Duo Crezdi to Appear in Recital

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Antonio Veracini, basso continuo, bassoon, Boulder Bach Festival, Buxtehude, Chaconne in D minor, chorale, chorale partita, coloratura, continuo, Dario Castello, Dresden, Duetto no. 3 in G Major, Duo Crezdi, Fifteen Inventions, First Congregational Church, Florence, Georg Böhm, gigue, harpsichord, Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber, Johann Ludwig Krebs, Josquin des Prez, Leipzig, minuet, organ, partita, passacaglia, Paul Miller, Peter Wollny, Rick Erickson, Rosary Sonatas, Sacred Mysteries, scordatura, Sei gegrüsset Jesu gütig, sonata, Sonata in G minor, Sonata No. 4 in C minor, Sonata Prima in A minor from Libro secundo, tetrachord, Vater unser im Himmelreich, Venice, violin, Zachary Carrettin

Duo Crezdi

In the final concert of the thirty-second season of the Boulder Bach Festival, Zachary Carrettin, violin, and Rick Erickson, harpsichord and organ, will join forces as Duo Crezdi in an artist recital at First Congregational Church in Boulder, Colorado at 7:30 pm on Friday, 3 May 2013.

The violin sonatas on the program will come from very different places and times. The earliest is Dario Castello’s Sonata Prima in A minor from Libro secundo. Diligent scholarship has not been able to determine any exact dates for Castello’s birth or death. In fact, almost no shreds of biographical evidence exist about the composer. This much is known: Castello lived much of his life in and around Venice. He was an excellent wind player and a master of the bassoon, an instrument which was very popular in Venice at the time. He published two books of sonatas in 1621 and 1629, which were so popular that they were reprinted in the 1640s and 50s. His sonatas are made up of a number of short contrasting sections and the work to be performed by the Duo Crezdi is no exception. As one of the first to write idiomatically for the violin, Castello’s music has a refreshing and delightful spontaneity about it which is easy to hear even four hundred years later.

Biber’s (1644-1704) Passacaglia stands as the last piece in the composer’s ambitious cycle of Rosary Sonatas. For each of the fifteen Sacred Mysteries, Biber composed a violin sonata, but each one is in a different tuning, or scordatura. In the sole surviving copy of the score, every sonata is prefaced by a lovely copper engraving. The Passacaglia is the last piece in the cycle, and the only one for violin without continuo. It is the only sonata that “duplicates” an earlier tuning for the violin – in this case, the ordinary tuning G – D – A – E. The Passacaglia consists of sixty-five repetitions of a descending tetrachord (four-note motive) in which all manner of harmony, melody and expression appears. In the middle of the piece, the descending motive even appears in an upper voice, complicating matters for the interpreter. Claiming the prize as probably the most elaborate composition for solo violin up to that time, Biber’s Passacaglia almost surely had some influence on J. S. Bach when he composed, some decades later, his own magnificent Chaconne in D minor (BWV 1004) for solo violin.

Chronologically speaking, the Bach and Veracini sonatas date from almost the same time. Bach’s six accompanied sonatas for violin and keyboard were composed no later than 1725, and the composer continued to tinker with them for many years thereafter. The Sonata in C minor (BWV 1017) is cast very much in the mold of a trio sonata. As Peter Wollny noted, each part (violin, keyboard right hand, keyboard left hand) has its own rhythmic character in the slow movements. For example, in the third movement the violin has a lyrical melody, the right hand of the keyboard has continuous triplets, and the left hand has a bass line mostly in quarter notes. The two fast movements feature dense counterpoint and imitative textures, perfectly in keeping with the idea that each part should be interesting and meaningful in and of itself.

Antonio Veracini (1659-1733) led a colorful life and held important posts in Florence and Dresden. As the story goes, he once claimed that “as there is one God, there is one Veracini.” Without lacking a sense of drama either in life or in music, Veracini once jumped out of a building during an argument in Dresden. He even survived a shipwreck in the English Channel. Veracini’s nephew diplomatically wrote that “the heart, rather than cleverness, guided [Veracini’s] finger and bow.” Of his many published violin works, Veracini’s Sonata in G minor (appearing in 1721 as op. 1, no. 1) is an intense, many-colored piece. Opening with a broad French-style introduction, it quickly moves through an impetuous Allegro before settling into a more lyrical Aria. The anxious Allegro that follows contains several outbursts that might have given even the stoic Bach a severe case of indigestion. The final two movements, a short Minuet and an almost ridiculous Gigue that alludes to the sound of the postman’s bell, do little to dispel the image of an undeniably brilliant, yet slightly unstable, musical mind.

