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Reflections on Life as an Organist

February 1, 2003
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Introduction

Robert Noehren will celebrate his 91st birthday on the
16th of this month. He has enjoyed an unusual musical career and is perhaps the
only serious organist in history who became an organ builder and skillful
voicer as well. This past year witnessed the release of a remastered CD of his
recordings on the large organ he built for St. John's Cathedral in Milwaukee
(The Robert Noehren Retrospective, Lyrichord LYR-CD-6005) and the book, An
Organist's Reader: Essays (Harmonie Park Press). He was for many years chairman
of the organ department and University Organist at the University of Michigan,
has made more than 40 recordings, authored numerous articles, and built more
than 20 organs throughout the United States.

Once upon a time when I was about seven or eight years old,
my father asked me if I should like to take piano lessons. I can't remember
that I was very happy with the prospect. My play hours after school with
baseball and my bicycle seemed pretty precious to me those days. My father was
a family doctor, and one of his patients was an attractive young lady, I doubt
that she was over 21 years old, who was beginning a career as a piano teacher.
She lived a long way from home, and I had to take a streetcar many miles to her
studio. Well, with much persuasion I began my lessons. After two or three
sessions it became obvious that there wasn't much rapport between my teacher
and me. She was very strict and was determined that from the beginning I would
have to maintain a hand position which was just so. I guess in most
circumstances there is nothing wrong with that, but I felt I was being put in a
strait jacket. We worked together at each hand alone, but all my efforts seemed
to trouble her even when I tried to play a very simple series of notes with one
hand alone. We struggled on, and it seemed like weeks before we tried anything
with two hands together. I had decided by this time that my coordination was
poor, and I felt very clumsy. Piano was not for me. I practiced just as little
as I could get by with. The whole year passed and, so far as my music was
concerned, it was an unhappy one. I constantly fretted about my lessons and
wanted to go back to baseball wholeheartedly.

Late in the spring I was getting off the streetcar on the
way to my lesson when I was struck by an automobile and run over. By some
miracle the wheels of the car missed any part of my body. I stood up almost
immediately and, except for some scratches, seemed to be quite unhurt. I even
continued on to my lesson. Needless to say, my parents were terribly upset when
they heard of the accident, and at this point it was not difficult for me to
persuade them that I should give up music.

The summer passed and a few weeks after school had begun
again, my father gently approached me telling me he had another patient who was
a piano teacher living very close to our home, and would I like to try again? I
must have been in a very receptive mood, for I said, "why not." This
woman was one of two maiden ladies who had a studio together. Each had her own
class of students. The one who was to be my teacher was named Clara Schwarb.
Again I began lessons, but this time it was quite a different story. Miss
Schwarb had a very attractive way with children, and I liked her at once. In
fact, she made a serious effort to interest me in music. I can no longer recall
the details of our lessons, but I do remember that she spent some time at each
lesson telling me about the great composers and assigned me little pieces which
they had written. I began to respond with enthusiasm and after only a few weeks
had passed I was playing rather difficult pieces for a beginner such as
Träumerei of Robert Schumann. Miss Schwarb was not very strict, nor was
she very critical. She did not slap my hand as had the first teacher, and did
not even try to correct wrong notes. And she had such a happy disposition. I
soon looked forward with much pleasure to my lessons and, I believe, by the end
of that year had already made up my mind to become a musician. I remember Miss
Schwarb with affection and owe a great deal of gratitude to her for her
patience and persuasion.

I have never ceased to wonder about talent. Perhaps
sometimes the teacher has more talent than the student. In any event, my
strange introduction to music may give us something to think about and perhaps
another slant at the meaning of talent.

St. John's Episcopal Church, Buffalo

During my early 20s I became organist and choirmaster of St.
John's Episcopal Church in Buffalo, the city where I had been brought up. It
was a lovely church designed by the famous architect, Bertram Goodhue, and
recently built in Tudor gothic style with fine stained glass and a ceiling
richly decorated with polychrome colors. I was there eight years, and spent
three and even four hours at the organ nearly every morning. It was a time when
I learned a great deal of repertoire from Bach to Tournemire.

