Harald Vogel plays Baroque music on the 1699 Schnitger organ in Ganderkesee

From a NDR-Kultur broadcast on May 23, 2015. Harald Vogel plays on the 1699 Schnitger organ in St. Cyptian- und Corneliuskirche of Ganderkesee. Dietrich Buxtehude 0:01 Praeludium in g-Moll, BuxWV 163 7:59 Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, Choralfantasie G-Dur, BuxWV 223 15:34 Passacaglia d-Moll, BuxWV 161 22:10 Toccata in F, BuxWV 157 27:33 'Vater unser im Himmelreich' (4 Verses), BuxWV 207 36:07 Heinrich Scheidemann: Toccata in C 40:23 Samuel Scheidt: Magnificat noni Toni, SSWV 148 52:06 Johann Lorentz: Praeludium in d Organ description: (source: GoArt Arp Schnitger Organ Database) The location was first mentioned in the late ninth century, and it is likely that at this early time there was already a wooden church. In 1050, Archbishop Adalbert of Bremen established a synodal church, which was located in a wooded area west of Bremen. The oldest part of the church is the Romanesque west tower built of fieldstone, whose lower story dates from the twelfth century. The size of the Gothic three-nave hall church is surprising, and almost corresponds to the dimensions of a town church. After the restoration of the twentieth century, in which the double galleries from the Baroque period disappeared, the church now has a reverberant acoustic, which beneficially amplifies the sound of the organ. The contract with Schnitger on April 19, 1699 was for a two-manual organ with Hauptwerk, Brustwerk and pull-down pedal with 16 registers. On October 17 of that year the organ was approved. This short construction time gives us a way to measure the capacity of the Schnitger workshop. The year before in the city of Bremen alone, Schnitger had delivered the two grand organs in the Dom and in St. Stephani for which he produced more than 90 registers. It is also possible that the Hamburg workshop relied on existing components to be able to deliver this very inexpensive project. In the Brustwerk, which has a rare plank windchest, a reed register is missing. In 1760 Johann Hinrich Klapmeyer added an independent pedal with 6 registers in two side towers. The façade of the Hauptwerk and Pedal each have a Principal 8'. In the nineteenth century, three generations of the Schmid organ-builder family from Oldenburg worked at the organ, the Pedal mixture was replaced by a Subbass 16'. In 1890 some high Schnitger registers and reeds were replaced with new ones in the style of the day. In 1917 the Schnitger façade pipes did not need to be given up to the war effort because they had a high lead content. Alfred Führer (Wilhelmshaven) began efforts to return the organ to its pre-nineteenth-century state already in 1934-35, which continued in 1966, but with an inadequate technical concept. With the thorough restoration by Heiko Lorenz (Wilhelmshaven), which was completed in 2005, a return to the eighteenth-century state of the organ could be achieved. The Subbass, which in previous work in the twentieth century had not been adequately replaced, was now replaced using old construction methods. The old manual keyboards were fitted with rounded natural keyplates, as they are still preserved in Dedesdorf in the style of the Schnitger workshop. Hauptwerk CDEFGA - c3 (45 keys) Principal 8' 1699 Quintadena 16' 1699 Rohrflöte 8' 1699 Octave 4' 1699 Super Octave 2' 1699 Wald Flöte 2' 2005 Quinte 1 1/3' 2005 Sesquialtera II 1699/2005 Mixtur IV 2005 Trompete 8' 2005 Brustwerk CDEFGA - c3 (45 keys) Gedackt 8' 1699 Blockflöte 4' 1699 Octave 2' 2005 Spitzflöte 2' 1699 Sifflöte 1 1/3' 2005 Scharff III 2005 Pedal CDE - d1 Principal 8' 1760 Subbass 16' 2005 Octave 4' 1760 Posaune 16' 1760/1820 Trompete 8' 2005 Trompete 4' 2005 Tremulant Schiebekoppel/Shove coupler BW/HW Temperament: Modified meantone at a1 ≈ 466 Hz