Two works for organ on the concert will feature compositions by men who were close to the Bach circle personally. Johann Ludwig Krebs (1713-1780) studied with Bach in Leipzig. The use of the letters of Bach’s name in the fugue subject reflect an ancient practice, dating back to Josquin, called soggetto cavato (“carved subject”) where the letters of a name determine the musical notes. We therefore have, according to German spelling, a subject of B-flat, A, C, B-natural.

Georg Böhm (1661-1733) was connected to the Bach family from his studies in Ohrdruf, a town which knew several generations of Bachs. Böhm might have tutored the young J. S. Bach but there is no direct evidence to support this assertion. Much later, C. P. E. Bach claimed that his father, J. S., loved to study Böhm’s music. Böhm’s Vater unser im Himmelreich is stylistically much like Buxtehude’s music. It is probably one of the most expressive works he penned. Particularly noteworthy is Böhm’s exploration of the organ’s high coloratura register.

The remaining works by J. S. Bach will show his mastery both of small-scale and large-scale musical forms. The Duetto no. 3 in G Major (BWV 804) is similar in texture to one of Bach’s famous Fifteen Inventions (BWV 772-86), but it is more extended and elaborate. Bach derives an entire motivic menagerie by exploring the possibilities of a simple seven-note cell, heard at the beginning in the right hand. Contrasting with this small scale form, the chorale partita for organ on Sei gegrüsset, Jesu gütig (BWV 768) is an extended set of variations on a chorale tune. This is the most ornate of the four sets of chorale variations Bach left us and contains eleven variations on the tune. The variations range from simple to elaborate and give us a full spectrum of Bach’s powers of inventiveness.

Paul Miller – Boulder Bach Festival

A French Fantasy for Organ

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Aria in F Major, Boulder Bach Festival, Couperin, d’Anglebert, Dieupart, en ravalement, English Suites, Fantasia in G Major, First Congregational Church, French, French Suites, fugue, Grigny, Johann Nicolaus Forkel, Lüneburg, organ, overture, Overture in B minor, Overture in F Major, Pièce d’orgue, Rick Erickson, suite, viola, violin, violone, Weimar

Bach’s biographer Johann Nicolaus Forkel, who was often critical of French music and musicians, judged the French composers whom Bach studied to have been “masters of harmony and fugue.” Although he did not list these composers, we know that Bach copied music by Grigny, d’Anglebert and Dieupart and arranged a portion of L’Impériale from Couperin’s Les Nations to create the Aria in F Major (BWV 587). Bach’s interest in French music is especially evident in his English and French Suites (BWV 806-811 and 812-817) and Overtures (BWV 820 and 831), and French practices can be detected in at least one of his organ works.

Bach’s Fantasia in G Major (BWV 572) makes reference to the French style in several ways. The French title, Pièce d’orgue, is given to it in several sources, and its three movements are also titled in French: Très vitement, Gravement, Lentement. It includes a low B pedal note that would have been found only in the extended compass of French organs en ravalement, and the work has a middle section in five voices that appear to correspond to the two violin, two viola and violone instrumentation preferred by French composers for the string orchestra. It is likely that the Fantasia was composed in Weimar, about ten years after Bach had first encountered the French style in Lüneburg.

Boulder Bach Festival music director and organist Rick Erickson will perform the Fantasia in G Major at a Benefit Concert at 6:30pm on 24 May 2012 at First Congregational Church in Boulder.

