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On Teaching

October 26, 2012
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Organ Method II

This is the first part—roughly the first half—of an Introduction designed to orient the beginning student to the instrument itself: what an organ is, what it feels like to sit at the console and begin to play, what you have to know in order not to find the initial experience of the organ overwhelming. One of my own earliest attempts to practice organ has always served as a caution to me. I was about thirteen years old, and I had arranged with a nearby church to practice on their organ. I had barely played at all prior to my first visit there. Of course, they were being quite nice and supportive to let me use the instrument. When I got there, I turned the key and got the instrument going. I started trying to play. No matter how few stops I put on—and I was trying to be quiet—the sound stayed the same: rather loud. I concluded that the organ was broken, and I was scared to death that I might have broken it. I turned everything off, left, and later called to tell my contact at the church that the instrument was broken, trying to tell the story in a way that made it look like I hadn’t done it. Of course, in fact, someone had simply left the crescendo pedal a little bit on. I had never heard of a crescendo pedal, so I panicked. I always hope to spare other beginners experiences like that. The Introduction is just a brief run-through of some concepts that I think the student should bear in mind before beginning to play. The last section of the book will be a more thorough discussion of organ history, types of organs, developments in organ repertoire, and so on. An important part of that section will be suggestions for further study, since of course what we know about the organ and its history keeps expanding and changing. As always, I strongly welcome any feedback. 

 

Introduction: the instrument

What is the organ? The answer to this question is surprisingly elusive. No student should expect to come up with a definitive answer, when no experienced professional can; every student, especially one new to the instrument, should  think about it, and can confidently expect to find thinking about it fascinating and absorbing. 

The word “organ” and its equivalent in other languages—orgue, orgel, órgano, and so on—has been used for many centuries and in many parts of the world to denote a musical instrument. That musical instrument has changed—evolved—over the centuries, and has also differed, to some extent, in different parts of the world. This evolution and these differences have been substantial: probably as substantial as the process that led from the harpsichord to the piano, or from the shawm to the oboe. In the case of the organ, however, its name has not changed. (Here’s why the name has not changed: because the biggest and most striking organs are solid, immovable objects that cost a lot and that in part define the spaces that they inhabit. Changes in organs have usually been sold as improvements, upgrades, updatings, or even restorations, no matter how new or innovative the content of those changes was, not as new instruments. New developments in smaller, portable instruments—a new action type in a stringed keyboard instrument, or a new kind of bore in a double-reed instrument—have usually been sold as new instruments.) A definition seems impossible: it is a challenge to find any one thing to say that is categorically true of all organs. Description, however, is possible, if it is flexible enough to encompass all of this magnificent variety. So, the organ is:

1) A musical instrument. This is obvious: it’s what we are talking about. Maybe it is not even worth mentioning, except that it is one of only two things that we can mention that are really true of all organs. The second one is that it is:

2) A keyboard instrument. In fact, even this is not quite universal. There have been barrel organs and other mechanically operated organs—organs that play themselves. However, for someone coming to study organ, someone who wants to learn to play, we can assume that it is a keyboard instrument that we are talking about.

3) An instrument with a pedal keyboard. The pedal keyboard has been a characteristic of the organ for a very long time indeed, but it has never been universal. It would be unusual nowadays (but not necessarily actually wrong) for someone who could not play the pedals at all to describe himself or herself as an “organist”. However, over the centuries many organs have been built without pedal keyboards, and something like (very roughly) half of the organ repertoire consists of pieces that do not need pedals.

4) A wind instrument. For many centuries all of the instruments that were considered “organs” were ones in which the sound came about through the application of wind. Some sorts of pipes—wooden or metal, with or without moving parts, similar in their ways of producing sound to wind instruments such as flutes or to reed instruments such as clarinets or oboes—were set up ready to receive a breath of wind—not from human lungs, but from some type of bellows system. This was then delivered to the correct pipes, through one sort of mechanism or another, when a player pushed a key. However, beginning in the early twentieth century, inventors began to create ways of making sound through electricity without the use of wind, which were then gathered under the umbrella of the organ. In the early twenty-first century, a large proportion of the organs in use have no pipes and use no wind: they are one sort or another of electronic organ, most creating sound through the use of computer technology. Many but not all of these electronic organs are explicitly intended by their makers to imitate the sounds of pipe organs. 

(Of course, the electronic organ has always been a source of controversy. If it is in theory trying to sound like a pipe organ, how well does it succeed? Is the sound as beautiful and stirring as the sound of a pipe organ? Is it artistically appropriate to play organ repertoire from before the era of the electronic organ on such an instrument? Does it offer any advantages—portability, more stable tuning, an even greater variety of sounds? And so on. One interesting point about these controversies is that they are new to recent decades only in their details. All changes in organ design over hundreds of years—and change has been the only constant—have met with both condemnation and adulation, and everything in between.)

5) An instrument with “stops”. That is, an instrument with discrete different sounds that can be used separately or in various combinations. This is highly characteristic of the organ, and essentially every organ beyond the very smallest is set up this way. Of everything that we have so far listed here, it might be the closest to a definition, or at least to a thread binding together all of the instruments that have been accepted as “organs” over the years. It is not quite universal: there are organs small enough that they make only one sound—that is, they have only one stop, so the business of combining stops does not apply. It is also not found only in the organ. Harpsichords also have stops, for example. However, the concept of stops and the combining of stops is essential to the artistic task of playing the organ. With most musical instruments, the player has one basic sound available, but has the ability to shape the nature of that sound somewhat, through dynamics or other means. With the organ, the player has several or, usually, many different sounds available. However, the ability to shape the nature of any given sound is limited. 

6) A place. More than any other musical instrument, a pipe organ is part of the architecture, part of the substance of the structure where it lives. Very few organs move around. Those that do are very small and not designed to play very much of the organ repertoire: they are valid organs, but they are not the most characteristic. Organists can feel enveloped by the instrument. The organ, rather than the room or the building, is where they are when they are playing. And if the instrument is an essential part of the architecture, then the architecture is also part of the instrument. The acoustics of the room in which it is found are always part of the sound of an organ, and the layout of the instrument in the room can dictate things about how it can best be used. 

7) A technological marvel. In the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance large church organs—fully mechanical with several keyboards and many stops—were at least candidates for the most advanced and intricate technology that had yet been developed. The history of the development of technology for the organ—key and stop action, and pipe design—moves in sync with the overall history of technology, including the application of electricity and of computer-driven functions. 

8) Whatever you the student think it is or want it to be. Why are you studying organ? Did you fall in love with the sounds? If so, were they of one particular organ, or a type, or a wide variety? (It could be even one particular stop.) Is it repertoire that draws you to the instrument? If so, what repertoire? A piece? A composer? An era? A variety of things? Is it the sense of power? That is a bit facetious, but also real: an organist at even a fairly small organ commands more sounds and a greater range of dynamics than any other performer: it is not even close. That can be intoxicating, and, since it is not harmful, there is no reason that we should not enjoy that intoxication. Is it a place—a place where you have heard organ music, whether a church or a concert hall or a practice studio? Is it an inspiring performer or teacher or friend? Is it a connection to one of the religious practices that make use of organ music? Try not to forget what drew you to the instrument and what makes you love it—especially if the hours of practicing ever threaten to seem long. At the same time, try to be open to discovering all of the sides of the organ. 

With all of this variety, how do we get started? 

I will end the excerpt here, because it is a fairly logical stopping place. Next month’s excerpt will begin with keyboard and stop control layout, and go on from there. It will discuss the beginnings of registration, and practice habits.

 

 

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