J.S. Bach on the Organ

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Interesting to hear that the sound from speakers, presumably on the floor, reproduces the height. Is it caused solely by the reverb/echo?
Its not surprising since we have only two ears even when we "hear" the sound from ceiling. Probably our brain is creating the 3d sound  with the height.
Somehow, the middle part in Tomorrow Never Knows by the Beatles presents the height/distance effect, but it is created without reverb.
I am dilettante, but I suspect if the interior is wood or stone makes difference in the sound as well.

I still think it's mainly about preferences. If someone claims to know "how an organ (recording) should sound", than it's mostly his/her personal preference.
For instance: during summertime, I visit both the Martinikerk and the Der Aa Kerk in Groningen, NL.
At a Martini concert, for my preferred 'Martini sound', I pick a place (if availabe) somewhere around the middle, not too close to the organ. Otherwise it sometimes just gets too loud for me. And the 'overall' experience is, to my taste, just beautiful.
In the Der Aa Kerk, which is a higher building with more reverb, I begin to prefer sitting close more and more during the years. The sound isn't as direct as in the Martini and not that loud, and it's also great to listen to the differences between Rugwerk, Hoofdwerk and Bovenwerk. You can hear those differences very well up close, and you can hear where the sound is coming from. That's just awesome.

Which brings me to another well-known baroque organ in NL: the Schonat/Duyschot/Hagerbeer organ in the Nieuwe Kerk, Amsterdam.
With that particular instrument, I prefer recordings where you can hear those differences between the 'Werke' more than recordings where the engineers have chosen for a more incorporated 'general' sound.
A good example of a beautiful recording on that instrument is when Bram Beekman plays BWV 688 "Jesus Christus, unser Heiland" with the sound of the Bovenwerk floating as if it comes from above (Heaven).

I.c. the tempi and such: there are plenty of organists who might agree with the quote from earlier today:

Still, when all those organists were playing the same instrument, they would probably opt for different tempi, different stops and a different way of phrasing.
Yes, we can read books and articles by f.i. Ewald Kooiman and Gerhard Weinberger about 17th/18th century tempi and way of playing (fingering, dicition, phrasing, (non) legato et al), but it's probably best to read it as an inspiration and as a serious attempt to find out what musicians and composers thought about those things in those earlier times. It's not meant (IMHO) as The Holy Baroque Tempi Bible. Their findings should not be used (IMHO) to 'punish' 'stubborn' artists who have their own ideas about it.

[Marc]

Interesting to hear that the sound from speakers, presumably on the floor, reproduces the height. Is it caused solely by the reverb/echo?
Its not surprising since we have only two ears even when we "hear" the sound from ceiling. Probably our brain is creating the 3d sound  with the height.
Somehow, the middle part in Tomorrow Never Knows by the Beatles presents the height/distance effect, but it is created without reverb.
I am dilettante, but I suspect if the interior is wood or stone makes difference in the sound as well.

Yes, your own listening 'circumstances' can make a huge difference as well. My speakers sounded different in my living room compared to the listening studio where I had checked them out. But, since they even sounded a bit better at home, I did not mind.
But since I listen a lot from headphones, I wasn't referring to that. I.c. the organs in the Der Aa Kerk (Groningen) and the Nieuwe Kerk (Amsterdam): the actual sound from the Bovenwerk really comes from behind/above, it's not caused by reverb or echo. Hence the name 'Bovenwerk' (Upper work). In some cases the 'Bovenwerk' is built behind the Hoofdwerk/Hauptwerk. Then some Dutch jokers speak of 'Achterwerk' ('behind work' or whatever), which also means 'buttocks' in Dutch.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

I didn't find this album on YT, but found his Bach works (OEHMS) and liked it. When you feel like, would you and other members please provide a review on his performance and instrument?

Re organ sound, I'm seeing that sound is a really major part of the appreciating a performance - just enjoying the noise. One that I've become completely addicted to, because of the sound, is this



I like to play it very loud on a system with enormous subwoofers!

[bioluminescentsquid]

So true but in an age where countless distortions of an original performance can be imposed due to recording technique and equipment used for replay the idea anyone commenting validly upon a particular tempi as wrong or right for any particular work is an absurdity.
Many organists when familiarising themselves with a particluar instrument and it's acoustics will have an assistant play a piece whilst they listen from a positions occupied by audience or congregation. A particular dislike of mine are recordings of tracker action instruments made with microphones so close to the keyboard they sound more like a knitting machine than a pipe organ. Some suggest this aberation is authentic. I suggest it's not even quaint. Even some organ builders get things wrong placing stops such as horizontal trumpet stops for instance too close to the keyboard. If an organist is silly enough to use these too often or for overly long periods it can degrade their perception of balance disastrously. Then we have recording engineers fond of placing 'ambience' microphones at an absurd distance from the instrument adding their contribution at far too high a volume making some instruments sound as if they're playing from the bottom of the Grand Canyon.