The Sonatas for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord

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Boulder Bach Festival, Brandenburg Concerto no. 3 in G Major, Brandenburg Concerto no. 5 in B flat Major, Brandenburg Concertos, Carl Friedrich Abel, Christian Ferdinand Abel, concerto, continuo, da gamba, Diego Ortiz, Erbarme dich mein Gott um meiner Zähren Willen, First Congregational Church, frets, harpsichord, Leipzig, ornamentation, rebab, Rick Erickson, siciliano, sonata, sonata da chiesa, Sonata in D Major, Sonata in G Major, Sonata in G minor, Sonatas for Viola da Gamba and Harpsichord, St. Matthew Passion, Trattado de glosas, vihuela de mano, viol, viola da gamba, Weimar, Zachary Carrettin

Carl Friedrich Abel

Although the circumstances behind Bach’s composition of three Sonatas for harpsichord and viola da gamba (BWV 1027-29) are unknown, recent research indicates that they were most likely written in the early 1740’s, when the greatest virtuosos of the viola da gamba were long a thing of the past. No original source combines all three sonatas into a cycle, but a single score of the Sonata in G Major (BWV 1027) that details performance instructions for ornamentation and articulation supports the idea that Bach wrote the sonatas for Carl Friedrich Abel, the son of Cöthen colleague Christian Ferdinand Abel, for performance during his 1737-1743 sojourn in Leipzig.

The viola da gamba emerged in Spain during the fifteenth century, perhaps as a hybrid between the North African rebab and the Spanish vihuela de mano. With six strings and a fretted fingerboard, this novel instrument in various sizes traveled quickly to Italy and was soon being produced by master luthiers throughout the Continent and England. Bach became acquainted with the North German instruments owned by Johann Ernst von Sachsen-Weimar, and an inventory of Bach’s possessions shows that he owned a hundred-year-old English “viol” at the time of his death.

A description of a harpsichord collaborating with a viola da gamba can be found in the Trattado de glosas published by Diego Ortiz in 1533, but instead of the harpsichord simply introducing themes to the viol for further elaboration, Bach calls for the harpsichordist’s left hand to play basso continuo while the right hand acts as a melody instrument.

The Sonata in G Major is a reworking of a Sonata for two flutes and continuo (BWV 1039). Written in the four-movement (slow-fast-slow-fast) sonata da chiesa form, Bach infuses this sonata with the newer gallant style and engages all three voices in intense contrapuntal conversation.

The Sonata in D Major (BWV 1028) is the most virtuosic of the three sonatas for the viola da gamba, although the harpsichord remains at least an equal partner throughout. Again in four movements, the opening adagio presents an arioso-like melody shared between the two instruments, and he following allegro features a melody full of lively rhythms and exuberant momentum. The third movement, an andante, presents a siciliano melody reminiscent of Erbarme dich, mein Gott, um meiner Zähren Willen! from the St. Matthew Passion (BWV 244), and the final movement includes an extended, cadenza-like harpsichord solo similar to the one in the Brandenburg Concerto no. 5 in B flat Major (BWV 1050).

The Sonata in G minor (BWV 1029) differs from the other two sonatas in that it is in the three-movement Italian concerto form. From the outset, the harpsichord’s accompaniment resembles the orchestral texture of the Brandenburg Concerto no. 3 in G Major (BWV 1048). In the adagio, Bach exploits the viola da gamba’s capacity to soar in a movingly, tender way, and the final allegro deftly handles a profusion of themes.

Boulder Bach Festival music director Rick Erickson will join concertmaster Zachary Carrettin in a performance of the entire Sonata in G minor at a Benefit Concert at 6:30pm on 24 May 2012 at First Congregational Church in Boulder.

The Suites for Violoncello

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Anna Magdalena Bach, Boulder Bach Festival, Cöthen, cello, da gamba, da spalla, dance, First Congregational Church, La Petite Bande, Ryo Terakado, Sergey Malov, Sigiswald Kuijken, Sonatas and Partitas for Violin, suite, Suite in D Major, Suite in G Major, Suites for Unaccompanied Violoncello, viola, violoncello, violoncello da spalla, Zachary Carrettin

Bach’s six Suites for solo violoncello (BWV 1007-12) are among the most frequently performed compositions written for an unaccompanied stringed instrument. Each suite consists of six dance movements, and the entire collection is carefully conceived as a cycle as opposed to an arbitrary series of pieces.

Violoncello da spalla by Dmitry Badiarov

Most likely composed during Bach’s Cöthen period, the lack of an autographed manuscript results in uncertainty as to whether the suites were composed before or after the 1720 Sonatas and Partitas for solo violin (BWV 1001-6), and the vagueness of the early use of the term “violoncello” (“small large viol”) does not suggest whether the pieces were to be played on an instrument held da gamba (between the legs) or da spalla (on the shoulder).