In those days the church was open every day for prayer and
meditation. Occasionally someone would enter the church, unknown to me. One day
as I came to a concluding cadence, I was interrupted by an old man who came up
to the console and said, "Young man, I have been listening to your music,
and you are in a very strange mood. I see dark colors and something is
depressing you." I was taken aback and a little shocked to hear someone
remark about my mood, especially from a complete stranger, for, as I recall, I
really hadn't been concerned with how I was feeling and surprised that it would
be evident in my organ playing. For a moment I suddenly wondered for what
purposes I had been working all this time. He was a very old man, in his
eighties or nineties with a strong will. From time to time he returned and
would sit in the church listening to me practice and then tell me what he had
heard. Sometimes we would have discussions. He talked as though he were
planning to live forever, but I couldn't imagine why. Well, I was too young and
unsympathetic to appreciate his point of view. I felt sorry for him, for to me
he looked very old and I wondered if he would even live to reach the outside of
the church again.

Ernest Mitchell

A few years earlier, after high school, I had entered the
Institute of Musical Arts in New York (now the Juilliard School). During the
first weeks I explored the city and visited the fabulous Wanamaker store that
in those days had an enormous organ. Later, as I left the store I saw before me
a large and beautiful Gothic church. I entered and at once heard the organ. I
walked quietly forward toward the chancel where I could see an elegantly
dressed man sitting at a very large four-manual console. He was playing Karg-Elert's
Now Thank we all Our God. The organ sounded magnificent, and what I heard and
saw at once impressed me as a model of perfection. The organist was Ernest
Mitchell and the church was Grace Church, and both were to have a profound
influence on me.

Grace Church in those days was an enormously wealthy church.
If you approached the church on a Sunday morning you would see at least a score
of Rolls-Royces and Pierce-Arrows parked along Broadway with their respective
chauffeurs in black suits guarding the cars. When I entered the church the
small congregation, elegantly dressed, in that lovely gothic nave suggested
that here was a chapel just for millionaires. I had the feeling that I was not
supposed to be there and hesitated to remain for the service. Nevertheless, I
remained. The choir was highly paid, and it was my introduction to Mr.
Mitchell's unique boy choir. The soprano section, consisting of 20 boys, had a
most beautiful and unusual tone quality with intonation and phrasing that
seemed faultless. There were also eight men representing some of the finest
voices in town. Donald Dame, the tenor soloist, was also singing with the
Metropolitan Opera. The choir boys lived in a  very well appointed boarding school and rehearsed every day.
It was the finest boy choir I had ever heard, and even now the quality of that
wonderful choir remains in my memory. The organ in the church was enormous. It
was a double organ: the organ in the chancel had 80 stops and was built first
by Hutchins-Votey and then E.M. Skinner; the gallery organ was more recent
having been built again by E.M. Skinner, and it contained 60 stops. There were
five 32¢s in that church!

Mr. Mitchell, who had been a student of Widor in Paris,
played superbly. He was particularly interested in French music and played the
Widor and Vierne symphonies, Roger-Ducasse, Duruflé, and was the first
organist to play Tournemire in this country. He played many of the suites of
Tournemire's famous work, L'Orgue Mystique, and two of his works were dedicated
to Mr. Mitchell. I found it difficult to decide in what he excelled: his
magnificent choir or his wonderful organ playing. Several years later I was to
become his student.

Some 20 or 30 years later on a visit to New York, I again
wandered into Grace Church and discovered Mr. Mitchell practicing again at the
console of a new organ. He was now retired and apparently in his seventies. A
new organist and choirmaster had been engaged, and a new organ had replaced the
old which reflected the incumbent's baroque taste. I was surprised though that

Mr. Mitchell still continued to practice, especially on an
organ which obviously did not suit his tastes. This I could not understand. I
said to myself why doesn't this old man give up and simply enjoy his
retirement. His professional life seemed to me to be at an end, and I couldn't
imagine what in the world he was practicing for.

