William Herschel’s Fugues for Organ
The latest volume of William Herschel’s organ music – containing Six Fugues – edited by David Baker and Christopher Bagot has now been published by Fitzjohn Music Publications. Further details are available at http://www.impulse-music.co.uk/fitzjohnmusic/. http://www.impulse-music.co.uk/fitzjohnmusic/
Herschel’s life and Career
Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel was born in 1738 in Hanover, Germany, one of ten children (only six of whom survived to adulthood) of Isaac and Anna Herschel. Along with his elder brother Jacob and younger brothers Alexander and Dietrich, William (as he later became known in England) received a sound musical education from his father Isaac. At the age of fifteen, Herschel was in the local militia, visiting England in 1756. The following year he resigned and came to London with brother Jacob on a more permanent basis. By this time, he was proficient on violin, oboe and organ (having perhaps been taught by Jacob) as well as a good linguist.
By early 1760, William was head of a small band of two oboes and two horns in the North Yorkshire militia. Dr Edward Miller, Organist of Doncaster Parish Church, saw Herschel’s potential and he soon become well known across the region, composing many symphonies and concertos as well as performing on the oboe and violin and directing prestigious concerts. Herschel was also sought out as a teacher of nobility and gentry, often giving up to 40 lessons a week. Herschel became director of concerts in Leeds in 1762. This resulted in further success as a performer, but he decided that having a regular post as organist would give more financial security. He was regularly practising on the organ at Leeds Parish Church by 1766. In August of that same year, he became organist at Halifax Parish Church, where Johann Snetzler had recently completed a large three-manual organ. Herschel only stayed for three months, however, leaving on 30 November,1766 to be organist at the newly-established Octagon Chapel in Bath.
Herschel went on to carve out a highly successful career in what was then one of the premier and most fashionable cities in England. The fact that he was now in lucrative and steady employment meant that he could devote himself increasingly to science and astronomy, which he did on a full-time basis from 1782, when he retired from the Octagon Chapel, moving to Windsor in 1785. His organist appointments in Halifax and Bath encouraged and indeed necessitated that he should compose and make music on a substantial scale. Aside from his works for organ, his compositions – mostly written by the late 1760s – included symphonies, concertos, harpsichord sonatas an opera, an oratorio, instrumental and secular vocal music as well as pieces for the choir of the Octagon Chapel, the latter written after 1767. John Herschel’s catalogue of his father’s musical output lists over 80 works for organ, including two organ concertos. Until now, little has been published or recorded. The organ compositions often include detailed registrations that may have been for the organs at Leeds and Halifax. No specification of the former instrument in the 1760s survives, but that for Halifax is given at the end of this editorial note as an aid to registration of the music.
The Present Volume
This edition has been transcribed from the autograph score in Edinburgh University Library. The title page of the autograph score reads: ’Six Fugues for the/Organ’, although the individual pieces are all marked ‘Sonata’, but then after a slow introduction each work is marked ‘Fuga’. There are no registration or dynamic markings in any of the pieces; nor are there many indications as to which manuals are to be used, although the fugue in Sonata III refers to use of the Swell manual and forte and piano effects are marked in the fugues of Sonatas V and VI. All but one of the pieces is in the major key; every introductory movement is in 3/4 time (pieces I-III and VI also being marked ‘Adagio’); only one of the fugal movements (number I) has a tempo marking (‘Presto’). Apart from the first Fuga, which is in 6/8 time, all the fugal movements are in 4/4 time.
The opening sections of each piece are written in a slow-moving, lilting triple-time style, with full chords, not least in the left hand, where there is much doubling of the bass line. Sonata III differs from this approach with less than characteristic left-hand arpeggios. The fugues all follow a similar pattern. Rarely is the music in ‘strict’ counterpoint for other than a few measures, even in the opening sections. Fugue III is a good example of this approach. This is even the case in fugue II, where in the original manuscript the composer draws attention to his augmentation of the opening subject without then developing it significantly. But then, Herschel was known to ‘love melody and hated fugues’.[1]
Was this a case of composing in this form because he felt that he had to? Despite the titles of the pieces, and the implication that the writing will be contrapuntal, there are long, often chordal, interludes which employ sequences and pedal or inverted pedal points. Modulation is to the expected keys – dominant, relative major, relative minor, and so on. Rarely is there any ornamentation, though the last bars of fugues IV-VI offer a pause, where (as would be customary at the time) the performer can improvise a cadenza, as desired. All the pieces have sections where the left hand is doubling the bass line, as if compensating for the lack of pedals. Sonata IV is notable for ending with low-pitched chords.
Editorial Approach
The original scores use C clefs in places. Passages noted in this way have been transcribed using either G or F clefs as appropriate. Registration instructions have been regularised where there is inconsistency. Cautionary or suggested accidentals have been added where appropriate. In some passages, Herschel adds horizontal lines to the notes of the bass line, indicating that these should be played in octaves. In this edition, these additional notes are all written out. Other editorial additions are denoted by [ ] or () in the case of added or cautionary accidentals. Notes in smaller type and dotted slurs and ties are also editorial.
Performance Practice
The pieces were written for a G compass organ with Swell manual but without pedals, though there is occasional evidence that Herschel was imitating the organs of his homeland – with pedals – in his writing for the left hand. The last page of the autograph score of the 12 Full Organ Pieces (first set) contains the specification of what appears to be a two-manual organ typical of the period:
Gr[eat]
Open Dia[pason]
Stop’d Dia[pason]
Princ[ipal]
Flute
12th
15th
Sesqui[altera] [Bass?]
Corn[et] [Treble?]
Trump[et] [Bass?]
Trump[et] [Treble?]
[Swell]
Open D[iapason]
Princ[ipal]
Trump[et]
Hautb[oy]
This matches the stop list of the Octagon Chapel in Bath reconstructed by David Shuker from markings in the performing parts of Herschel’s two organ concertos played during the opening of the Chapel.[1] This fact, together with the lack of registration instructions, might suggest that at least some of the organ music was written with the Bath organ in mind. It should also be noted that Herschel taught private pupils, some of whom might have had chamber organs in their homes. Could some of the music. have been written for secular rather than sacred purposes? However, the Six Fugues are substantial pieces that would have tested both the organist’s technique and the resources of the instrument. Perhaps these compositions were therefore intended for a much larger and more versatile instrument of three manuals such as that at Halifax Parish Church.
Choir
Open Diapason
Stopped Diapason
Principal
Flute
Fifteenth
Cremona
Bassoon (‘up to c’)
Vox Humana
Great
Open Diapason
Open Diapason
Stopped Diapason
Principal
Twelfth
Fifteenth
Sesquialtra IV [with tierce]
Furniture III [without tierce]
Cornet V (from middle c)
Trumpet
Bass Clarion
Swell (enclosed)
Open Diapason
Stopped Diapason
Principal
Cornet III
Hautboy
Trumpet
Compasses: Choir and Great – GG (no GG#) – e3 57 notes; Swell g – e3 34 notes
No couplers
[1] Lubbock, C. (1933), The Herschel Chronicle: The Life-Story of William Herschel and his Sister Caroline Herschel. Cambridge: CUP, p.36
[2] http://www.npor.org.uk/NPORView.html?RI=E01258. See also Organists’ Review June 2013 p.36