Great to see another organist here!
Well, at least in old Spanish organs the horizontal reeds are placed right above the console for the most "live" wind and also ease of tuning. So they knew what they were doing. But they do get painfully loud (so does the full Brustwerk flue choir on an organ I regularly play) and should be used in moderation

Any specific examples of recordings that are miked "too close"? Even if the overall blend is often off, I do like being close to the pipes and being able to hear every minute aspect of their singing - not to mention also being close to the musician (if it is a tracker instrument, with the console at the foot of the organ) and feeling the intimacy of their music-making. But it's a very personal preference.

[Mandryka]

I didn't find this album on YT, but found his Bach works (OEHMS) and liked it. When you feel like, would you and other members please provide a review on his performance and instrument?

There are some comments about it on presto music

https://www.prestomusic.com/classical/products/8049859--hans-leo-hassler-organ-works.

It's the Scherer which has the sound which I find so visceral!

I should say that Raml, like all of them, may be a marmite musician. I love what he does here no more and no less than in Pachelbel and Scheidt. But I have a friend who thinks he's too serious, he says he plays everything like it's by J S Bach!

Hassler is someone who I really appreciate, partly because his music sounds so old, it's like I sense that he was aware and loved c15 music.

[prémont]

I should say that Raml, like all of them, may be a marmite musician. I love what he does here no more and no less than in Pachelbel and Scheidt. But I have a friend who thinks he's too serious, he says he plays everything like it's by J S Bach!

It's just that Raml is very German in his approach to the music, - fortunately, since the music is German too.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Does anybody have the Lorenzo Ghielmi recordings from DHM? How are they? Also any opinion on his more recent recordings?

[Mandryka]

Does anybody have the Lorenzo Ghielmi recordings from DHM? How are they? Also any opinion on his more recent recordings?

I listened just a few weeks ago to one of his Frescobaldi masses, Missa Della Madonna. I felt it was competent without being inspired or inspiring.

I also remember listening to the French Suites on Passacaille, which I enjoyed, but felt much the same. Professional executions well enough recorded, neither more nor less than that.

[Marc]

Does anybody have the Lorenzo Ghielmi recordings from DHM? How are they? Also any opinion on his more recent recordings?

I would say that Ghielmi is a very solid Bach interpreter, but in the chorale based works I find him (mostly) too aloof.
(I once heard him live and it didn't change my opinion.)
Probably my fav Ghielmi disc is the one he made for Passacaille with the 6 Trio Sonatas.



https://www.amazon.com/Trio-Sonatas-Lorenzo-Ghielmi/dp/B0043BNYYQ/?tag=goodmusicguideco

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

Thank you for your reviews!

[bioluminescentsquid]

I found this one to be very nice. On an intimate little Ahrend organ, too. A concerto transcription, trio sonata, and other miscellaneous things.

[bioluminescentsquid]

Bach on historic Dutch organ by Koito on DHM. A new release.
[asin]B07P83ZP63[/asin]

I'm late to the party, but my god, this is an interesting recording! Dorian toccata with inégalité!? A mind-blowing variety of articulation too.
There's so much of that mannerist sprezzatura in Koito's playing, more so than here previous recordings. Pieces threatening to devolve into nonsense (a la Lena Jacobsen), but somehow still musically coherent.
Her trio playing does seem more on the sloppy side - unless you like Rübsam with wildly offset voices
Also, I do like the microphone position. I don't think I've heard the Martini organ sing - chirp - scream like that before. Something about Koito's recordings I like is the consistently good recording quality.

[Mandryka]

I've only listened to the Leipzig chorales on the recording. She takes them all quite fast, and I think there's a price to pay in terms of expressiveness - basically they all come off as bracing and cheerful, a bit lacking in seriousness and nobility - is that what organists call gravitas? I'm not sure that her approach makes much sense if you think the music is exegesis of the associated psalm.

The registrations and sound are bright and clear. The cost to that IMO is that you lose out on mystery.

It's as if she thinks that  these chorales are abstract bravura organ pieces.

Does she say anything in the booklet about what she's trying to achieve?

The Groningen Schnitger sounds like a musical instrument rather than a bellowing roaring beast, which is good. What a bass!

There's a chromatic passage in 656, the transition into the final section,  where she makes it sound a bit like one of those improvised orchestral sections in the Beatles' A Day in the Life. Memorable!

I like the 656 taken at her sort of pace - the first section can be a problem taken more slowly because it's so repetitive.