A different view

Well, here I am at the same gate post, and the scene looks quite
different from my point of view today. Now I realize how I had completely
misunderstood those two old men who had come into my earlier life, and I see
clearly that some of us wish to live forever and carry on the same desires and
ambitions of our youth. In fact, for me the next recital or recording is still
my zenith. The urges for artistic accomplishment are even greater than ever and
are nourished by many years of experience. Of course, at this late date I no
longer look forward or backward except as a point of reference. Now I must live
only for the moment with all its challenges and problems. Nevertheless, I must
confess, there is always the future. This can't last forever. Well, I simply
couldn't understand all this when I was a young man.

Lynnwood Farnam

I have never forgotten those two old men. They are two of
the many influential figures that came into my young life. Lynnwood Farnam was
another and probably the greatest of them all. My ambitions as an organist were
probably linked to the influence Farnam had over me. His approach to organ
playing remains unique in my memory, and he set a standard of quality in
performance that was surely unprecedented and from my perspective today
re-mains unchallenged.

Farnam was unusual; his conception of a musical work was
never confined by the limitations of the organ. He sought to realize all its
musical possibilities in spite of tonal and mechanical style="mso-spacerun: yes">  limitations. He was of course concerned
about the quality of the instrument he had to play, as are all good performers.
He had immense enthusiasm for the organ; he understood its traditional
qualities and had a strong instinctual feeling for it.

On one occasion I remember hearing him play a Magnificat of
Titelouze and was struck by his handling of the registration and his style of
playing. He seemed to re-create the atmosphere of that period, even though the
organ was hardly appropriate for the purpose. He realized, for instance, that a
great work of Bach must finally sound as if it thoroughly belonged to the organ--it
must, after all, be completely idiomatic. Thus, by combining a rich musical
feeling with a passion for the organ, he succeeded in realizing an unusual
conception of such a work on the average organ, even a mediocre one.

He was, first of all, one of the most accurate of all
keyboardists I have ever heard. I am sure that this was not because he had
great pride in his technical ability. To the contrary, he believed that a wrong
note, no less a poor sound or a weak rhythmic figure,  spoiled the texture of the music and thus distracted from
the total impression. Accuracy was fundamental to his efforts to interpret the
music.  In the end it was this high
quality of Farnam's playing, musically and technically, which set such an
unusual standard for me to follow.

Josef Hofmann

Another of the great influences
of my life was the pianist Josef Hofmann, who was the head of the piano
department and, in fact, dean of the Curtis Institute when I was a student
there. Some say that Hofmann was the greatest pianist of the 20th century. His
chief contender in those days was Sergei Rachmaninoff, but both men were good
friends who seemed to stand in awe of each other. Like Farnam, Hofmann set the
highest possible standard; he was one of the most consistently accurate keyboard
players, and had the most remarkable mechanism of any  pianist I have ever heard. And it is interesting to know
that he was not only a great pianist but also a remarkable mechanical genius.
He had his own machine shop and had acquired several patents for devices he had
invented, including the shock absorber.

Over the years I have studied
Hofmann's technique at the piano; it was based on a system of leverage
involving the upper and lower arms. I came to understand that by using leverage
of the arms, it is possible to develop great skill and power at the piano and
still play with considerable ease. Of course, we organists do not need this
kind of power unless we are playing a large tracker organ with manuals coupled.
With this kind of technique the hands and fingers do not strike the keys. The
feeling is more like a pushing away from the keyboard.

Hofmann did little practice, and
I can understand why it is said that his technique required no maintenance. He
did most of his work mentally away from the piano. He could learn a big work
simply by studying the score, bring it to the instrument, and then play it at
once in a finished form. In the use of his technical system he developed a
unique touch with a tremendous control of dynamics. He not only played all the
right notes, but seemed to play the right notes better than other pianists. You
have to hear his playing to believe it.

