The History of Organ in the Museum
The Permanent Exhibition leads you through all periods of organ history, which began more than 2200 years ago in Alexandria. All the organs on display in the Museum are in playing condition: history for the ears – a unique experience!
Organs of the High Middle Ages are known only from descriptions. One such Romanesque organ was reconstructed for the Museum. The single-line melodies played on it accompanied and supplemented the Gregorian chant of the monks. The oldest original Blockwork organ is from the island of Gotland, dating roughly from 1350; this old instrument is of course no longer playable – but the copy in our Museum is. Manual and pedals mean that polyphonic (and often very rhythmical) music was already possible on this instrument.
At the beginning of the 19th century, other instruments – above all the pianoforte – gained in importance. For the genteel culture of this ″Biedermeier″ period, the sound of the organ seemed too big and powerful. But growing national consciousness soon demanded an organ with a big, orchestra-like sound. Mighty instruments were constructed, worked no longer by mechanical but by pneumatic (air pressure) action. Such a pneumatic organ dating from 1913 is in the Ostheim Museum of Organ Construction. It provides a complete contrast to a simple house organ of 1940, in which a deliberate turning away from the large Romantic organs is apparent.
With an original positive organ of 1646 by the Nuremberg organ-maker Nikolaus Manderscheidt, the Museum possesses a first-class instrument from the zenith of European organ construction. This is a small-scale house organ such as continued to be built in the High and Late Baroque for private use in the houses of well-off families. While the mighty church organs of the Baroque for which Johann Sebastian Bach composed his works have been preserved in many places – Ostheim of course amongst them –, most house organs have been destroyed. The collection in the Museum with examples from Germany, Switzerland and Italy is therefore of great importance.
Positive organ by Nikolaus Manderscheidt
Johann Pachelbel: Ciacona in C major, 1699
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