Germany Enters—Organs, Organists and Organ Works
It is rather hard to believe that the largest of all instruments, the
pipe organ, is a descendant of Pan’s Pipes, played by the shepherds on
the hillsides of ancient Greece, is it not? The pipes of the church
organ of today are of different lengths and are built on the same
principle as were the pipes of Pan, our goat-footed friend, who broke
off the reeds by the bank of a stream way back when the world was young,
to pour out his grief in music for his lost love, Syrinx.
The next step was to supply the organ pipes with wind so they could be
made to produce tones without blowing on each one separately. A wooden
box was invented, and each pipe inserted into a hole in the top of the
box, which is still called the wind-chest. At first this was supplied
with air by two attendants who blew into tubes attached to the
wind-chest. Soon the tubes were replaced by bellows, and were worked
with the arms, and as the instrument grew larger, with the feet like in
a treadmill. An organ is spoken of in the Talmud as having stood in the
Temple of Jerusalem, and the hydraulic (water) organ in which air was
supplied to the pipes by means of water power was built in Alexandria,
Egypt, about the year 250 B.C. The small organ with keys that could be
carried from place to place was called a portative (from the Latin
_porto_—to carry); the larger organ sometimes stationary and sometimes
moved on wheels was called a positive. The levers needed to produce the
sound were soon exchanged for keyboards which at first had only a few
keys, and you may remember our telling how the keys were pounded with
the fists and elbows, in the Winchester organ.
A Greek writer of the 4th century A.D. gives us a vivid description of
an organ: “I see a strange sort of reeds—they must methinks have sprung
from no earthly, but a brazen soil. Wild are they, nor does the breath
of man stir them, but a blast, leaping forth from a cavern of oxhide,
passes within, beneath the roots of the polished reeds.”
It is not known just when the organ was first used in the churches, but
there are records of its having been known in Spanish churches as early
as the 5th century A.D. Pope Vitalian introduced it in Rome in 666, and
in the 8th century in England, organ-building became a very popular
profession. Cecil Forsyth says: “In those days a monk or bishop who
wished to stand well with society could not take up essay-writing or
social-welfare: what he could do was to lay hands on all the available
timber, metal, and leather, and start organ-building.”
Pepin, the father of Charlemagne, imported an organ into Compiègne,
France, from Byzantium in the 8th century. Charlemagne had it copied at
Aix-la-Chapelle. The Arabians must have been organ-builders, too, for
one of their most famous rulers, Haroun-al-Raschid, sent Charlemagne a
pneumatic organ noted for its soft tone. The instruments made in Germany
and France up to the 10th century were small and unpretending, but were
objects of astonishment and curiosity.
In Magdeburg, in the 11th century, we find the first keyboard with keys
3 inches broad. In 1120, we hear of an organ in the Netherlands that had
2 manuals (keyboards) and pedals. Organ-building was growing up! In the
14th century the manuals of many organs had 31 keys.
The organ was not always accepted in the church, for in the 13th century
its use was regarded as scandalous just as the English Puritans in the
17th century called it a “squeaking abomination,” and it is not even now
admitted in the Greek Catholic Church!
Until the 14th century, the organ had been used only in a most primitive
way to guide the singers of plain-song. It became a solo instrument when
it was possible to grade its tone from soft to loud, which was done by
the invention and use of three manuals: the upper one played “_full
organ_” (very loud); the middle, the _discant_ (softest), played a
counterpoint to the subject; the subject was played on the lowest
keyboard.
So we see how one invention led to another until the organ became an
instrument of almost unlimited possibilities, and how keyed instruments
had shown the composers how to develop music along new lines. By the end
of the 16th century, organ compositions and organ-playing had made rapid
progress all over Europe, and you will recall the great organists in all
the churches and cathedrals in the Netherlands, in England, Italy,
France, Spain, and even in Germany which up to this time had not been on
the “musical map.” (Chapter XI).
Are you wondering why we have gone back into “ancient history” at this
point, or have you already discovered that these grand old organists are
leading us directly Bach-ward?
FRESCOBALDI
Just a century before Bach’s time, the greatest of all Italian
organists, Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583–1644), was born at Ferrara, Italy.
So popular was he, that he filled the vast Cathedral of St. Peter’s,
whenever he played. His compositions were the most important produced
for organ in the early 17th century, and his fugues were the first to be
treated in modern fashion, in form, fancy, and feeling for tone color,
and were a foundation on which Bach’s were built. His compositions
include _canzones_, _toccatas_, _ricercari_, and numerous pieces in the
popular dance forms. Most of these are found in two collections
published for _cembalo e organo_ (spinet and organ). He was not
interested in opera, but went his own musical way expressing himself in
an original and individual language far ahead of his period. With
Frescobaldi, Italy ceased to be the world’s center for organists.
