Sunday, October 21, 9.30 pm
Church of São João Evangelista (Colégio)

Poulenc, Organ Concerto
Vincent Dubois, organ
Madeira Classical Orchestra
Rui Pinheiro, direction

Though not precisely liturgical, the organ pieces performed in today’s programme were conceived, even though in different circumstances, under the influence of a certain religious feeling. The so-called “French romantic organ school” has its roots in the teachings of the Belgian Jaak Nikolaas Lemmens (whose Méthode d’orgue disseminated for the first time in Belgium and France the principles of absolute legato, of the technique of the modern pedalboard and of rigorous study) and the symphonic idiom of César Franck (also of Belgian origin). However, the factor which perhaps contributed most to the creation and dissemination of a new organ school was the work of the French organ builder Aristide Cavaillé-Coll. Much influenced by Franck’s idiom and Lemmens’s ideas, Cavaillé-Coll built in France, during the last decades of the 19th century some five hundred instruments symphonically conceived (some of large proportions), creating a new sonority which would come to alter radically the French organ world. This sonority, which, according to Charles-Marie Widor, allowed the organ to become a “mystical instrument”, influenced all the French composer-organists of the beginning of the 20th century, who exploited it in many ways.

On 20 June 1940, the German army crossed the defence line of Saumur in France. Amongst the many French soldiers who perished trying to stop the invasion was Jehan Alain who, at only twenty-nine years of age, thus had his brilliant career as an organist and composer cut off. Alain’s death was mourned by the French musical community, who had considered him as one of the most promising composers of the century and the darling of the last generation of the French school. Amongst the composers who wished to pay homage to his memory was Maurice Duruflé, who was his fellow pupil at the Paris Conservatoire. Duruflé wrote in 1942 the Prélude et fugue sur le nom d’Alain, which bears the dedication “A la mémoire de Jehan Alain, mort pour la France”. The prelude maintains an obsessive movement in triplets (based on a cell of five notes, A-D-A-A-F, derived from the letters A-L-A-I-N), upon which is superimposed periodically a more lyrical melodic motif and, near the end, an allusion to the theme of Alain’s Litanies. There follows a double fugue, whose first theme is based on the same five notes. After a second fugue, with a much more agitated theme, both themes are superimposed in a series of increasingly complex combinations. The fugue is conceived as a crescendo (in terms of dynamics and complexity and of dramatic intensity) and ends on an apotheotic note.

Évocation, by Marcel Dupré, was first performed by the composer on 26 October 1941, on the great Cavaillé-Coll organ of the Basilica of Saint-Ouen in Rouen, of which Albert Dupré (the father of Marcel) had been the titular organist for twenty-eight years. The composer evokes simultaneously the memory of his father, who had died ten months before, and the instrument itself. Allegro deciso, the third and final movement of Évocation, is a triumphant finale, an unshakeable conclusion after the second movement, far more introspective in character and more hesitant harmonically. It is interesting to note this choice of a victorious finale, following a long, section, tortuous and reticent, both in the Prélude et fugue sur le nom d’Alain by Duruflé, and in the Évocation by Dupré – two works written during the time of the German occupation in the Second World War.

Antiche arie e danze is a set of three orchestral suites by the Italian composer Ottorino Respighi, written on the basis of free transcriptions of pieces originally for lute. Respighi’s activity as a musicologist and his interest in Italian music from the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries led him to compose a number of works inspired by the music of those periods. The Suite no. 3 was composed in 1932 and is the only one of the three for strings only. Respighi based it on lute pieces by Jean-Baptiste Besard and by Santino Garsi da Parma, a piece for baroque guitar by Ludovico Roncalli, and other works by anonymous composers.

Thought not an organist, Francis Poulenc wrote several works in which the organ has an important role. In 1936, after the death of a friend, Poulenc made a pilgrimage to the Marian sanctuary of Rocamadour – an experience which apparently revived his Catholic convictions. This reborn faith influenced not only the sacred works which Poulenc produced from that time on, but also the conception of the Concerto for Organ, Strings and Timpani, whose compositional process had already been initiated, following a commission from the Princess Edmonde de Polignac in 1934. Poulenc, who until then had never written for organ, dedicated himself to the study of the great works for the instrument by Bach and Buxtehude. The whole Concerto breathes a neo-baroque atmosphere, and it is impossible not to notice the analogy between the entry of the organ and the beginning of the Fantasy and Fugue in G minor by Bach. Poulenc was also advised (especially concerning the registration) by Maurice Duruflé, who was the soloist at the private première of the work on 16 December 1938, on the Cavaillé-Coll organ of the Princess de Polignac’s salon.

João Vaz

Maurice Duruflé (1902-1986)

¬ Prélude et fugue sur le nom d’Alain, Op. 7 (1942) *

Marcel Dupré (1886-1971)

¬ Évocation, symphonic poem
› 3. Allegro deciso *

Ottorino Respighi (1879-1936)

¬ Antiche danze ed arie per liuto, Suite III (1932)
› I. Anónimo Anonymous: Italiana. Andantino
› II. Jean-Baptiste Besard: Aria di corte.
Andante cantabile
› III. Anónimo Anonymous: Siciliana.
Andantino
› IV. Ludovico Roncalli: Passacaglia.
Maestoso – Vivace

Francis Poulenc (1899-1963)

¬ Concerto for organ, timpani and strings in g minor (1938)

* solo organ

Participants

Notes about the organ

Church of São João Evangelista (Colégio), Funchal

This instrument, with 1586 sounding pipes, is situated in a religious space with certain particularities. As a church typical of those belonging to Jesuit colleges, with a broad nave and quite a gentle acoustic, the organ had to be specially conceived, especially with regard to the measurements of the pipes. Thus all the pipework of the instrument has been specifically tailored to produce a full sound, and each stop produces a timbre with an individual personality, forming part of a harmonic ensemble based more on the sound of fundamentals and less on harmonics. It was also felt to be essential to give the instrument a certain ‘latin’ sonority that would favour performance of ancient music of the Italian, Spanish and Portuguese schools of the 17th and 18th centuries.

Another aspect to be taken into consideration was the need to complement the current range of organs available locally: the new organ responds in an ideal fashion to the performance of works of periods and of technical and artistic requirements that none of the 24 historic instruments of Madeira cater adequately for. It also enhances the range of organs that constitute the island’s heritage by being present in this particular religious space, as well as by existing side by side with other historical instruments. In the decision to build it for this church, not only were the issues of acoustic, aesthetic and liturgical space taken into account, but also the presence there of an important historic instrument which is currently on the list of instruments undergoing restoration.

I Manual - Órgão Principal (C-g’’’)
Flautado aberto de 12 palmos (8’)
Flautado tapado de 12 palmos (8’)
Oitava real (4’)
Tapado de 6 palmos (4’)
Quinzena (2’)
Dezanovena e 22ª
Mistura III
Corneta IV
Trompa de batalha* (bass)
Clarim* (treble)
Fagote* (bass)
Clarineta* (treble)

II Manual - Órgão Positivo (C-g’’’)
Flautado aberto de 12 palmos (8’)
Tapado de 12 palmos (8’)
Flautado aberto de 6 palmos (4’)
Dozena (2 2/3’)
Quinzena (2’)
Dezassetena (1 3/5’)
Dezanovena (1 1/3)
Címbala III
Trompa real (8’)

Pedal (C-f’)
Tapado de 24 palmos (16’)
Bordão de 12 palmos (8’)
Flautado de 6 palmos (4’)
Contrafagote de 24 palmos (16’)
Trompa de 12 palmos (8’)

Couplers
II/I
I/Pedal
II/Pedal

* horizontal reeds