Concerto for Organ with Percussion Orchestra

Lou Harrison

General Info

Year: 1973
Duration: c. 24:00
Difficulty: (see Ratings for explanation)
Publisher: PeerSouth
Cost: Score and Parts - $0.00   |   Score Only - $0.00

Movements

Movement 1: Allegro
Movement 2: Andante: Siciliana in the Form of a Double Canon
Movement 3: Largo
Movement 4: Canons and Choruses
Movement 5: Allegro: Finale

Instrumentation

Solo

organ

Ensemble

Player 1: Glockenspiel
Player 2: Vibraphone
Player 3: Tubular bells
Player 4: Celesta
Player 5: Piano
Player 6: Muted large plumbers pipes(6), bells made from oxygen tanks6), pak, sweet jangles, guiro
Player 7: Muted gongs(3)
Player 8: Snare drum, Chinese cymbals α2, suspended cymbal, maracas, temple blocks(3)
Player 9: Tom-toms(3), suspended gongs(3)
Player 10: Bass drum, wooden drums(3)

Program Notes

In 1972, I was asked by Philip Simpson, who was then teaching organ at San Jose State University, for a work for his instrument. Within a day or so I also received a request from Anthony Cirone, director of the San Jose State University Percussion Ensemble, for a work for his year's concert. The two requests came so closely together that it occurred to me to try combining the two. It also seemed to me that since the percussion orchestra can make a lot of sound and the pipe organ can make a lot of sound too, to put them together and see what would happen. The work was premiered in 1973 and is dedicated to Gibson Walters, who made it possible, and to Anthony Cirone and Philip Simpson who asked for it.

For this work, Bill Colvig made for us some stunning new wooden drums...very large cube-like instruments suspended from a large rack, and he also added to the set of large gas cylinder bells which we had previously used in my Heart Sutra . Because the organ is a sustaining tonal instrument, and much of the percussion I wished to use was to be of abstract sound without specified fixed pitch, I felt that an intermediate group of percussion instruments of fixed pitch ought to be used. Thus, there is a chorus of piano, glockenspiel, vibraphone, celeste, and tube chimes which bridge between the organ and the abstract percussion section. My pleasure in the keyboard treatment of Henry Cowell lead me to the use of large sections of "cluster" writing for which Bill provided felt padded slabs and which require special techniques from the organist. My feeling in the last movement was originally meant as a kind of homage to those syncopated sections in Caesar Frank. Although it is composed entirely in an inverted mode from ancient Greece, and is commonly construed by audiences as a sort of jazz festival, the central largo movement is another of my works using that 8-tone mode which runs half-step, whole-step, half-step, whole-step, etc...a mode which I always find a pleasure to use.

Premiere Details

Date: 30 April 1973
Place: San Jose University
Organ Soloist: Phillip Simpson

Works for Percussion by this Composer

A Tribute to Charon (Passage throught Darkness/Counterdance in Spring) - Percussion Trio
Ariadne - Solo Percussion and Flute acc.
Beverly's Troubadour Piece - Percussion and Harp
Bomba (Harrison) - Percussion Quintet
Canticle No. 1 - Percussion Quintet
Canticle No. 3 - Percussion Quartet; Ocarina; Guitar (6 Players)
Concerto for Organ with Percussion Orchestra - Percussion Octet; Organ, Piano
Concerto for Violin and Percussion Orchestra - Percussion Quintet, Violin
Double Fanfare - Percussion Ensemble 12 - Harrison/Cirone
Double Music - Percussion Quartet - Cage/Harrison
Fifth Simfony - Percussion Quartet
First Concerto - Percussion Duo and Flute
Fugue - Percussion Quartet
In Praise of Johnny Appleseed (for Dance and Percussion) - Percussion Trio; Flute; Dancer
Labyrinth No. 3 - Percussion Ensemble (11)
Orpheus - for the Singer to the Dance - Percussion Ensemble (15); Solo Voice; Chorus
Serenade - Percussion; Guitar
Simfony No. 13 - Percussion Quartet
Suite - Percussion Quintet
Suite No. 1 - Percussion; Guitar
The Drums of Orpheus - from the ballet "Orpheus"
The Song of Queztecoatl - Percussion Quartet