Hofmann had one of the most
remarkable ears in musical history. One day when he was still a boy, he heard a
tuning fork supposed to be A-440 at the Metropolitan  Opera and said it was a shade sharp--and it was. With his
remarkable ear he could play back music correctly without ever having seen the
score. Not a week passes that I am not listening to one of the many Hofmann
recordings in my collection.

The Rev. Walter Lord

My early years of professional
life in Buffalo as organist at St. John's Church were memorable ones. The
Rector of the church, Walter Russell Lord, was a sympathetic influence in my
career. He was a personality of unusual culture with far reaching interests in
literature, the arts and music. His wife was a fine  painter who had exhibited at the famous Armory Show of 1913
in New York. They travelled constantly in England, France and Italy. Dr. Lord
and I sometimes had differences of opinion about the hymns and anthems, but he
nevertheless was a great inspiration to me, and my interest in painting and
gothic architecture began at this time.

Walter Holtkamp

Soon after I began my career at
St. John's Church in Buffalo, I became aware of an unusual organ builder in
Cleveland, Walter Holtkamp, the father of Walter Holtkamp, Jr., and grandfather
of Chris Holtkamp, who is now successfully running that company today. Walter
Holtkamp was apparently forging an unusual and even daring path which would
have a profound effect on the future of organ building in America, and I soon
became excited with what he was trying to do. I started going back and forth
between Buffalo and Cleveland to play and study his instruments. Early in the 1930s
he even had invited me to take part in a recital and reception in his shop
where he had set up one of his instruments. Holtkamp was aware of the new
movement in German organ building; he had also been reading and studying the
writings of Albert Schweitzer and had been corresponding with him. He had seen
how the modern American organ had lost almost all vestiges of its traditions.
His first interest, I believe,  was
to restructure its casework, so its speaking pipes could be brought forward
into the room and placed in an open position where they could be heard by the
listener just as all other musical instruments. He was the first builder in
this country to introduce the Rückpositiv, a division typical of North
German organ building, and his first example was installed in the original
organ built for the Cleveland Museum of Art. Holtkamp became another strong
influence in my life, and much of my feeling for the organ today goes back to
my experiences with Holtkamp.

Paul Hindemith

Toward the end of my tenure in
Buffalo it came as quite a surprise to hear that the composer, Paul Hindemith,
had been engaged to teach at the University of Buffalo, and there was a lot of
excitement in town in musical circles. My wife and I had been married for only
a year and lived in a small apartment just two blocks from the hotel where
Hindemith lived. Unfortunately, Hindemith only remained in Buffalo for several
months, mainly the spring of 1941, before he accepted a position at Yale
University. But during those 
months we saw a great deal of him. I became a student in a small class
for composition. Hindemith was very generous with his time. For a man with all
his accomplishments he had a very easy going manner and behaved as if he were
lazy and lonely. It seems he never turned down a request for his help or a
social invitation.

It so happens that I had
prepared my choir at that time for a concert which was to be held by
coincidence shortly after Hindemith's arrival. At the second or third meeting
of our class he called me aside and said that he had heard I was giving a
concert with my choir. He then added that he rarely attended concerts but that
he would like to attend the final rehearsal. What could I say?! A final
rehearsal is difficult enough under normal conditions, but for the great
Hindemith to attend my modest efforts with a volunteer choir put me in a trying
circumstance, to say the least. Well, of course he came.

The program was to open with a
short Buxtehude cantata with strings, and this was my only rehearsal with the
strings. It was the first work on the agenda, because I only needed the strings
for that one work. Here I was having to handle my choir in an already difficult
situation and then contend with the presence of one of the foremost musicians
of the day and one, moreover, who only a few weeks earlier had provoked
considerable attention by standing up against Hitler and the Nazis. You can
imagine how I felt!

Nevertheless, the rehearsal
began with the short introduction of the Buxtehude cantata which involved the
strings. We hadn't played more than eight bars when Hindemith interrupted the
rehearsal telling us he wasn't satisfied with the sound of a certain ornament.
Of course, ornaments are controversial, and it was well-known that Hindemith
had a strong interest in early music.

