| Christ
ist erstanden (Christ is risen) for organ, op. 57c (1975) Introduction
- Intermedium - Toccata Duration: 3 Minutes Publisher:
Bonifatiusverlag, Paderborn, printed in "Orgelstücke zum Gotteslob,
Teil II" Hummel's
Toccata on the Easter hymn "Christ ist erstanden" is written
for direct use in liturgy and church service.
Hummel integrates the four
opening lines of the cantus firmus (and emphasises four times the initial or title
line) in a seven-section rondo variant in the scheme A-B-A'-B'-C-B"-A".
The melody part is heard up to this point in the descant; only the acclamation
"Kyrieleis" is as fifth line entrusted to the pedals in the quasi-coda
(bars 31-33) following the descending whole-tone tetrachords of the C
section (bars 16-21). The rondo character results thus not from the substance
of themes and motifs but rather from the construction techniques of the sections
with their diverse metres. They have in common the unisons of right and left hand
as well as - as far as the A and C sections are concerned - the
pedal. Within this framework, further space is created, in addition to the whole-tone
tetrachords mentioned above, by the fourth-seventh arpeggios in the A sections
and in the parallel major triads in the B sections, each of which closes
with a pedal solo whose sequential fourths are derived from the first line of
the chant.
Joachim
Dorfmüller (in "Cantus-firmus-Toccata zwischen Tradition
und Avantgarde", Kunst und Kirche 3/82) |