical effect on their interpretations? Didn't these composers really just make a dramatic change just to keep it interesting after the previous idea seemed to have run its course?

Another is:

Olivia Ontko mentioned the organ of the Nieuwe Kerk in Amsterdam. One of the many interesting features of that organ is that it has a tremendous amount of doubling of ranks. In the Hoofdwerk (Great), the 16' Praestant goes to two ranks about midway up the compass. Other stops double even more. The 2' Octaaf in the Hoofdwerk has SIX pipes per note in the top octave. A few North American organs have this sort of doubling also. Examples include the Wolff organs at DePauw University and Christ Church Cathedral in Indianapolis. So, the questions, to start with anyway, are:
1) What is the purpose served by having two or more pipes per note on a single stop?
2) Does this create tuning problems between the two ranks?

Olivia Margaret Ontko I have used doubling in three ways: (1) to make a pitch more prominent, such as the doubling of a pitchbreak in a mixture. I always double either the 8' or the 4', never a higher pitch. (2) to achieve a richer texture without an increase in loudness, most often in the treble of an 8' Principal (3) not the same, but in trebles (above 8' D51) of reed stops I often use two flue pipes of principal scale, one at the stated pitch and one an octave above, to maintain both the power and the effective timbre of the tongued pipes. My general rule is to scale and voice both pipes exactly alike and place them next to each other on a common channel with one wind source. The pipes must be absolutely on speech and tuned together like a mixture. Never had a problem with pulling out of tune when done that way...
3) If not, how is the tuning problem prevented?

Rudy Zuiderveld: A couple years ago I visited with Gustav Leonhardt, who graciously took me to the Nieuwe Kerk in A'dam. It is the largest church (by interior space) in Holland. The huge number of doubled ranks were, perhaps, an attempt to address that problem.

Leonhardt suggested an interesting interpretation: the effect is like comparing a small group of singers and doubling their numbers to create a larger choir. The result is not additional loudness, but an additional bloom or fullness.

The truly magnificent effect of the organ is the doors slowly opening as it is played--provoking a feeling of majesty in this most royal of Dutch churches. The tourist crowd noticed, and felt the awe. The organ does not sound overwhelming or even loud, rather regal and grand, with contributions from the beautifully painted doors on the Palladian, theatrical case.

Two other brief insights into this question: with a group of students in 1981 we visited the de Swart (rest. Ahrens) organ in Leiden's Hooglandse Kerk--it has a doubled praestant, which added just a bit of fullness. The case plus doors have inspired the gallery organ of the St. Thomas Church, NYC--very beautiful, although a small instrument (perhaps ca. 20 stops). Interesting that the high Gothic Hooglandse kerk had a barrel vault installed that lowered the roof where the organ also is--I suppose to improve sound for listening to preaching.

In Groningen Martinikerk, the Kropwerk (above, against the ceiling) has a huge 3-rank Praestant by Schnitger. It is quite powerful, maybe even a bit much to my ears; but then the whole organ is overwhelming!

Rudy Zuiderveld
Jacksonville, Illinois

Timothy Tikker The French classic organbuilders had two kinds of mixtures, the Fournniture and Cymbale. however, it's clear from the treatises of the day that these were always meant to be used together. Doing so provided a good supply of doubling of pitches. Futhermore, Dom Bédos' instructions for tuning the principal chorus (Plein Jeu) call for drawing the entire chorus and tuning the whole lot, pipe by pipe, note by note. This would ensure that these doublings would be in tune when the two types of mixture were used together. BTW Koos van der Linde says that the 16th century Dutch mixtures were composed with a similar concept: low and high mixtures always meant yo be used together as their compositions were interdependent.