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    Frederik Magle
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    Krummhorn
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Cochereau in English!

Krummhorn

Administrator
Staff member
ADMINISTRATOR
Nice posting, acc ... thanks :up:.

Anytime Cochereau is featured playing like this is icing on the cake.
 

Corno Dolce

Admiral Honkenwheezenpooferspieler
Aloha acc,

I enjoy all your video posts - you never fail to satisfy me with your efforts. :up::up::up:

Cheerio,

CD :tiphat::tiphat::tiphat::clap::clap::clap::cheers::cheers::cheers:
 

musicalis

Member
A very good video, in spite You tube is not the best thing for the audio and vdeo quality, even with &fmt=18.
 

Contratrombone64

Admiral of Fugues
Hey acc, long time! thanks for that wonderful little clip, really enjoyed it. And, as to him speaking French while in Rome do as the Romans springs to mind.
 

dll927

New member
There's an old saying that 50,000,000 Frenchmen can't be wrong -- except that they all speak French.

English is pretty much a universal "second language". I can recall former German Chancellor Willy Brandt sounding as if English were his native language. I've seen two or three clips where Daniel Roth spoke acceptable English while he was showing off The St. Sulpice masterpiece. And given that many performers tour the U. S., they had better know some English, since most Americans disdain foreign languages. (I should know - I spent 34 years as a Spanish teacher!!)

Cochereau died too soon. That clip must be rather old, but he sure rips up that organ, which I understand Fred Swann did some of after he left the Crystal Cathedral. So far, I haven't heard of him dissing First Congregational L. A., which was his next stop. But if you have ever been in that notable pile of concrete (I have a number of times), you know that organ can shake the place.
 

acc

Member
You are of course right about the ubiquity of English. But for people of Cochereau's generation (he was born in 1924), this was maybe not quite as true as it is now. So while speaking reasonable English has become rather commonplace in today's world, I still think that back then, there was something more remarkable about it. (Maybe I'm also struck by it because I have listened to Cochereau's voice so many times before, and invariably in French.)

Also, CT64's "Roman" saying does not refer to English as a lingua franca, but as the local language of that particular place (i.e. Garden Grove, CA). So what I wanted to say is that it would be difficult for, say, an international recitalist to travel to the US, Japan, Russia, Sweden, The Netherlands, Italy, etc. and speak the local language everywhere.
 

dll927

New member
Acc's comment about languages raises a question I've wondered about:

Do Russian organs (which I understand are rather few) have their stop names engraved in Cyrillic (Russian)? I can just imagine a western-trained organist sitting down to such a console and not being able to make heads or tails of the stop names. In most places, the names are standardized enough that minor linguistic differences don't matter, but here you're talking about a whole different alphabet. That could make things just a bit difficult!!

And as long as we're on the subject, what about Chinese or Japanese? I've seen some organs in those places that were imported from European companies, but how does that all add up?
 
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pcnd5584

New member
Acc's comment about languages raises a question I've wondered about:

Do Russian organs (which I understand are rather few) have their stop names engraved in Cyrillic (Russian)? I can just imagine a western-trained organist sitting down to such a console and not being able to make heads or tails of the stop names. In most places, the names are standardized enough that minor linguistic differences don't matter, but here you're talking about a whole different alphabet. That could make things just a bit difficult!!

I do not think that this is the case.

If this is so, it would indeed pose a problem; for, whilst the Cyrillic alphabet is phonetic, this only helps if one knows what a flute, trumpet or mixture (for example) are called in Russian. Two approximate instances are:
ТРУБА (trumpet) - pronounced 'trooba'. Or; ДИАПАЗОН (diapason) - pronounced 'deeapazon'.

Incidentally, one of the reasons that organs are so rare in Russia, is that they were originally used in brothels, and therefore the Orthodox Church, by association, deemed them unfit for use in religious services.
 

