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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 17 June 2015
While organs had been built in the United States since the eighteenth century, until the middle of the nineteenth century what passed as an ‘organ concert’ consisted of a mélange of transcriptions from choral music and simple improvisations, interspersed with choral music and vocal solos. As larger organs began to appear by the middle of the nineteenth century, solo organ recitals by players such as George W. Morgan were occasionally performed. In the 1850s Americans such as Dudley Buck and John K. Paine travelled to Germany to study organ performance and composition, and others followed. The opening of a large organ in Boston's Music Hall in 1863 and the building of large churches in the post-war period gave impetus to public organ recitals, which along with compositions by Bach, Mendelssohn, Rinck and Batiste etc. usually included transcriptions from operas and orchestral works, and compositions by the performers. At first, the emphasis was on Germanic music, but as the second half of the century progressed and more organists were studying abroad, works by British and French composers began to appear. By the end of the century the emphasis had become strongly French, particularly after the concert tours of Parisian virtuoso Alexandre Guilmant, and America's first true concert organist, Clarence Eddy, began making tours to European countries. By this time many large organs had been built for concert halls, cathedrals, colleges, and urban churches, providing excellent venues for solo organ recitals as the twentieth century opened.
1 For detailed accounts of early organs, see Ochse, Orpha, The History of the Organ in the United States (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1975)Google Scholar and Owen, Barbara, The Organ in New England (Raleigh: Sunbury Press, 1979)Google Scholar.
2 Accounts of early organists and other musicians may be found in Clark, J. Bunker, The Dawning of American Keyboard Music (New York: Greenwood, 1988)Google Scholar, Tawa, Nicholas E., From Psalm to Symphony: A History of Music in New England (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 2001)Google Scholar and Ogasapian, John, Church Music in America, 1620–2000 (Macon: Mercer University Press, 2007)Google Scholar.
3 Cited in John Ogasapian. English Cathedral Music in New York: Edward Hodges of Trinity Church (Richmond: Organ Historical Society, 1994): 156.
4 Hartford Daily Courant, 3 November 1849.
5 The Baltimore Sun, 30 May 1853.
6 Cited in Ogasapian, John, Organ Building in New York City: 1700–1900 (Braintree: Organ Literature Foundation, 1977)Google Scholar: 245–6.
7 ‘The New Organ in the Tremont Temple’. Dwight's Journal of Music 5/21 (26 August 1854).
8 ‘Opening of the Harmonia Organ’. Dwight's Journal of Music 5/8 (27 May 1854).
9 ‘The Organ Concert’. Boston Daily Atlas, 25 August 1856. Thunderstorm pieces, both composed and improvised, had been a staple of organ recitals in early nineteenth-century Europe, and crossed the Atlantic easily, being sure-fire crowd pleasers.
10 From the printed programme.
11 ‘The Grand Organ Concert’. Hartford Daily Courier, 17 January 1862.
12 Orr, N. Lee, Dudley Buck (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 2008)Google Scholar: 40, 52.
13 From the printed programme.
14 Collection of early programmes in the archives of Methuen Memorial Music Hall.
15 Dwight's Journal of Music 23/17 (14 November 1863): 134–5.
16 ‘The Great Boston Organ’. New York Times, 6 November 1863.
17 Dwight's Journal of Music 25/16 (28 October 1865): 127.
18 See Owen, Barbara. ‘Lillian Sarah Tillinghast Frohock: A Pioneering Concert Organist in the 19th Century’. The American Organist 45/10 (October 2011)Google Scholar: 42–6.
19 ‘Who's Who Among the Organists of America’. The Diapason 23/6 (May 1932): 30–31.
20 Omaha Republican, 21 July 1869.
21 From the printed programme.
22 From the printed programme. After a period of neglect in the early twentieth century, the Worcester Organ was restored in 1981 by the Noack Organ Co., and has remained in regular use since, for recitals and other events.
23 ‘The New Organ for Plymouth Church’. New York Times, 17 November 1865
24 ‘Plymouth Church Organ’. Organist's Quarterly Journal & Review, January 1875, p. 67.
25 ‘Opening of the New Organ at Plymouth Church’. American Art Journal 5 (9 August 1866): 243.
26 ‘Geo. Wm. Warren's Concert at Plymouth Church’. Brooklyn Eagle, 14 November 1866.
27 ‘Plymouth Organ Concerts’. Brooklyn Eagle, 29 January 1869.
28 ‘An Incident’. Brooklyn Eagle, 28 February 1871.
29 ‘Plymouth Organ Concert’. Brooklyn Eagle, 7 April 1873.
30 ‘Plymouth Organ Concert’. Brooklyn Eagle, 8 November 1875.
31 Crean, David, Samuel P. Warren: Organist at Grace Church, New York (DMA diss., Juilliard, 2014)Google Scholar: 14–15.
32 Ogasapian, Organ Building in New York City, 246, 249–50.
33 Interestingly, both of these organs are still extant and in use, the New York one now in the building designated ‘Old St. Patrick's’ after the present cathedral building was erected further uptown.
34 ‘The Grand Organ in the Catholic Cathedral’. Dwight's Journal of Music 34/24 (4 February 1876): 192.
35 Owen, Barbara, ‘Organs at the Centennial’, The Bicentennial Tracker, ed. Albert F. Robinson (Wilmington, OH: Organ Historical Society, 1976)Google Scholar: 128–35.
36 Both organs were sold after the exhibition closed; the Hook & Hastings to St Joseph's Cathedral in Buffalo, where, although slightly altered, it remains in use, and the Roosevelt to Mechanics Hall in Boston, where it was little used and later broken up.
37 Nichols, George Ward, The Cincinnati Organ (Cincinnati: Robert Clarke & Co., 1878)Google Scholar: 30.
38 From the printed programme.
39 ‘Mr. Eddy's Organ Concert’, Hartford Daily Courant, 21 March 1874.
40 ‘Organ Concert’. Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, 13 August 1875.
41 ‘Organ Concert’. Milwaukee Daily Sentinel, 6 October 1876.
42 Dunham, Henry M., The Life of a Musician (New York: Richmond Borough Publishing, 1931)Google Scholar: 70.
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45 Dwight's Journal of Music, 33/4 (April 1874): 206.
46 Crean, Samuel P. Warren, Appendix V.
47 A facsimile edition containing all issues was published in 1995 by the Boston Organ Club chapter of the Organ Historical Society.
48 Ogasapian. Organ Building in New York City, 252.
49 Osborne, William, ‘Charles Ives the Organist’, The American Organist 24/7 (1997)Google Scholar: 58–9.
50 Osborne, William. Clarence Eddy (1851–1937): Dean of American Organists (Richmond: Organ Historical Society, 2000)Google Scholar: 217–21.
51 For a complete history of this organ, later moved to Hill Auditorium, University of Michigan, see Wilkes, James O., Pipe Organs of Ann Arbor (Richmond: Organ Historical Society, 1995)Google Scholar.
52 Osborne, , Clarence Eddy, 233–261Google Scholar.
53 ‘Alexandre Guilmant in New York’. The Organ ii/7 (1893): 151–2.
54 Cited in Stephen L. Pinel, ‘Alexandre Guilmant in Organ Society’, in preface to The Forty Programs Rendered by M. Alexandre Guilmant at Festival Hall, World's Fair, St. Louis, ed. Ernest Richard Kroeger (Richmond: Organ Historical Society, 1985). Reprint of Guilmant's recital programmes at the St Louis World's Fair.
55 This organ later became the core of the huge concert organ installed in Wanamaker's Philadelphia department store, where it may still be heard regularly in concerts by notable organists.