Historical Organ Literature Flashcards

The 'Récit de Nazard' designation in French Baroque organ music specifies which type of texture?

Answer: A solo line on the Nazard (twelfth) mutation stop combined with other ranks to create a distinctive flute-like color

A Récit de Nazard features a solo melody using the Nazard (2⅔' mutation stop), typically combined with a flute to produce a sweet, reedy tone.

Which 19th-century German composer wrote three large organ sonatas (Op. 65) that helped restore the fugue and chorale to prominence in Romantic organ writing?

Answer: Felix Mendelssohn

Felix Mendelssohn's Six Sonatas, Op. 65 (1845) revived contrapuntal and chorale-based writing in the Romantic period and remain standard repertoire.

The 'Magnificat' organ settings of the Baroque period were composed to serve which liturgical function?

Answer: To replace alternating verses of the Magnificat canticle during Vespers services

Magnificat organ settings replaced alternating verses in the Vespers service according to the alternatim tradition, with the organ playing even verses and choir singing odd ones.

Petr Eben's 'Moto Ostinato' from 'Sunday Music' (1958) exemplifies which 20th-century compositional approach in Czech organ music?

Answer: Integration of Slavic folk music patterns with neo-Baroque contrapuntal structures

Eben's Sunday Music combines neo-Baroque forms with rhythmic patterns influenced by Czech folk music, reflecting his synthesis of tradition and contemporary language.

The 'tiento' was the primary form of Spanish Renaissance and Baroque organ music, corresponding most closely to which Italian form?

Answer: Ricercar

The Spanish tiento, like the Italian ricercar, is a serious imitative polyphonic composition; Cabanilles and Cabezón composed outstanding examples.

Louis Vierne's 'Carillon de Westminster' (Pièces de Fantaisie, Op. 54) is built on which famous chime melody?

Answer: The Westminster Quarters, the bell melody of the Palace of Westminster clock tower

Vierne based this piece on the four-note Westminster Quarters chime pattern that rings every quarter hour on Big Ben.

The 'Dorian Toccata and Fugue' by J.S. Bach (BWV 538) is so called because of which musical feature?

Answer: It is written without a key signature but in D minor, giving it a modal appearance resembling the Dorian mode

The Dorian Toccata and Fugue in D minor is written without a key signature (as was common for D minor in Bach's time), which gives it the appearance of the Dorian mode.