Page:A Dictionary of Music and Musicians vol 2.djvu/591

ORGAN bellows—being above. Several of the pipes were so far of an exceptionally large size, probably foreshadowing the Double Diapason of subsequent times, that some were 'conducted hither, others thither'; that is to say, in organ-builders' language, they were 'conveyanced off' pipes, and were probably brought into view and so grouped as to form an ornamental front, exactly as in the present day. The 'tongues' were perforated with 'hidden holes,' after the manner explained by Theophilus; and there were the remarkable number of ten pipes to each playing-slide 'in their due order,' whatever that 'order' may have been.

The organ had a total number of forty tongues; and as the organist had the help of two assistants, and each 'managed his own alphabet,' the lettered tongues must have been assorted into three sets. The remarks of the same writer on the voicing of pipes show it to be quite probable that the three divisions of this organ produced as many different strengths of tone, like the separate manuals of a modern instrument. The gamut of the instrument consisted of the seven diatonic sounds, with 'the music of the lyric semitone (B flat) added.' This last expression is interesting, as showing not only that the introduction of the B flat was unusual, but that its effect was musical. It modified the tritone which existed between F and B.

Sufficient is indicated in this account to enable one, after some thought, to offer a suggestion as to the most probable range of the three sets of playing-slides of this Winchester organ. A series of eleven diatonic sounds, from C to F, making with the B flat (lyric semitone) twelve, would be all that was required by the old chants as an accompaniment, and would dispose of thirty-six of the notes. The chief alphabet may not improbably have descended one note lower, to B&#x266e; and three higher, to B&#x266d;, a compass that was afterwards frequently adopted by the mediæval organ-makers; or may have had two extra diatonic notes both above and below, extending the range to two octaves, namely from A to A, corresponding with the ancient 'Disjunct or Greater System Complete.' In either case the exact number of ' forty tongues' would thus be accounted for. These assumed ranges are exhibited in the following diagram.

The description of the organist's opening or closing the holes 'as the individual nature of the varied sound requires,' clearly indicates that he manipulated for single notes only; in fact, with slides he could for successive sounds do no more than draw forward with one hand as he pushed home with the other.

The contrast from 'loud' to 'soft' and back, which from an organ was probably heard for the first time in this example, would be obtained by 'the organist' himself ceasing, and letting one of his assistants take up the strain, and then by his again resuming it; but whether the three, when simultaneously engaged, still played the melody only, or whether they occasionally 'battered the ears' of the congregation with some of the hideous progressions instituted by Hucbald in his 'Organum' in the 10th century, it probably now would not be easy to ascertain. If the latter, it is quite possible that the chants of the period were sometimes clothed in such harmony as the following; the 'organist' playing the plain-song, and each of the attendants one of the under parts:—

If the din caused by the zealous organist and his 'two brethren (religious) of concordant spirit' was such that the tone 'reverberated and echoed in every direction, so that no one was able to draw near and hear the sound, but had to stop with his hands his gaping ears,' which could 'receive no sound but that alone,' it is evident that the race of noisy organ accompanyists dates much farther back than has generally been supposed, and existed before 'lay' performers were heard of.

We now arrive at a period when a vast improvement was made in the manner of constructing the organ. It has been shown that when the Winchester organ was made, and onwards to the date of the treatise by Theophilus, the method of admitting wind to, or of excluding it from the pipes of a note, was by a slide, which alternately covered and exposed the underside of the holes leading up to its pipes. The frictional resistance of the slides, at all times trying, would inevitably be increased by their swelling in damp weather and becoming tight; they would certainly have to be lengthened for every pipe added, which would make them heavier and harder to move with the hand; and they involved the twofold task, already mentioned, of simultaneously thrusting one slide back while another was being drawn out. These circumstances, added to the fact that a given resistance can be overcome with less difficulty by a blow than by a pull with the fingers and thumb, must have directed attention to the possibility of substituting pressure for traction in the manipulation of the organ. Thus it is recorded that towards the end of the 11th century huge keys, or rather levers, began to be used as the means for playing the instrument; and however unwieldy these may have been, they were nevertheless the first rude steps towards providing the organ with a keyboard. A spring-box, too, of some kind was almost of necessity also an improvement of the same period; for without some restoring power, a key, on being knocked down, would have remained there until picked up; and that restoring power would be the most readily supplied by a spring or springs. In some of the early