Corno Dolce

Admiral Honkenwheezenpooferspieler
Aloha pcnd5584,

Ummm, Ermmmm, Uuuuuh - I converted to the Russian Orthodox Church just little over two years ago. The real reason why there is no organ used in the Russian Orthodox Church is because the organ is seen as taking away from the focus of the Divine Liturgy, namely the worship of the Triune God.

It has nothing to do with brothels. The choir of human voices is the *organ* - musical instruments in the Russian Church are anathema! As a former Lutheran and organist whose father was a priest in the Lutheran Church I know what I have given up, but for the sake of my salvation and conscience I left the Lutheran Church.

Humbly and Respectfully yours,

CD :tiphat::tiphat::tiphat:
 

Krummhorn

Administrator
Staff member
ADMINISTRATOR
. . . Do Russian organs (which I understand are rather few) have their stop names engraved in Cyrillic (Russian)? I can just imagine a western-trained organist sitting down to such a console and not being able to make heads or tails of the stop names. In most places, the names are standardized enough that minor linguistic differences don't matter, but here you're talking about a whole different alphabet. That could make things just a bit difficult!!

And as long as we're on the subject, what about Chinese or Japanese? I've seen some organs in those places that were imported from European companies, but how does that all add up?

While on a choir tour, I played the organ at St. Stephens Basilica in Budapest, Hungary, I was rather confused at first as all the stop names were engraved in Hungarian. In fact, none of the stops worked ... I had to use the crescendo roller for the entire church service and accompanying the choir. After the service, I discovered an out-of-the-way foot activated lever which read "furrech" which meant "For Registration" ... Doh!!

The other organs I played in Hungary had stop names in either Italian or German.
 

pcnd5584

New member
Aloha pcnd5584,

Ummm, Ermmmm, Uuuuuh - I converted to the Russian Orthodox Church just little over two years ago. The real reason why there is no organ used in the Russian Orthodox Church is because the organ is seen as taking away from the focus of the Divine Liturgy, namely the worship of the Triune God.

It has nothing to do with brothels. The choir of human voices is the *organ* - musical instruments in the Russian Church are anathema! As a former Lutheran and organist whose father was a priest in the Lutheran Church I know what I have given up, but for the sake of my salvation and conscience I left the Lutheran Church.

Humbly and Respectfully yours,

CD :tiphat::tiphat::tiphat:

Although I wrote 'one of the reasons...' I was given this information by a friend who also converted to the Orthodox Church a few years ago. However, I was also aware of your reason given above and this is certainly true.
 

Corno Dolce

Admiral Honkenwheezenpooferspieler
Aloha pcnd5584,

I admit to not hearing about the *brothel reason* in re to organs not being in the Russian Church - It just seems so *ancillary* :grin::grin::grin: I'll have to check in on that with my contact in the Moscow Patriarchate.

What can be good to keep in mind is the overt use of musical instruments during the worship service is found in the Old Testament, not the New Testament.

Cheers,

CD :tiphat::tiphat::tiphat:
 

pcnd5584

New member
... What can be good to keep in mind is the overt use of musical instruments during the worship service is found in the Old Testament, not the New Testament. ...

I am not sure how you intend that this should apply to the subject in question. Do you, for example, imply that the New Testament is the more authoratitive text for the interpretation of current worship styles - or do you mean that you view unaccompanied vocal worship as more acceptable to God than those which involve the use of musical instruments, particularly the organ?
 

Corno Dolce

Admiral Honkenwheezenpooferspieler
Aloha pcnd5584,

I'm not implying that the New Testament is the more authoritative text for interpretation of current worship styles, nor that unaccompanied worship is more acceptable to God. I just wanted to highlight another worship tradition, thats all.

Cheerio,

CD :tiphat::tiphat::tiphat:
 

pcnd5584

New member
I'm not implying that the New Testament is the more authoritative text for interpretation of current worship styles, nor that unaccompanied worship is more acceptable to God. I just wanted to highlight another worship tradition, thats all.

OK - thank you. Now all is clear.
 
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