Merck toch hoe Sterck

As this is my 600th upload, I tried to find something a bit special.

Going through my sheet music I discovered a long-forgotten piece I played many years ago: Merck toch hoe Sterck.
It is a song from 1626 on a text by Adriaan Valerius and an Italian dancing tune.

At the time the Dutch were fighting the Spanish, as the Spanish king Philips II had inherited the Netherlands.
In Bergen op Zoom the Dutch “Geuzen” (= sea pirates) took a stand when the city was besieged, together with the inhabitants.
After three month the battlewas won. In the end the Spaniards withdrew and left the Netherlands; hence the triumphant song.
It was a turning point in a war that lasted 80 years.

Paul Christiaan van Westering (1911-1999) was a Dutch composer. He was most famous for the children’s melodies he wrote to poems of Annie M.G. Schmidt. He excelled in music for children and was marvelous at making a unity of text and music.

One of his (few) organ works is a set of variations on “Merck toch hoe sterck” dedicated to Feike Asma. In the piece he flirts with Feike Asma’s style of playing along side a few variations of his own in a modern idiom. It is a rather nice.

Especially parts 4 and 9 are typically Asma!
I played as follows:

1: Theme "Merck toch hoe Sterck"
2. Poco Staccato
3: Iets langzamer
4: Andante
5: Not recorded
6: Not recorded
7: Not recorded
8: Vivace
9: Glorioso