Bach’s second wife, Anna Magdalena, prepared a copy of the suites and indicated that the sixth was to be performed on an instrument with a fifth string tuned a perfect fifth above the top string of our modern cello. Cellists wishing to play this Suite in D Major (BWV 1012) on a four-string cello must employ high positions to execute many of the notes, while performers of period instruments can choose either a five-string Baroque cello held da gamba or a da spalla form of the instrument.

Sigiswald Kuijken has recorded all six suites on the violoncello da spalla, as has Ryo Terakado, also of La Petite Bande. Sergey Malov, violinist, violist and relative newcomer to the violoncello da spalla, offers an online performance of the gigue from the Suite in G Major (BWV 1007).

Boulder Bach Festival concertmaster Zachary Carrettin will perform the entire Suite in G Major on viola at a Benefit Concert at 6:30pm on 24 May 2012 at First Congregational Church in Boulder.

Interview with Michael Unger: “Bach Inspirations”

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acoustics, Alexander Winterberger, Allein Gott in der Höh’ sei Ehr’, André Raison, aria, balance, blend, Boulder Bach Festival, canon, cantata, chorale, chorale prelude, Clara Schumann, dance, Dupré, First Congregational Church, Friedrich Ladegast, fugue, Kommst du nun Jesu vom Himmel herunter, Liszt, Merseburg, Michael Unger, organ, organ pipe, Passacaglia in C minor, pedal piano, piano, Salmen Organ Co., Schumann, St. John's Episcopal Cathedral, W.W. Kimball Co., Weimar, Wir danken dir Gott wir danken dir, Wir glauben all’ an einen Gott

Edward McCue (EM) What is behind the title “Bach Inspirations” that you’ve given to your concerts at St. John’s Episcopal Cathedral in Denver and First Congregational Church in Boulder?

Michael Unger (MU) With this program I’m inviting the audience to investigate some of the various ways in which Bach has inspired generations of musicians that came after him, how Bach himself may have been inspired by the music that he himself had heard, and also how we are all still inspired by Bach.

Every organist since Bach has had different ideas on how Bach’s music should be heard and appreciated, and particularly, when we get into the nineteenth century German circle of organists and composers who studied Bach and his music, we can see how those later composers tried to capture in their own language some of the aspects of what they found so beautiful and meaningful in Bach’s compositions.

The B-A-C-H piece by Franz Liszt that closes the program is a massive prelude and fugue based on the letters of Bach’s name in the musical alphabet, according to the German system of nomenclature, with “B” spelling our “b flat” and “H” spelling our “b natural.” The whole composition is based on that rather unusual and diminished motive that Bach himself used in his compositions, and it’s a thoroughly creative work that’s a real homage to Bach.

Liszt dedicated this fantasy and fugue to his Weimar associate, the organist Alexander Winterberger, in appreciation for his introduction to a huge new instrument being installed in the former cathedral at Merseburg by the organ builder Friedrich Ladegast. Liszt was so enthralled by the colors and orchestral capabilities of that instrument that the two spent days registering the piece in preparation for its inauguration by Winterberger, an effort that contributed greatly to its success.

EM Speaking of colors, how are you going to determine which registrations to use with the Kimball and Salmen instruments you’ll be playing in Denver and Boulder? Can you simply look at the name of the stops and immediately know how they will perform in combination and in succession?

MU You do know, to some extent, how things might work together by looking at the organ’s history, its stop list and the disposition of similar instruments, but much experimentation is required before you can really know how things will balance and blend. I’m especially looking forward to discovering the special characteristics of the solo sounds available from these two eclectic instruments, and, as the result of a trial and error process, how each behaves in two very different acoustical environments.

This will be especially important for the pieces by Robert Schumann, working backwards through the program, as they were written by Schumann during a rather dark period in his life when he was struggling with some severe professional, emotional and health issues. It was at the suggestion of his wife, Clara, that Schumann began to apply himself to the disciplined study of Bach’s counterpoint. This study of Bach’s canons and fugues and the many other forms of polyphony led to a number of collections of pieces for pedal piano, an instrument that few of us know that much about today. The Studien are somewhat pianistic in construction, but they are based on counterpoint, and while the collection that I’m playing in these concerts are all canonic in construction, they are all still very much in Schumann’s own personal, lyrical language.

EM Was the pedal piano capable of sustaining tones the way that the organ can, and how do you interpret music orginally written for a piano on an organ?