Moreover, it should be
remembered  that Hindemith was a
conductor who later in his life toured with and conducted many of the major
orchestras in Europe and America. He also had a special talent for playing instruments
and could play virtually all the instruments of the orchestra. He was a
virtuoso on the violin and viola.

He asked to see the score and
then suggested we begin again. After we had passed the point in question I
stopped and waited for Hindemith's appraisal. He was silent for a moment or so
and then admitted that what we had first played was, after all, the best
solution. The fact that he had nothing to offer relieved some of the tension
and made me feel somewhat more comfortable. The rehearsal proceeded and there
were no  more serious problems.

Incidentally, I had grown up
with the impression that such great men try to remain obscure in their private
lives and, in any event, do not waste a whole evening on small-town organists
and volunteer choirs. I wondered how he could afford the time for such
excursions! If he was looking for entertainment, I should think a movie might
have been more appropriate than to contribute to the nervous breakdown of a
young man still in his twenties. Nevertheless, I lived through that rehearsal and
at least had the comfort to know that he would not attend the concert.

Nevertheless, Hindemith was very
helpful to me during those months, and we also had many good times together. He
was a fascinating person. He had a dozen hobbies--gardening, model railroads,
timetables, maps, walking, etc.--in addition to his comprehensive activities in
music. He walked five miles every day, and by the time he had been with us for
two weeks, he knew Buffalo far more thoroughly than I who had style="mso-spacerun: yes">  been born and brought up there. He
always seemed to take his time, and it is still a mystery to me how such a man
accomplished what he did and yet appeared to give one the impression he was
lazy. In fact, one day when asked about his well-being he said, "I have
just been walking around feeling stupid."

Eventually I had a lesson on how
Hindemith handles his time. One day my wife and I happened to have lunch in the
dining room of his hotel. We saw him there alone reading his book on Kepler in
preparation for an opera he was planning as he was having his lunch. We
returned home and about three o'clock received a phone call from Hindemith
announcing to us that he had just completed the score of the slow movement for
a new organ sonata. He asked if he might come over to the apartment so that we
might try it out on the piano. Of course, and we played it. I was much
impressed. He told us he had written it in 20 minutes, and, in fact, the score
was beautifully written all ready for the publisher. He wrote the first
movement the following morning and the final movement that afternoon. I
surmised that these pieces had probably been swirling around in his head during
those long daily walks and by the time he sat down at his desk, there was
little more to do than write out the scores. This then was the story of the
Third Sonata for organ. But there is still an interesting sequel to that story.

Hindemith knew that I owned a
recording machine. It was, of course, before the day of tape decks and the
proliferation of amateur recording. One had to go to some trouble to own a
recording machine of any kind those days, and my machine was a complicated
affair; the recording was made by actually cutting a disc with a needle. If it
went bad during a session, it was not so simple to try again, for it was fairly
expensive to begin again with a new disc. In any event, when Hindemith brought
me the final score he suggested we make a recording of it. I was pleased with
the idea, of course, and I agreed to do so. He asked me when we should set up a
date, for he wanted to be on hand. I looked at the sonata rather superficially
and thought to myself that learning this piece is going to require some hard
work. I brought out my little book and suggested a date about two weeks off. At
that, Hindemith exclaimed,"What! Are you going to go into hibernation and
sleep with this piece? Come on, let's do it the day after tomorrow!" Well,
I was flabbergasted, to say the least. I had never in my life tried to learn a
piece of such difficulty in so short a time, but it seemed that I had no
choice. My pride was such that I could not muster the nerve to disagree with
him. Somehow I managed to learn that sonata and make the recording according to
Hindemith's wishes. I never forgot that experience, and it taught me a lot
about how to practice. It also told me something about the handling of time and
why Hindemith was able to squeeze so much from his life.

