A Baroque Organ Christmas
Early Music for Christmas and Advent
Streamed Live from Ascension Episcopal Parish
Emma Mildred Riggle, organ
Saturday, December 19, 2020, 4pm PST (7pm EST)
Admission is free. Tips gratefully accepted at Vemno: @EmmaMRiggle or at https://paypal.me/EmmaRiggle
Baroque Organ Christmas: My Favorite Kind of Christmas
At Ascension Episcopal Parish, I have the privilege of playing a charming little one-manual Baroque-style tracker organ, built in 1973 by Kenneth Coulter. It’s smaller, sweeter and gentler than your average grand cathedral organ (I love those too!) and it’s ideal for a certain type of early organ repertoire.
In the Renaissance and the Baroque, when small organs like this were more common, many composers wrote music specifically designed for the capabilities of little pipe organs with only one or two manuals (keyboards for the hands), and only a few stops (stops are the knobs I pull to change which set of pipes speaks as I play: Ascension’s organ has a choice of five different ranks of pipes, each with its own unique sound.)
I love this early organ repertoire, particularly the works of early and mid-Baroque composers, like Dutch organist Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck and Danish organist Dietrich Buxtehude. Most of all, I love their compositions for Advent and Christmas, which often brought out Baroque composers’ most profoundly beautiful expressions, and their sweetest, most charming music.
You can imagine my disappointment when it became clear that COVID restrictions were going to prevent me from playing live music for my congregation during Advent and Christmastide. Variations on Unto Us a Boy Is Born just aren’t the same in the middle of Lent, or whenever it is I’ll get to see parishioners in person again.
That’s why I’m playing this livestream recital in December. I hope to bring you a bit of holiday cheer, and a bit of spiritual solace, but mostly I can’t stand the thought of going an entire Christmas season without playing you my favorite pieces.
Program
Here are some of the pieces I’m planning to share with you in the livestream recital. They range from profoundly moving to adorably charming (dare I say it, perhaps even silly?), and all of them play nicely on Ascension’s unique little pipe organ.
jan pieterszoon Sweelinck (1562-1621)
Chorale Prelude on Freu dich sehr, o meine Seele
Chorale Variations on Puer nobis nascitur
dietrich buxtehude (c.1637/9-1707)
Chorale Prelude on Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern BuxWV 223
Franz xaver murschhauser (1663-1738)
Variations on Lasst uns das Kindelein wiegen, In Imitation of a Cuckoo
michel corrette (1707-1795)
From Suite No. 1 in Nouveau Livre de Noëls
2. Joseph est bien marié
Jean-François Dandrieu (1682-1738)
From Livre de noëls pour l’orgue et le clavecin (1759)
46. Vous qui désirez san fin
JOhann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750)
Der Tag, der ist so Freudenreich BWV 719
Wir Christenleut BWV 1090
Das alte Jahr vergangen ist BWV 1091
Johann Michael Bach (1648-1694)
Chorale Prelude on In dulci jubilo