[Mandryka]

She has written an essay, it's available online here, in French only

https://www.kei-koito.com/portfolio-item/reflexions-sur-les-oeuvres-et-leur-interpretation-par-kei-koito/

She's clearly very aware of the exegetical content of the Leipzig chorales. So for The Rivers of Babylon she says

L'atmosphère de la pièce est plutôt sereine, mais poignante à la fois, certaines parties augmentant l'affect de l'affliction par le chromatisme et le mode en mineur

This is something I missed completely in the performance, this poignancy, so I clearly wasn't listening well enough.

And of the great 656 she has some very interesting things to say about the text and the symbolism of the music, eg

À la fin du deuxième segment, un commentaire musical en courbure traduit le texte « All' Sünd' hast du getragen » (« Tu as porté le péché »), et déroule une spirale chromatique extrêmement intense et douloureuse, comportant la ligne descendante (passus duriusculus) finissant sur une basse de do dièse pour exprimer « ...sonst müssten wir verzagen » (« ...sans quoi nous n'aurions plus d'espoir »).

Il est très frappant que Bach ne s'attache précisément ici qu'à un seul mot, « Verzagen » (« désespéré »), qui le pousse à chercher un Affekt musical spécifique. C'est, pour J.-Cl. Zehnder (2009), ce qui caractérise la maîtrise du jeune Bach, en comparaison avec des œuvres tardives qui, elles, tiennent bien plus compte de l'intégralité d'un texte.

Après quelques mesures d'un passage chromatique saisissant, c'est par une transmutation aussi soudaine qu'inattendue qu'arrive le troisième segment, diatonique, le libérateur « Gib uns den Frieden » (« Donne-nous la paix »), en lieu et place de « Erbarm dich unser » (« Aie pitié de nous ») des premier et deuxième versets. Pour l'auditeur, c'est l'Univers tout entier qui s'ouvre.

I must say, I don't fully understand the point that Zehnder is making.

Before I read this it crossed my mind that Koito was part of a secular French bach organ tradition, with Chapuis as a prime example. Looks like, from her essay, I was completely wrong to think that. I shall revisit the recording with her comments in mind -- in my memory what I heard this morning doesn't completely tie up with what I read this afternoon.

What I can say though is that I don't recall hearing the chromatic passage of  656 played with more force than on Koito's recording, it may be me misremembering.

[JBS]

The liner notes on the two of her Bach CDs for Claves I just got speak about the chorales as being musical commentary on the text. [Bach Organ Masterworks Volumes I and II] But they were not written by Koito. The author is listed as Gilles Cantagrel.

[Mandryka]

I feel rather inspired by the Gottfried Silbermann in Dresden today, largely through listening to Matthias Maierhoffer's new Art of Fugue, which I think is a fabulous recording. But the other discs recorded on the organ that I can find seem a bit less exciting, maybe Stefano Molardi doing late Bach chorales (very "cleanly", very "well behaved" - for "very" maybe substitute "too") seems like the best of the rest.

There's some other things mentioned on France org, but they haven't captured my imagination anywhere near as much as Maierhoffer. Am I missing anything?


https://france-orgue.fr/disque/index.php?zpg=dsq.fra.rch&org=&tit=&oeu=&ins=Dresden&cdo=1&dvo=1&vno=1&cmd=Rechercher&edi=

[Harry]

maybe Stefano Molardi doing late Bach chorales (very "cleanly", very "well behaved" - for "very" maybe substitute "too") seems like the best of the rest.

You know my friend, I actually threw the whole Bach set by Molardi away, I could not bring myself to giving it away, afraid of ruining the senses of an innocent soul.
A very ill conceived project by Brilliant.

[Marc]

I feel rather inspired by the Gottfried Silbermann in Dresden today, largely through listening to Matthias Maierhoffer's new Art of Fugue, which I think is a fabulous recording. But the other discs recorded on the organ that I can find seem a bit less exciting, maybe Stefano Molardi doing late Bach chorales (very "cleanly", very "well behaved" - for "very" maybe substitute "too") seems like the best of the rest.

There's some other things mentioned on France org, but they haven't captured my imagination anywhere near as much as Maierhoffer. Am I missing anything?

https://france-orgue.fr/disque/index.php?zpg=dsq.fra.rch&org=&tit=&oeu=&ins=Dresden&cdo=1&dvo=1&vno=1&cmd=Rechercher&edi=

I most certainly like this one: Franz Raml playing a nice Bach collection.



https://www.amazon.com/Bach-Orgel-Werke-Franz-Raml/dp/B000HSP0AK/?tag=goodmusicguideco

[Mandryka]

Excellent! A better trio sonata than on Ultrich Bohm's recording I think.

[Dry Brett Kavanaugh]

I most certainly like this one: Franz Raml playing a nice Bach collection.



https://www.amazon.com/Bach-Orgel-Werke-Franz-Raml/dp/B000HSP0AK/?tag=goodmusicguideco

Yes I like the recording. I don't know anything about this organ but it sounds great. Was it you who said that JSB didn't like or use Silbermann ?.