MU It doesn’t have that much to do with sustaining capabilities of either instrument, although the pedal piano did have a sustain pedal, just like modern pianos do, but because Schumann wrote these pieces for a type of piano, they’re perhaps a little more florid in their writing and are a little more melodically driven than most of Bach’s own works for organ.

EM It was intriguing to learn from Christoph Wolff’s Johann Sebastian Bach: The Learned Musician that Bach had collected works of André Raison in his personal library. How much impact did that French predecessor have on Bach?

MU There’s some speculation that a tiny little piece by Raison contained a fragment that could have inspired Bach in his composition of the Passacaglia in C minor (BWV 582). The Trio in passacaille by Raison, with its repeating bass line, is pretty similar to the opening measures of the bass line that Bach uses in his own Passacaglia. That’s why I wanted to pair them together.

EM As for Frenchmen, why do you think Marcel Dupré transcribed the opening Sinfonia from the cantata Wir danken dir, Gott, wir danken dir (BWV 29)? Was it just to showcase the timbres of a large French Romantic instrument?

MU It’s ever more fascinating than that. Dupré absolutely loved Bach’s music and edited the complete organ works of Bach. He taught and performed Bach all of his life, and in the case of that particular Sinfonia, I think that Dupré’s motivation for including it in his complete Bach edition was so that this cantata movement for organ and orchestra could come close to serving as an organ concerto. You’ll see that it provides a brilliant opening to the entire program.

EM Tell me about the three chorale preludes by Bach that follow the opening Sinfonia. 

MU These three different preludes illustrate three different times in Bach’s life and three different styles of writing. The first, Allein Gott in der Höh’ sei Ehr’ (BWV 662), is like an aria or lyrical song. The second, Kommst du nun, Jesu, vom Himmel herunter (BWV 650) is a chamber piece that really dances. Wir glauben all’ an einen Gott (BWV 680) serves as a sort of postlude that is quite fugal and features much more of the full organ sound than the other two pieces.

I think it will be very much an adventure to perform these chorale preludes on the two very interesting instruments in Denver and Boulder. The Kimball in Denver is a great example of an important American historical tradition, especially since the process of its renovation has just been completed. My impression on paper of the Salmen instrument in Boulder is that it should feature plenty of color and depth. I expect that both instruments will display a lot of variety and serve the entire program very well.

This will be my first trip to Colorado, and I’m looking forward to being there. I’m really honored that the Boulder Bach Festival has invited me to be part of such an ambitious series of concerts of Bach’s great music and has offered me the opportunity to perform “Bach Inspirations” on both 24 and 25 February.

Restored Kimball Organ Returns to St. John’s Cathedral

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Boulder Bach Festival, chorale prelude, First Congregational Church, Liszt, Michael Unger, organ, Passacaglia in C minor, Salmen Organ Co., Schumann, Spencer Organ Co., St. John's Episcopal Cathedral, W.W. Kimball Co.

St. John’s Episcopal Cathedral in Denver has completed a $1.6 million restoration of its 1938 Platt Rogers pipe organ, thereby culminating the celebration of the present cathedral building’s centennial. The original organ builder, W.W. Kimball Co. of Chicago, ended production in the late thirties, so the instrument, featuring nearly six thousand pipes in a three-story chamber on the left side of the chancel, is among the last of its kind. The ninety-eight ranks of pipes, crafted to emulate the sounds of instruments in an orchestra, along with the four-manualed console and windchests with electro-pneumatic action, had not been modified or updated before being cleaned, reconditioned and recently reinstalled at the cathedral by the Spencer Organ Co. of Waltham, Massachusetts.

This “American Symphonic” style of organ, with a tonal design emphasizing color, depth, contrast and power, will be featured during a 24 February 2012 Boulder Bach Festival concert entitled “Bach Inspirations” to be performed by organist Michael Unger at 7:30pm. Unger, multiple organ competition winner and recording artist on the Naxos and Pro Organo labels, will interpret chorale preludes by Bach (BWV 662, BWV 650 and BWV 680), his Passacaglia in C minor (BWV 582), and major nineteenth century organ works by Schumann and Liszt that were inspired by Bach.

This concert will be repeated the following evening at 7:30pm on the Salmen Organ at First Congregational Church in Boulder.