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MUSIC FOR SPECIAL ORGANS There has always been a great deal of experimentation in organ building. One reason for this may be that there is a multitude of possibilities for producing and combining notes; but another is the uniqueness of each instrument, which makes every builder an inventor at the same time. The history of the organ takes us back to antiquity, when the inventor Ctesibius of Alexandria developed the ‘hydraulis’ in 246 BCE. The instrument caused bronze pipes to sound via wind pressure, using water to keep that pressure even. In Roman times, such organ sounds – which were considered entirely worldly – accompanied the bloodthirsty shows in the arena; it was only in the Byzantine Empire that the instrument, now developed further, was used for high ceremonies, which ultimately paved the way for its absorption by the church. The particularity of the organ is that one can create different pitches, sounds and dynamics on the same keys with the aid of different registers or stops. A register consists of a rank of pipes with a uniform construction and timbre that can be coupled with a manual. Normally the lowest pipe has a length of eight feet (one foot = c. 30 cm); if one plays the note C, then exactly this C comes out. A 16’ register accordingly sounds an octave lower, as each pipe is twice as long as with the 8’ register – and a 4’ register then sounds an octave higher. There are also registers that produce intervals of a fifth or a third. The timbre can be influenced by the different construction of pipe ranks: one distinguishes between labial pipes, which have lips and produce recorder-like sounds, and lingual pipes, which have reeds and produce sounds in a similar manner to the clarinet. Labial pipes can be closed at the top, which transposes the note down an octave; these are also given the name ‘Gedackt’. The possibilities of a register are virtually endless: tremulants make the tone vibrate, while effect registers can evoke timpani, thunder, glockenspiels or other sounds, and some organ builders have invented joke registers like the ‘Rauschwerk’ at Ratzeburg Cathedral, where pulling out the stop opens a drawer containing a bottle of whisky. As every organ has different registers, it is up to the organist to find the most appropriate combinations for each work they play. On the other hand, composers can make use of this very uniqueness in order to conceive their works for very specific organs and their peculiarities. The present CD features works composed and performed by Hans Eugen Frischknecht, who went a step further and designed his compositions for very particular organs: instruments in meantone temperament, quartertone instruments and the ‘wind-dynamic’ organs of the INNOV-ORGAN-UM project. Modern keyboard instruments in Western countries are mostly tuned in equal temperament, meaning that all semitones are intervallically equal, being exactly 100 cents apart from their neighbours. This has some disadvantages, however, as the intervals are all slightly impure in comparison to the pure, ‘just’ intervals of the harmonic series. And before this tuning became the rule, keyboard instruments were tuned in just intonation, following the frequency ratios of the different intervals discovered by Pythagoras. This practice was soon abandoned, because the frequency ratios were always tied to just one basic key: modulating from one key to another was almost impossible, as the intervals based on the new fundamental would sound highly impure, and thus ‘wrong’. This was partly alleviated by meantone temperament, which was the norm from the 16th to the 18th century: it was based on pure thirds, but with slightly narrowed fifths. So modulations were possible, but only for a limited number of keys. It was only with certain late Baroque temperaments that unrestricted modulation between all twenty-four keys became possible, which led J. S. Bach to create his masterpiece The Well-Tempered Clavier, with preludes and fugues proceeding through all twenty-four keys – or rather, enabled him to do so at all. It was only a small step from well-tempered intonation to today’s equal temperament. The trick was to cleverly spread the impurities over all the notes, making them almost imperceptible to the ear. To enable modulation to distant tonalities in meantone temperament, some instrument builders inserted additional black keys. This resulted in the division of black keys: the lower half of a key could be used to play E flat, for example, and the upper half to play D sharp, with roughly a fifth of a tone between them. Some instrumental also had (slightly smaller) black keys between B and C and between E and F. In his compositions for the meantone organ, Hans Eugen Frischknecht draws on precisely these split keys to relish the contrasts between the different sub-semitones. The dawn of the 20th century saw countless innovations; there were dreams of progress and modernity. In music too, people wanted