Organ landscape Moscow

The Moscow organ landscape comprises more than 40 organs in and around Moscow .

history

Since organs are not used in Orthodox churches , organ music in Moscow was initially limited to the court of the grand dukes and tsars and later also to aristocrats, commoners, churches of foreign denominations, concert halls and music training centers.

The oldest surviving information about an organ in Moscow is the Italian organist Giovanni Salvatore (Ioann Spasitel), who was born in 1490 by the wife of Grand Duke Ivan III. was brought to Moscow. In 1578 a Danish organ builder Daniel Gottlieb Eilhof was mentioned, and in 1586 the purchase of an organ from England. In the 17th century there were Polish and Dutch organ builders in Moscow, names of Russian organists are known. Under Tsar Peter I , more organs were built since the late 17th century, also in churches by foreigners, for example in 1697 by Arp Schnitger from Hamburg and in 1715 as well. Tsar Peter was so impressed by the Casparini organ there during his visit to Görlitz in 1715 that he asked the organist Christian Ludwig Boxberg to draw up plans for a monster organ with 94 and 114 registers for the cathedral, which was never built.

In the 18th century, lessons in organ playing were offered at the Slavic-Greek-Latin Institute and in the Educational House. The organist Johann Wilhelm Häßler from Erfurt , who settled in Moscow in 1794 , had a major influence on Moscow's musical life . He had learned from his uncle Johann Christian Kittel , who had himself been a student of Johann Sebastian Bach . Hässler inspired the Muscovites with his organ playing and made them familiar with Bach's music.

In the 19th century organs were built for some concert halls. Concerts also took place in churches abroad, for example in 1843 by Franz Liszt in the German St. Peter and Paul Cathedral . New organs were created, mainly by German organ builders, the oldest preserved is an instrument by Friedrich Ladegast from 1868, which is now in the Glinka Museum . The composer Michail Glinka appreciated playing the organ very much and liked to improvise.

At the end of the 19th century, training for organists was created at the conservatory . In 1899, Aristide Cavaillé-Coll built a new organ for the Conservatory, which was shown in the Russian Pavilion at the World Exhibition in Paris the following year and which came to Moscow in 1901.

After the revolution, the foreign churches were closed around 1920, but the organs in the concert halls remained and continued to be played. In the 1950s and 1970s three organs were ordered from Schuke from Potsdam and from Rieger-Kloss from the ČSSR.

After the political upheaval, numerous new instruments were built in Moscow, mainly by Western European companies, and only three by a Russian organ building company. The instruments in the Sarjadje concert hall and in the International House of Music are the largest in Russia with 82 and 84 registers, respectively, after the organ in Königsberg Cathedral.

Organs (selection)

Existing organs in Moscow

The largest organs are

place	Organ builder	year	image	Manuals	register	Remarks
International House of Music	Glatter-Götz organ building , Owingen; Johannes Klais organ building	2004		IV / P	84	third largest organ in Russia with 5582 pipes
Concert hall «Zaryadye»	Muhleisen , France	2018		IV / P	82	second largest organ in Russia with around 7800 pipes
Tchaikovsky concert hall	Rieger-Kloss, ČSSR	1959		IV / P	82	Opus 3255
Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception , Catholic	Kuhn Orgelbau , Männedorf, Switzerland	1955; Established in 2005		IV / P	73	Built in 1955 in Basel Minster with IV / P, 74, in 2005 moved to Moscow by Orgelbau Schmid , Kaufbeuren
Conservatory , Great Hall	Aristide Cavaillé-Coll , Paris	1899		III / P	50	Shown in 1900 at the World Exhibition in Paris, installed in Moscow in 1901, work carried out in 1958 by Hermann Lahmann, Leipzig, 1968 by Wilhelm Sauer, Frankfurt / Oder, 1980 by Michel, Merklin & Kuhn, Lyon and in 2016 Rieger , Schwarzach
Reformed Church, today Baptist Church	Ernst Röver , Hausneindorf	1898		III / P	38	Opus 73
Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul , Evangelical Lutheran	Wilhelm Sauer , Frankfurt / Oder	1898		III / P	33	Opus 755; Restored in 2006 by Reinhard Hüfgen
Bolshoi Theater	Glatter-Götz, Owingen	2013		II / P	31
Moscow Music Museum (previously Glinka Museum)	Schuke organ building , Potsdam	1976		II / P	28	Opus 467
Conservatory , Small Hall	Hans-Joachim Schuke , Potsdam	1959		II / P	26th	Opus 302; previously Ladegast organ from 1868, this one in the Glinka Museum
Central clinic, mourning room	Mönch & Prachtel , Überlingen	1987		II / P	25th	Repaired in 2014 by Dmitrij Below

literature

• Douglas E. Bush, Richard Kassel (eds.): The organ. To encyclopedia. Routledge, New York 2006, ISBN 0-415-94174-1 , pp. 479 f.

Web links

Commons : Organs in Moscow  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Where do Moscow's best organ concerts take place? according to Rossiyskaya Gazeta on Russia Beyond , December 10, 2016
• Organ database The organ page ; when entering Moscow the city's largest organs
• Organ in Russia (Russian)
• Organ music in Russia (Russian)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Moscow, International House of Music Klais (German)
2. ↑ Die Orgel ( Memento of the original from December 25, 2018 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. International House of Music (Russian) 
3. ↑ Travaux en cours en 2018 Manufacture d'orgues Muhleisen
4. ↑ Construction of one of the largest organs in Russia completed. Orgelbau Schmid Kaufbeuren eK
5. ↑ Kuhn organ (Russian)
6. ↑ Moscow Bolshoi Theater Orgelbau Glatter-Götz (English)
7. ↑ Schuke Schuke Orgelbau, p. 33, No. 467 (pdf)
8. ^ Moscow, mourning hall of the central clinic Mönch Orgelbau Überlingen
9. ↑ Ремонт органа Ритуального зала Центральной клинической больницы УДП. Москва, 2014 г. [Repairs to the organ] Dmitrij Below workshop (Russian)