When one considers the large churches in the great
musical centers of northern Europe, it is remarkable to think that from
the 16th through the 18th centuries many had not just one single
magnificent organ placed in the west-end gallery, but a second, no less
glorious, if somewhat smaller, organ on another wall. The organists of
such churches commanded the resources afforded by two instruments of
seemingly limitless potential, often spatially removed from one another by
a considerable distance and each capable of playing the entire organ
repertoire of the period. These secondary instruments were generally
placed in side chapels and were most often used for smaller devotional
services; this was the case in Marienkirche in Lübeck, where Dieterich
Buxtehude served as organist from 1668 until his death in 1707. The church
had an organ of some 54 stops in the main balcony and one of around 40
stops in the so-called Totentanz chapel along the north side of the
building.
Another site of such abundance was Nicholaikirche in
Hamburg, home to not only the largest organ Arp Schnitger ever made but
another instrument of around 25 stops restored and rebuilt by him. The
smaller organ was sold to another church early in the 19th century and
subsequently disappeared; the large instrument fell victim to the great
Hamburg fire of 1842. Both of the organs Buxtehude once played at
Marienkirche were destroyed by Allied bombs a century later, in 1942.
When one tries to imagine what it must have been like to
be in one of these churches, an alluring scenario presents itself: Two
masters of the north German organ art, friends and colleagues, are seated
at the two organs, say, of Marienkirche, Lübeck. Suddenly, one organist
begins to play, perhaps the opening of a free-ranging toccata, perhaps an
elaboration of the first line of a well-known chorale tune, perhaps the
refrain of a popular song or dance. As the opening statement dies away and
the echo of a cadential chord rings down the church, the other player
responds. Thus the two disport themselves in spirited dialogue—a
cooperative musical exchange to be sure, but one with more than a hint of
competition in it as well.
Buxtehude counted among his friends Johann Adam Reincken,
the organist at Jacobikirche in Hamburg, one of the most important musical
posts in north Germany. It seems certain that Buxtehude visited Reincken
in Hamburg, and it is no less likely that Reincken stayed with Buxtehude
in Lübeck on occasion; a group portrait from 1674, now in Hamburg, shows
them gathered around a harpsichord. Is it possible that the two never took
the opportunity to fire organistic salvos at one another down the nave of
Marienkirche? Or that other members of the tightly knit organist
fraternity along the Baltic did not do the same?
Consider as well the two instruments that Jan
Pieterszoon Sweelinck had at his disposal in the Oude Kerk, Amsterdam.
Both organs—one of three manuals, the other of two—were built in the
middle of the 16th century but were not used in the divine service during
Sweelinck’s tenure there, due to Calvinist dictates against instrumental
music. It was in secular concerts, most famously for promenading city
fathers and wealthy businessmen, that organs were permitted to sound
forth.
Sweelinck taught an entire generation of north German
organists. Among his many pupils were the gifted trio of Samuel Scheidt,
Melchior Schildt, and Heinrich Scheidemann, all of whom went back to their
sponsor cities (Halle, Wolfenbüttel, and Hamburg, respectively) after
their studies in Amsterdam and then established themselves as three of the
finest organists of the period. Might Sweelinck have held forth at one
organ while a student answered him at the other? He would have had sound
pedagogical reasons for encouraging such games because they spurred
quickness of thought and helped develop acute hearing. Or might he and one
of his students have played the two instruments in the Oude Kerk together
in public concerts as a way of displaying the musical and fiscal wealth of
Amsterdam in its Golden Age?
The Memorial Church at Stanford University, a space as
grand and reverberant as that of the Oude Kerk, also has two
mechanical-action organs within its walls. The large four-manual
instrument in the gallery draws on the legacy of the north-German 17th
century; the smaller one, which usually resides in a side chapel but can
be wheeled to the front of the church below the altar, is a fiery consort
instrument, a Renaissance organ on the cusp of the Baroque. Both are in a
mean-tone temperament and are at the same pitch. By using two separate
pairs of stereo channels during the recording and mixing process, we have
tried to give the listener a sense of the spatial remove of the organs
that, along with the varied sonorities each instrument offers, makes
playing in dialogue such a challenging and rewarding endeavor. The
Stanford church and its instruments, along with the recording technology
employed, are ideal for re-creating the excitement of two 17th-century
organs and organists in colloquy.
With this under-explored historical possibility in mind,
the music on the present recording is drawn from composers who at some
point in their careers would have had access to a church with two organs.
Variations such as Sweelinck’s setting of the drinking song More
Palatino, Scheidt’s no less raucous treatment of the popular Bergamasca
tune, and Schildt’s swift-moving Gleich wie das Feuer are all readily
divided between two organs. Scheidemann’s lively Galliarda ex D—a
piece that reflects the composer’s charm and wit—is also in the
secular vein, and shows again that Sweelinck, a virtuoso of variation
technique, taught his students well. These secular pieces made up a
fitting repertoire for the decidedly non-sacred duties of the Oude Kerk
organs, but would also have been suitable for the home churches of
Sweelinck’s German students, at least when they were played outside of
the service and when the more austere of the resident Lutheran clerics
were elsewhere.
Along with dances and songs, chorale tunes provide a
bountiful source for tandem improvisation. Thus we have apportioned the
sprawling fantasia on Christ lag in Todesbanden by Franz Tunder—Buxtehude’s
predecessor at Marienkirche—between Stanford’s two organs as a kind of
commemoration of the lost instruments of Marienkirche and the musicians
who played them. Our version of Buxtehude’s great Toccata in D Minor
makes a similar tribute, and, as a pendant to the Toccata in G Major by
his friend Reincken, exemplifies the skill, imagination, and boundlessness
of the north German organ art.
Of course, two masters would certainly have taken the
time to play extraordinary solo works for each other as well. In doing so,
they would have impressed upon each other their own unique powers of
invention, expression, and grandeur of conception. Thus we have included
Schildt’s plaintive Paduana Lachrymae and Scheidt’s monumental In te,
Domine, speravi as solo compositions. But even here, the two masters would
have come to a better understanding of each other, further developing a
spirit of freedom that would have encouraged them to play against each
other across vast spaces and that has encouraged us to revisit such past
glories.
– David Yearsley