to explore new paths and break out of all existing norms. While the composers of Arnold Schönberg’s Second Viennese School took the step into free atonality without any fixed harmonic centre, and from there sought ways to connect the twelve chromatic pitches, others were not satisfied with the normal supply of intervals. Ferruccio Busoni had a harmonium with third-tones built in order to explore in-between harmonies, whereas Béla Bartók and Charles Ives employed quartertones to enrich their compositions. Alois Hába became famous in this field for his experiments with even smaller intervals, going further to sixth- and twelfth-tones and even inventing new instruments to realise his sonic ideas. While microtones can easily be realised on fretless string instruments, keyboard instruments are restricted to the fixed pitches of the respective keys. To go beyond the usual array of pitches, quartertone instruments have been built, with twenty-four keys per octave; in the German-speaking countries, there are organs in parishes in Zurich, Basel, Bern and Hamburg that can play quartertones. Experiments in organ building are still continuing in the 21st century. The project INNOV-ORGAN-UM has set itself the task of enabling dynamic changes after pressing a key. Together with the south German organ builder Peter Kraul, the organist Daniel Glaus has so far developed three prototypes. This enable different variations in wind pressure, causing increases and decreases in volume. At the same time, however, the pitch also changes. When the keys are pressed lightly, a tail valve opens a windchest through which air flows into the pipes with constant pressure. If the key is depressed to a certain depth, which can be changed via the action, it gradually – depending on the exact depth – also activates a conical valve. This leads to a second windchest whose pressure can be varied. Higher pressure leads here to louder dynamics, and with some pipes can also lead to overblowing. Foot bellows and kicks also affect the wind pressure, which can be read from a metre at the side. With a reduction of finger pressure, the pitch falls in a glissando of sorts until the note falls apart into its overtones. The wind pressure particularly affects the overblowing registers, where the air column in the pipes vibrates not as a whole, but in parts; depending on the pressure, the note switches from the fundamental to the octave, or even higher. The prototypes developed by INNOV-ORGAN-UM also have a register with the name ‘Aeolian harp’, which is positioned slightly too high; because of this, the wind cuts across the edges of pipes that have no labium. This produces flute-like ‘wind tones’, blowing sounds on fixed pitches. A further INNOV-ORGAN-UM prototype is found in Biel parish church: the Metzler company from Dietikon (Switzerland) designed an instrument with three conventional manuals and one wind-dynamic one based on the principles of prototypes 2 and 3. This enables the organist to confront the timbres of the different manuals. In his pieces and pictures for the ‘special organs’, Frischknecht deals closely with the characteristics of the respective instruments and highlights their peculiarities. They are mostly fairly short works underlining certain aspects of the instruments. One could draw parallels to earlier forms like preludes or toccatas: these were used to ‘explore’ the instruments, to playfully examine their individual traits and to convey them both to the player and the listener. Oliver Fraenzke Translation: Wieland Hoban THE ORGANS When organs are built today, the builders often follow historical examples. The Choir Organ at Nydegg Church in Bern was built on the model of Italian Baroque organs. The organ is tuned in meantone temperament and has split keys for G sharp /A flat and D sharp / E flat. Different prototypes were developed in the project INNOV-ORGAN-UM. Prototype 2 has a range of two octaves. The stops are: Gedackt 8’ Principal 4’ Gedackt-fifth 2 2/3’ – overblowing* (fifth 8’ with low wind pressure, third 1 3/5’ with high wind pressure) This was followed by Prototype 3, with three manuals and a range of five octaves. The stops are: Principal 8’ Gedackt 8’ Flute (overblowing) 4’ (low wind pressure: 8’) Gedackt-fifth (overblowing) 2 2/3’ (low wind pressure: 8’) Gedackt-third (overblowing*) 1 3/5’ (low wind pressure: 2 2/3’, very low wind pressure: 8’) Aeolian harp (this produces mostly an air sound; the pitch is only faintly embedded in the air sound) These registers can be used with the first and third manuals. The first manual has conical valves built in, the third has tail valves. The second manual is a coupling manual. The two prototypes were used with the Biel Parish Church organ for the recording and were later transferred to Bern Minster. The fourth manual of the new Organ in Biel Parish Church is wind-dynamic, and has the following stops: Flute 8’ Principal 4’ Fifth 2 2/3’ Third 1 3/5’ Aeolian harp
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