Squire Haskin

Among my friends was a very
unusual man named Squire Haskin, who came to Buffalo as the director of music
at the First Presbyterian Church two or three years after I had become
choirmaster at St. John's Church. It didn't take me long to realize that Squire
was a musician of formidable talent, who, if I was going to react normally,
could give me some real competition. Squire had recently graduated from the
Eastman School of Music where he had been the first student in the history of
the school to do a double major, in organ and piano. In fact, for graduation he
had played both an organ recital and a piano recital from memory during the
same week. Soon after he arrived in Buffalo he played a very fine recital at
his church which included the Duruflé Toccata, the Bach Passacaglia and
a Franck Chorale all learned and memorized within a week's time.

I soon discovered that Squire
was also an amazing sight-reader; at the piano he could read at once a piece as
difficult as a Chopin Étude and, with one or two more readings, have it
memorized. Because of his musicianship and sight-reading ability he was soon in
demand as an accompanist for singers and instrumentalists around town. He was
often called back to Rochester to fill in as a last minute substitute at the
Eastman School. On such occasions, he could learn and play a Hindemith,
Bartók or Schoenberg work in a morning rehearsal with a violinist for
performance the same evening.

I didn't begin to have this kind
of talent, a formidable one, to say the least. However, I soon became aware
that Squire did not have the ambition nor did he espouse a career the equal of
his talents as pianist, organist or accompanist. Life had too many other
interests for him to settle down and concentrate on an artistic career. He was
content with his position as director of music of a large city church, and he
remained there for the rest of his life.

Over the years, as organist, he
played in recital or as voluntaries at the church services the complete works
of Bach, Franck, Vierne and Widor, and many of the works of Messiaen and
Langlais. He knew and played the piano literature as well. His quick style="mso-spacerun: yes">  mind took to languages and he spoke
French fluently and at least some Italian. His interests embraced an extensive
awareness of painting and architecture, and he was an avid reader as well.

Squire, by his example, taught
me the art of living. He was a real gentleman and seemed to me to be a modern
example of the Renaissance man. He surrounded himself with fine books,
paintings and many other beautiful things. He listened to music and attended
concerts and galleries, intimately knowing the paintings of Buffalo's Albright
Art Gallery and many other galleries around the country.

But Squire essentially was a
modest person, not ambitious, and was never simply trying to extend his
knowledge to show off his ability. What he knew and loved was there only
because of his interest in such things. This made a strong impression on me. He
could be tough on occasion when necessary, but he never developed the arrogance
of so many college professors. He became an important influence in my life, and
we became life-long friends.

Years later I built him a large
new organ of 80 ranks for First Presbyterian Church. It brought us both a lot
of pleasure. In many ways, his life was too good to be true, and sadly he was
murdered in his own home by a thief on the eve of a celebration for 50 years of
service at the church. I had come to Buffalo to join in the celebration. It was
one of the saddest and most frustrating moments of my life, and I am still
haunted by that unfortunate occasion.

Teaching

I chose to be an organist by the
time I was 21 years old, and have been practicing and playing ever since.
During the 12-year period when I was teaching full time at the University of
Michigan, I played many recitals, including the complete organ works of Bach. I
don't remember how I did it, for my responsibilities in running the organ
department, teaching, committee meetings and the many interruptions of such a
schedule limited the hours I had for practice. Then, at the height of this
career I began organ building and a few years later gave up teaching. I had
liked teaching and I especially enjoyed the students, but I was somewhat
demanding and I am sure some of them did not entertain such an impression. But
I found teaching the most difficult work of all. To listen every day to the
great organ works played by someone who is just beginning his career, often
played well and sometimes very well, yet never quite the way one conceives
them, is not easy. Very few students at that age have reached a level with what
I call an artistic attitude, and it is very tiring to listen every day to such
playing. I doubt that the students ever stopped to think of how I felt about my
playing. After all, I was never satisfied with my own efforts. In fact, I was
so critical of myself that I didn't dare play for them seriously at lessons
when I should have. I finally had to perform at recitals, of course, and then I
tried to do the best I could. I was not one blessed with too much talent.
Technical skill did not come easily for me. I had to work, and learn to teach
myself.