GERMAN ORGANISTS
At this point, Germany came into the musical field, and soon became the
artistic center of organ-playing. Up to this time, the country had
produced less music than any of its neighbors: Italy had written the
greatest Church music, and invented opera; France had followed closely
in Italy’s footsteps; the Low Countries had helped in music’s growth by
their early work in polyphony and had taught all Europe including
Germany; England had led the world in her compositions for virginals and
harpsichord, the forerunners of piano music. Although Germany did not at
first rank musically with these countries, the religious fervor and
devotion to the cause of Protestantism bore fruit in the grand chorales
of Luther. In these we find the birth of German music destined to rule
the world for two centuries, the 18th and the 19th, just as the Italian
had in the 16th and the 17th. The religious inspiration, the direct
simplicity and sincerity of the chorales are the qualities found in the
works of the first great German composer, Johann Sebastian Bach!
The religious wars of the first half of the 17th century crushed almost
all the music out of Germany. In the second half, the organists became
the leaders, and their music for organ inspired by the chorale was the
first real contribution that Germany made to the growth of music.
One of the earliest of these German organists was Johann Jacob Froberger
(1605–1667), of Saxony, who was a pupil of Frescobaldi, and court
organist at Vienna. He went to London (1662), and as he was robbed on
the way, he arrived penniless. He found work as organ-blower at
Westminster Abbey. On the occasion of Charles II’s marriage, he overblew
the bellows and interrupted the playing, which so enraged the organist
Christopher Gibbons, son of Orlando, that he struck him. Poor Froberger!
But he had a chance to redeem himself, for he sat down to the organ a
few moments later, and started to improvise in a manner for which he was
famous in Vienna. A former pupil of his, recognizing his style, was
overjoyed to find him, and presented him to the King. He was invited to
play on the harpsichord which he did to the astonishment of every one.
A Dutch organist, Johann Adam Reinken (1623–1722) and a Dane, Dietrich
Buxtehude (1637–1707) belong to this school, as they lived in Germany
most of their lives and worked along the lines the Germans were
developing. Reinken was a pupil of Frescobaldi; he had a direct
influence on Bach who often walked from Lüneburg to Hamburg to hear the
far-famed organist. When Reinken was 99 years old he heard Bach
improvise on his Chorale “By the Waters of Babylon,” which drew from him
the praise, “I thought that this art was dead, but I see that it still
lives in you.”
ABSOLUTE MUSIC
It is very probable that had Buxtehude not lived, Bach would have
written his organ works in a different style, so deeply did the younger
composer study the older man’s compositions. Buxtehude was organist in
Lüneburg and there he started a series of concerts which became so
popular that they were continued into the 19th century. Bach walked
fifty miles to hear Buxtehude play, but was too shy to make himself
known to the great man; it was probably to hear one of the concerts
which had the poetic name of _Abendmusik_ (Evening Music), that he went.
Buxtehude was one of the first to try to make instrumental music stand
as music (a language in itself), without a dance form, a plain-song or
chorale or poetic idea behind it, to act as a Biblical text does in a
sermon. This music for music’s sake is called “Absolute Music” and Bach
was one of its strongest disciples. Absolute music, which was so
beautifully handled by Buxtehude, became the basis of the Classic School
of the 18th and early 19th centuries.
The organ chorale prelude which was so important a musical form during
this period had a very interesting history. Today the organist in our
churches plays the hymn through before it is sung; he plays it quite
simply just as it is written in the Hymnal, but in the day of these old
German organists, the artistic feeling was deeper, and the organist was
allowed to weave the chorale or hymn into a beautiful and complete
composition. But in his love of composing and of showing how many
different ways he could decorate the chorale, he often exceeded his time
limit, and the chorale prelude was left behind. In its place the organ
fantasia and the sonata appeared.
Johann Pachelbel (1653–1706), of Nüremberg, was a pupil of another
celebrated director and organist, Johann Kaspar Kerl (1628–1693), who
was said to be one of the best teachers of composition of his day. There
were also three German organists born late in the 16th century, all of
whom were followers of the famous Dutch composer Jan Sweelinck. They
were known as the “three S’s”—Heinrich Schütz was the greatest of them.
