BUXTEHUDE: Organ Music vol. 1

Ellenberger, Volker

8.554543

The Praeludium or Praeambulum, a prelude, is a free form and one in which Buxtehude excelled. The Praeludium in G major, BuxWV 147, is a fine example of this type of composition, opening, as it does, with a passage for the pedals and an imitative section that leads to the fugal part of the work, to which the earlier passages had served as a quasi-improvisatory prelude. The Praeludium in D major, BuxWV 139, opens with an exchange of arpeggios between the two manuals, before the pedals make their entry, now in dialogue with the manuals. The first fugal subject enters with a repeated note, to be followed by a chordal Adagio and a concluding passage in toccata style, leading to final bars over a sustained tonic pedal. • The Praeludium in A minor, BuxWV 152, is relatively conventional. Its inclusion by Handel's Hamburg companion Johann Mattheson in his 1739 Der vollkommene Capellmeister of 1739, where it is wrongly attributed to Froberger, is discussed by Kerala J. Snyder in her authoritative study of Buxtehude (Dietrich Buxtehude: Organist in Lübeck, New York, 1987). In the Phrygian mode, the work opens with a freely composed section, followed by two fugues, one immediately following the other. The final example of the form here included, the Praeludium in G minor, BuxWV 149, is unusual in its inclusion of a ciaconna (chaconne), the foundation of which is heard in the pedals in the freely composed opening, leading to a fugal treatment of the ground. There is an Allegro, followed by a Largo, again treating the chaconne bass fugally, combining fugal texture with the traditional variation form.

CD x 1

Naxos

02/04/2001

636943454329