Rhythm and nuance

In the performance of any
musical instrument rhythmic nuance is an indispensible means for musical
expression. The organ is the most mechanical of all musical instruments and it
tends to discourage nuance. Yet, nuance is the lifeblood of musical expression;
it is the means for making subtle distinctions with dynamics and rhythm.
Traditionally the organ has a very limited means for expression; dynamics
cannot be affected directly at the keyboard. With the invention of the swell
box, it at least became possible to control the dynamic level of one or a group
of stops by opening or closing such an enclosure by means of shutters. It is
easy enough to learn to play in a simple, equally spaced order of beats and
measures but the very nature of the organ with its rigid and uncompromising
sound seems to inhibit a serious attempt in the handling of nuance.
Nevertheless, with effort it is possible.

We organists have developed a
mode of playing which stresses one dynamic at a time and a simple approach to
rhythm by playing too much in strict time. Of course, on a baroque organ we can
have only one dynamic at a time, and thus we have found it easy to believe in a
tradition of playing concerto movements and preludes and fugues from beginning
to end with but one registration and, of course, only one dynamic, more or less
in strict time. But I am not sure that this is a kind of playing typical of
good organ playing in earlier times. Moreover, I find many people who really
enjoy music have learned to stay away from organ recitals.

With practice, I find that even
playing the simplest kind of organ, even one with tracker action built in an
old style, it is possible to become involved with a much more subtle kind of
rhythm by practicing a touch inspired by imagination for dynamic variation.
Although they cannot be altered, just the attempt to feel where dynamics occur
with the touch will affect and alter the rhythm and even suggest a variation of
dynamics. This is the kind of playing typical of a sensitive pianist. However,
because of his instrument he is able to affect both dynamics and the rhythm at
the same time. The two go together in a very natural way. Nevertheless, we
organists should be able to develop a touch which approaches this kind of
playing and which will produce subtle nuances of rhythm which in turn suggest
variation of dynamics.

I have read very much from the
18th century which suggests that performers then were far more sensitive to the
expressive quality and touch of their instruments than we now believe. For
instance, J.J. Quantz, a friend of Bach, wrote:

Good execution must be varied.
Light and shadow must be constantly maintained. No listener will be
particularly moved by someone who plays in the same colour. Thus, a continuous
alternation of forte and piano must be observed. The alternation of piano and
forte heightens some notes at one time, at another arouses tenderness.

Of course, Quantz is mainly
speaking of playing the flute or the violin, not the organ. However, I have
tried in vain to find information from that time which suggests that organists
should play in a special style which is expressionless. Organists in our time
have too easily come to the conclusion, for instance, that even registration in
its simplest use should never be changed in the performance of a prelude and
fugue. To the contrary, I am persuaded that Quantz is quite right when he says
that no listener will be pleased by someone who plays without change of color
or dynamics, and that intrigues me far more than blindly following a tradition
which offers so little and is obviously questionable. I could quote many more
passages which confirm the statement of Quantz, but I shall include one more
which suggests that some players apparently played as expressively as we do
today. This passage describes the playing of one of the foremost players of the
viola da gamba during the 17th century, Nicolas Hotman, and is found in a study
book written by Jean Rousseau in 1687:

One admired him often more when
he played tenderly some simple little song than in the most learned and
complicated pieces. The tenderness of his playing comes from those beautiful
bowings which he animated, and softened so cleverly and properly that he
charmed all those who heard him.

I go back to the 18th century
because, as organists, we play an instrument which was favored by the great
J.S. Bach, and whose organ music is the cornerstone of our whole repertoire.
The music of Bach is wonderful, and I am convinced it should be played far more
expressively that it is. None of us really knows how Bach played, and I don't
understand why we should be so determined to make his music fit all the rules
of a vague tradition probably created after Bach was gone and, in any event, so
little understood in our time. Dom Bedos, who authored a famous work on organ
building during the 18th century, wrote:

There is a manner of conceiving
music entirely different from the one taught in all the treatises upon this
art: it is founded upon the execution itself.

