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The English classical organ developed as an elegant musical instrument expressing in aesthetic terms the ideal of moderation and decorum
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Quite logically, this new philosophy was reflected in organ-building. The model of instruments established by Smith and Harris became the accepted basis for the new school of national organ-building. It was improved upon, but never radically changed until the nineteenth century. The English classical organ developed as an elegant musical instrument expressing in aesthetic terms the ideal of moderation and decorum. In 1712, the Jordans (father and son) introduced a new device, the ‘swell’, which replaced the former ‘echo’ and enabled the organist to increase or lower the sound thanks to a pedal which opened or shut blinds behind which the pipes of the corresponding keyboard were placed. Thanks to this efficient mechanical system, the organist was now able to give a more natural ‘expression’ to the melody he played, and to imitate the way a singer would swell his or her voice when singing an air. Apart from this novelty, which was soon adopted by all English builders and became a key element in the aesthetic of the national organ, nothing much changed. English organs still ignored pedals. Instead, their keyboards went down to bottom G, which enabled the organist to double the bass in octaves to accompany the choir or the congregation. The so-called ‘long compass’ survived until the beginning of the nineteenth century, while only a few instruments had pedals. Organ-cases, generally built on the west-end gallery, and surrounded by the rows of seats where the ‘charity children’ or the choir could be placed, generally did away with a detached ‘chair’ (or ‘positif’). Simply designed in a neo-classical style, they avoided extravagant decoration, just as the number of stops inside the instruments tended to be limited, compared to what continental organs of the same period would boast. Compare for instance the size of the 1721 Smith-Schreider organ in St. Paul’s Cathedral (28 stops) with that of the 1733 Thierry organ in Notre-Dame in Paris (46 stops). All this tended towards economy, balance and moderation.
In the Anglican service, outside its main role of accompaniment of the hymns and anthems, the organ was used for solo pieces, called ‘voluntaries’. The voluntary was a rather loose form, its very name suggesting its improvisational character. Very often, it was in two parts: first, a slow, meditative movement on the Diapasons, and then either a fugue or an allegro, which, later in the eighteenth century, tended to be played on the Cornet stop. An intriguing Voluntary on the Old Hundredth by Henry Purcell (or maybe his master John Blow?), intended for a ‘double organ’ (that is, an instrument with two distinct keyboards), presents the hymn tune as a cantus firmus, four successive times interspersed with commentaries. Though a common device in German music, this is a unique instance in the English music of the period. The English voluntary was as it were disconnected from all liturgical thematic material. The organ contributed to the cementing together of the congregation, and it was part of the decorum of the service, but, contrary to the Lutheran tradition, it did not elaborate on the material of the hymns sung by the congregation.
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