Even though our service this morning has a great deal of musical variety, I’d like to comment specifically on the organ voluntaries. The prelude, Benedictus of Max Reger, and the postlude, the Fugue in G Minor by J.S. Bach, are two of my favorite pieces. Reger was profoundly influenced by Bach, and was once quoted as saying, “In music, I owe everything to J.S. Bach.” I think many organists, who play and cherish Bach’s organ music, would also echo this sentiment in some way. With Reger, his admiration for Bach runs deep. Perhaps you can even sense this in listening to these very different compositions this morning.

Both of these composers wrote complex music, but it goes so much further than that. Their complexity is wicked, yet it is profound, poignant, and deeply emotional. Actually, Reger delighted in writing difficult music, and I think to some degree, Bach did too. For example, Bach wrote a series of Trio Sonatas, which are notoriously bewildering for the performer – but intentionally so. The Trio Sonatas were not only meant to serve as a beautiful, artistic expression, but as a pedagogical tool to help his students master the technical demands of reading and rendering three, independent lines of music (right hand, left hand, and pedal). The technical proficiency that it takes to play the Trio Sonatas often sends the novice organist running for the hills. Reger aspired to the formidable intricacy of Bach’s music too, and strove to create equally complex, yet emotionally moving music.

The Benedictus is slow, lush, and it constantly shifts and oozes around various tonal centers. Bach’s music does that too, although I wouldn’t say it oozes from note to another. Rather, Bach’s music snaps, hops, and zips through a web of interlacing melody. In the second section of the Benedictus, you’ll hear the organ climax to a dramatic peak, and then descend to an ending that is as soft as the organ can play. It’s a handful to manipulate the organ to make these subtle dynamic contrasts. However, it gives the listener an appreciation for the full dynamic range of the mighty pipe organ, while providing a medium for a reverence and solemnity in the music itself. For a completely different set of reasons, the postlude is off-the-chain complicated. The fugue, from the famous Fantasy and Fugue in G Minor, is a bewildering galaxy of independent musical lines that seem to swirl around an ever-changing tonal center. The music moves in so many surprising, and perplexing ways that when the ending comes, it’s so satisfying, and it’s so “complete.” I hope you enjoy learning about the organ, as much as I enjoy telling you about it and playing it. There are no words that can fully describe the meaning of pieces like this. I hope that when you hear the music in person, it “says” more than the words you read about it. Soli deo Gloria!