I agree with this. It suggests
that there is an obligation for me to study the score itself, explore it, and
using my intuition, find for myself the best possible way to make it sound.

Organ design

Finally, we need good organs to
perform expressively. The organ is a very complicated instrument, and this may
in part account for our inability as organists and organ builders to reach the
high musical standards of the pianist or the violinist. In truth, the
expressive possibilities of the organ are much greater than we seem to believe
they are.

A good pianist sits down at a
fine Steinway piano and is able to perform a Chopin Ballade or a delicate
Debussy Prelude with ease and conviction. Both the player and the instrument
are sensitive to musical and instrumental problems and understand together the
function of their instrument.

Now, I do not find this kind of
rapport true of the organ. I am rarely convinced that the player and the organ
builder are even talking to each other. Consider how organs are designed. The
procedure, it seems, tends to be haphazard. For instance, the organist will
provide a list of stops, but the builder rarely understands the musical
implications of what that list means in terms of registration. The builder
then, on his own, inadvertently proceeds to design the instrument from his
point of view and with far different motives than the organist. Both know too
little about each other's art.

I am appalled that so few
organists have more than a superficial understanding of their instrument, its
design, tone and action. The voicing of organ pipes still remains somewhat of a
mystery to organists and even some organ builders. There are apparently few
organists too who really revel in the tonal colors of their instrument.
Exploring and exploiting the various sounds of an organ requires at least a
little skill in improvisation and can be a source of inspiration.

Look again at the piano; its
casework is always the same and simply constructed to contain the elements
which produce its tone. Organ cases also are constructed to contain the
pipework and mechanism of the organ, but the organ builder is too often more
concerned for the appearance of the organ and its casework than its tone
quality. Walter Holtkamp back in the 1930s, 40s and 50s was a builder who came
the closest to such an ideal. He insisted on building a organ which first could
be placed properly within the room and then designed his cases to expose the
pipework, allowing the sound to be projected directly to the listener. Today,
it is the fashion to build cases in the style of the 17th and 18th centuries.
Much of this kind of casework is redundant, burdened with heavy woodwork, and
unnecessarily expensive.

It is also the responsibility of
the organist as well as the builder to give more serious thought to the
wind-chest and action to provide a sensitive and responsible touch for the
player, and one which will encourage nuance. The voicing of the pipes and the
construction of the action are closely related to each other. The finest
voicing favors pipes which speak promptly. The design of the chest and its
valves must be sympathetic to this kind of voicing. The voicing and the speed
and precision of the valve must work together. The valves in various types of
windchests are often too fast or too slow for the voicing, but with modern
technology it is now possible to design and adjust the opening and closing of
the valve to suit the voicing of the pipe. There is an urgent need for
discussion of this kind among organists, for it is only the organist with some
knowledge of voicing and the playing mechanism who can really understand the
kind of responsiveness he desires and translate his desires to the organ
builder. And it is he who should be responsible for the whole organization of
the instrument, one which is carefully designed to create an organ for the
finest kind of performance. The organist and the organ builder have common
interests and need to become involved more closely with each other.

The function of musical
performance is to play music for the enjoyment of music. That's the purpose of
a symphony concert, a piano recital, a performance of lieder or an organ
recital. Simply said, that is our goal. But all of these means of performance
can only be judged by the fine art of listening to music. If we go to an organ
recital simply to find out if one of our colleagues is using correct tempos or
is playing a chorale prelude in a proper style, both we and our recitalist
colleague really belong back in the classroom. Fortunately, we still enjoy a
musical culture in which there are magnificent symphony orchestras, wonderful
string quartets, pianists, violinists and, of course, some organists, where the
goal of musical performance, plain and simple, is to make beautiful music for
the listener.

During these last years I have discovered
more than ever the great joy of listening to music. It's a gold mine. I try to
set aside an hour or so each day just to listen to music. I try not to let
myself be distracted by reading or conversation. I just try to remain quiet and
relaxed without making any undue effort to concentrate, for in my life
listening to music is one of its greatest joys.