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Noon Edition

Pipes And Bellows

We're putting the pedal to the... choir loft in this all-organ episode!

This week on the show, the Ether Game Brain Trust is pulling out all the stops. We're looking at music for the organ this week in a show we're calling "Pipes And Bellows." Here's out "great" and "swell" playlist of organ music below:

  • Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), "Little" Fugue in G Minor, BWV 578 – In his lifetime, Bach was regarded as the greatest master of the grandest instrument, the organ. He could perform in every major style, with perfect technique, and even improvise fugues like his famous "Little" fugue in G minor. However, early in his career, Bach felt that his skills paled in comparison to the great organ master Dietrich Buxtehude. When Bach was 20 years old, he apparently walked over 200 miles just to meet Buxtehude. Buxtehude was quite a popular guy in those days: George Frideric Handel had also visited him two years earlier. Buxtehude held a prized position as the organist at St. Mary's Church in Lubeck, and both Handel and Bach were interested in being his successor for that job. However, both composers eventually gave up on obtaining the post, because neither was interested in fulfilling one of the requirements of being the next organist-marrying Buxtehude's daughter!


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  • Charles Ives (1874–1978), Variations on "America" – In 1889, Charles Ives became the youngest professional organist in Connecticut. Alongside performing, his duties as a church musician involved writing hymn settings and anthems. This music inspired him to composed his Variations On "America." While even the most experienced organist might find this piece challenging, the 14 year old Ives famously described the work as being "as much fun as playing baseball." The variations are among the composer's earliest experiments with bi-tonality: or using two different keys at the same time. The work took the long route to public attention, failing to find a publisher for years-a fate that would become all too common for Ives's music. Unearthed in 1949, the variations were edited by organist E. Power Biggs, who worked with the consent and assistance of the aging composer. Biggs performed the variations in 1962, at the dedication of the Philharmonic Hall (later renamed Avery Fisher Hall) at Lincoln Center.


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  • César Franck (1822–1890), Grande Pièce Symphonique – In the late 19th century in France, a genre of music emerged called the "organ symphony." Unlike a regular symphony, it featured only one instrument: the organ. However, everything else about the work in terms of form and scope were derived from the symphonic genre. The pioneering work in this genre is the Grande Pièce Symphonique by composer César Franck from 1862. At the time, Franck was working as the organist on the brand new organ at the Sainte-Clotilde church in Paris. This job inspired him to experiment on the instrument, where he created this grand work. The piece was dedicated to his friend Charles-Valentin Alkan, a fellow composer and a virtuoso pianist. Just a few years prior, Alkan had written a symphony for solo piano, which influenced Franck's symphony for solo organ.


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https://youtu.be/ZWCZq33BrOo?t=20m49s

  • Camille Saint-Saëns (1835–1921), Symphony No. 3 in C Minor ("Organ") – Although Camille Saint-Saens lived another 35 years after completing his Third Symphony, he never attempted the genre again. He seemed to know even at the time that this was the best he would ever be able to do, saying, "I gave everything to it I was able to give. What I have here accomplished, I will never achieve again." The work was the grand culmination of many of his musical trademarks, including brilliant orchestration and virtuosic piano work. It even incorporated his primary instrument, the organ-hence the nickname, "The Organ Symphony." Although, since it has other instruments, it's not an "organ symphony," a work for solo organ like in the Franck example above! The symphony was first performed in London in 1886. A few months later, Saint-Saens's close friend Franz Liszt passed away. So when the work was published later that year, Saint-Saens dedicated the symphony to Liszt in his memory.


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  • Tomaso Albinoni (1671–1751), Adagio in G Minor for Strings and Organ – The Adagio In G Minor for Strings and Organ by Tomaso Albinoni, often referred to as simply "Albinoni's Adagio," is a work that's been heard in countless films and television shows, including The Sopranos and Manchester By The Sea. But the 18th-century Venetian composer known for his operas and concertos really had little to do with this work. He wrote only the first few bars of the melody and bass line. The rest was compiled in 1945 by Albinoni's biographer Remo Giazotto. Purportedly, Giazotto had discovered a fragment of this Albinoni melody at a library in Dresden that had been almost completely destroyed in World War II. He then reconstructed this piece in the style of Albinoni. However, there's growing evidence that the whole story may be a hoax, and Giazotto wrote the entire "Adagio" by himself.


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  • Heitor Villa-Lobos (1887–1959), Harmonica Concerto – The organ works by pressing down the keys of a keyboard (known as a "manual") which triggers bellows to push air through a pipe or reed to create a sound. Although they are the largest and most complex instruments, the idea is still pretty simple: air moving through holes to create sound. That's also basically what happens in a harmonica (air is blown through reeded holes create sound), which is why the harmonica is often given the nickname the "mouth organ." Harmonicas are widely used in folk and blues music, but in the 1950s, they also worked their way into the concert hall. Its popularity had much to do with a man named John Sebastian, a virtuoso harmonica player who brought harmonica-playing into the world of classical music. In the 1940s and 50s, Sebastian commissioned several well-known composers to write harmonica concertos for him, including Henry Cowell, Alan Hovhaness, and Heitor Villa-Lobos.


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  • Antonín Dvořák (1841–1904), 5 Bagatelles for Strings and Harmonium – Antonin Dvorak wrote the piece we just heard for a cellist and friend: Josef Srb-Debrnov, for a private concert at Debrnov's home. Debrnov regularly held chamber music concerts at his home, although surprisingly he did not have a piano for use in these concerts. Instead, he owned  a harmonium, a small, single manual pump organ with hand or foot-operated bellows. Consequently, Dvorak included this instrument in his collection of Bagatelles, and probably played the harmonium part when the work was performed at Debrnov's home. We know for sure that Dvorak performed on the harmonium when the piece was premiered publically at a concert in Prague in 1879. Dvorak was not the only famous composer to write for the instrument. Camille Saint-Saens, and Giacomo Rossini both wrote chamber music for it, and Cesar Franck wrote an entire collection of 59 pieces for solo harmonium.


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  • Booker T. & The MGs, Soul-Limbo – Booker T Jones's professional career started when he was only sixteen years old as a baritone saxophone player for Stax Records. Though he was a child prodigy and a talented multi-instrumentalist, he decided to attend Indiana University in 1962 to study classical music and composition, traveling between Memphis and Bloomington on weekends to continue playing with his Stax studio band Booker T and the MGs. Jones provided a distinctive Hammond organ sound for his Stax recordings (he was using the smaller Hammond M3 model, instead of the more popular B3). His 1962 song Green Onions went on to become one of the most popular instrumental soul songs ever. Soul-Limbo marked the release of the band's 1968 album of the same name, and was composed right after the death of fellow Stax musician and superstar Otis Redding.


Music Heard On This Episode

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