Praeludium und Fuge d-Moll, Op. 16, Nr. 3

Clara Schumann (1819–1896)
Praeludium und Fuge d-Moll, Op. 16, Nr. 3
Transcribed for organ by Joachim Dorfmüller
Furore-Edition 122 (1988)

0:00 — Praeludium: Andante
2:48 — Fuge: Andante con moto

Clara Schumann composed her three Preludes and Fugues, Op. 16, for piano in 1845 when Robert Schumann was occupied with his Studies for Pedal Piano and the Six Fugues on B-A-C-H for organ or pedal piano.

In the preface to his 1988 transcription, Joachim Dorfmüller points to this shared fascination with Baroque forms and counterpoint, with Mendelssohn as an important influence. Of Clara's three works, he considers No. 3 particularly suited to the organ, citing its balance of homophonic and polyphonic writing and its motivic, thematic, and harmonic kinship with the sound worlds of Mendelssohn ala Bach.

That made the choice of organ particularly interesting.

This recording uses the Gallery Schlicker at First Congregational Church of Los Angeles, sampled by Evensong. At first, an instrument associated with the twentieth-century Orgelbewegung might seem an unlikely home for Clara Schumann.

The two worlds are not as distant as they appear, though.

The early Leipzig circle looked backward toward Bach, contrapuntal craft, older forms, and admired historical organs while creating something distinctly contemporary. A century later, the Orgelbewegung would recycle something of that same Zeitgeist: once again, the past became a means of renewing the present.

The Schlicker's wealth of 8′ color allows the Mendelssohn-like manual contrasts suggested by Dorfmüller, while its extraordinary transparency keeps Clara's increasingly dense counterpoint clear as the fugue grows.

Clara Schumann works on the Schlicker not because the instrument can be made to sound Romantic, but because both music and instrument emerged, a century apart, from moments when musicians believed the future might be discovered by listening again to the past.