He wrote organ music, but also worked out a scheme for combining the
chorale with the ideas of Peri and Caccini for use with Bible texts in
the Lutheran Church. This was called Passion music and was originally
written for Good Friday. On this foundation Bach built some of his
grandest oratorios. The Italian influence came into Schütz’s work while
he was a pupil of Gabrieli in Venice. Johann Heinrich Schein was a
Cantor at St. Thomas’ School before Bach, and wrote many chorales. The
third of the “three S’s” was Samuel Scheidt who was called the German
Frescobaldi. “What plain-song was to Palestrina and his school, the
chorale was to Schütz and his followers.” (Quoted from Charles Villiers
Stanford.)
THE INVENTOR OF THE SONATA AND OF “PROGRAM MUSIC”
Johann Kuhnau (1660–1722), wrote many compositions which today we find
very amusing! For his day, however, he must have been looked upon as
ultra-modern! The composition which first brought him into public notice
was a motet, written for the election of the town council. Could you
imagine anyone writing a serious composition for an election today, or
anyone willing to listen to it at the polls? He was organist of St.
Thomas’, in Leipsic, a graduated lawyer, master of several languages,
writer of satirical poems, musical director of the University, and
finally Cantor in two Churches. He was admired and honored after his
death as one of the greatest musicians of his day and one of the most
learned men. He invented a style of music for the clavier which he
called Sonata. It was in several movements and was not based on dance
tunes as were the suites. While it was not in the form that later was
known as sonata-form, it was a sign-post pointing the way. Seven of
these sonatas he named _Fresh Clavier Fruit_! And it was fresh in style
as well as in name.
He was the first German composer to write “program music,” that is the
kind which tries to tell a story, or to imitate the actual sounds of
natural objects, such as the crash of thunder, the motion of a windmill,
the rocking of a cradle, and the cackling of a hen. You can see how long
a list one might make and how easy it would be for anyone with a vivid
imagination to make up all sorts of pictures in music. This is just the
opposite from music for music’s sake which we described to you as
“Absolute Music,” and most of it which follows this period when music
comes of age can be put into one of the two camps,—the Program Music
Camp, or the Absolute Music Camp.
Kuhnau’s program music took a queer turn! He was living at a time when
religion was uppermost in every one’s thoughts, when the Bible stories
were bedtime stories and when the leading compositions were the sonatas
written for organ. So in 1700 he published six Biblical-history Sonatas.
In _David and Goliath_, he attempts to put into music the rude defiance
and bravado of the giant; the fear of the Hebrews; David’s courage and
fearlessness, and the battle and fall of the giant; the flight of the
Philistines (can’t you imagine how the composer would represent this
with all kinds of runs and scales?); the joy of the Hebrews; the
celebration of the women who probably came out to meet David “with
timbrels and harps”; and general jubilation.
At the end of the 17th century, Germany was strongly under the influence
of France and Italy, especially in opera. In Dresden, Berlin, Munich and
Vienna, one heard only opera in Italian sung by Italian singers, but
Hamburg tried to develop a national music by giving German opera sung by
German singers, and attracted many serious musicians. Johann Mattheson
(1681–1764) a singer, conductor and composer, is remembered chiefly for
a book called _A German Roll of Honor_, in which he gathered up all the
information he could find about German composers up to his time. He
asked all the living composers to write accounts of themselves for his
book, so we take it for granted that it must be truthful!
Music had changed more in the 17th century than in any that had gone
before. If we tried to sum it all up in one word we should say that it
was a century of _transition_ or the passage from one condition to
another. It began with the old Ecclesiastical, or Church, modes, and
ended with the major and minor scales which we still use today; the
reign of counterpoint was over, and now had to share the throne on equal
terms with harmony.
SONATA-FORM
The dominating musical form after Bach’s time was to be the Sonata, a
name we have often used. The sonata which found its champions in Haydn,
Mozart and Beethoven, was the child of the sonata written by D.
Scarlatti, Kuhnau, and Bach and his sons. It is built on the principle
of contrast as were the suites. A sonata is a collection of three or
four related pieces called movements: one, fast—one, slow—then fast. If
in four movements, the first is moderately fast; the second, very slow;
the third, fast (scherzo); the fourth fast (usually rondo form).
Sonata-form is the name given to the first movement of a sonata, a
string quartet, trio, quintet, etc., concerto or a symphony. It has two
main themes which are announced, then developed and then re-announced,
forming three contrasting sections or panels: _Statement_ or
_Exposition_, _Development_, and _Restatement_. From now on, when we
speak of _sonata-form_, this picture should come to you.
The stage is now all set for Bach and those who came after him.
Music Has Grown Up