Bernhard Ruchti (born in 1974 in Berkeley, California, USA) [1] is a Swiss pianist, organist, composer and music researcher.
Bernhard Ruchti (born in 1974 in Berkeley, California, USA) [1] is a Swiss pianist, organist, composer and music researcher.
Ruchti studied piano with Eckart Heiligers and organ with Rudolf Scheidegger, Stefan Johannes Bleicher, and Bernhard Haas. Since 2013, he has been organist at the ev.-ref. Stadtkirche St. Laurenzen in St. Gallen. [2]
During his time as a student he became interested in the performance practice and playing technique of the 19th century. Inspired by his studies with Bernhard Haas, he published an essay "Thoughts on the stimulation of organ playing by a pianistic playing technique" in 2006. [3]
In 2010 and 2011, Ruchti spent a sabbatical in the United States and lived in San Francisco for 10 months. He began composing music and wrote a number of piano pieces, including "Five Songs of The Wind." These were released on his album "Liszt & The Black Hills" in 2012. He released another album of his own works ("Echoes from Chrysospilia") in 2017. In 2018, the world premiere of his choral cantata "Auf die Tiefe: ein irdisch Fahrtenlied" on a text by Bernd Gonner took place. [4]
In 2018, he began his "A Tempo Project". [5]
In 2017 he was awarded by the city of St. Gallen with the Förderpreis Kultur. [6]
Since 2018, Ruchti has been conducting his "A Tempo Project," [5] an interpretation, research, and recording project that explores tempo and time in 19th-century music. [7] The focus is on Franz Liszt's performance practice.
His work started with the exploration of the academically controversial "double beat theory" by Willem Retze Talsma, which postulates an alternative use of the metronome and subsequently a much slower interpretation of classical music. Ruchti sees a historical justification for the idea of “double-beat” but takes a critical distance to the double-beat-theory itself. He uses it for the reinterpretation of classical works such as Frédéric Chopin's Études or Robert Schumann’s Fantasy in C-major. [8] [9]
In 2021, Ruchti published a book on the performance practice of Franz Liszt's Fantasy and Fugue on Ad nos, ad salutarem undam for organ. [10] [11] [12] The book presents the history surrounding the composition, premiere, and reception of the work in the 19th century. It provides insight into Liszt's performance practices, specifically about tempo. The starting point is the duration of the work of 45 minutes documented at the time it was first performed. This duration differs from modern interpretations by more than 15 minutes. Ruchti also recorded the work on the Ladegast organ at Merseburg Cathedral, on which Liszt premiered the work. [13]
Starting with Volume V of the A Tempo Project, Ruchti does not explore the “double-beat-theory” anymore but turns more to the musical aspects of tempo through historically documented duration, with works by Franz Liszt and Ludwig van Beethoven. [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] [19]
Since 2014, Ruchti has been the head of the musical activities at St. Laurenzen church. [2] He has been organizing the traditional “Laurenzen Concerts” as well as creating "Laurenzen Vespers". The “Laurenzen Vespers” consist of half an hour of music and poetry at monthly intervals. [20]
Starting in 2016, Ruchti developed the idea of a surround organ for the Stadtkirche St. Laurenzen in St. Gallen. The existing organ in the church by Orgelbau Kuhn (III/Ped, 45 stops) is supplemented by three new pipe locations corresponding to the three main timbres of an organ (principals, flutes, strings). These new pipe divisions are located on the three galleries of the church, creating a surround effect. The new organ, inaugurated in September 2023, was built by Orgelbau Goll from Lucerne, Switzerland. [21]
Sonata, in music, literally means a piece played as opposed to a cantata, a piece sung. The term evolved through the history of music, designating a variety of forms until the Classical era, when it took on increasing importance. Sonata is a vague term, with varying meanings depending on the context and time period. By the early 19th century, it came to represent a principle of composing large-scale works. It was applied to most instrumental genres and regarded—alongside the fugue—as one of two fundamental methods of organizing, interpreting and analyzing concert music. Though the musical style of sonatas has changed since the Classical era, most 20th- and 21st-century sonatas still maintain the same structure.
Claudio Arrau León was a Chilean pianist known for his interpretations of a vast repertoire spanning the baroque to 20th-century composers, especially Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Chopin, Schumann, Liszt and Brahms. He is widely considered one of the greatest pianists of the twentieth century.
This article is about music-related events in 1823.
Friedrich Julius Reubke was a German composer, pianist and organist. In his short life, he composed the Sonata on the 94th Psalm in C minor, which is considered to be one of the greatest organ works in the romantic repertoire.
The organ repertoire is considered to be the largest and oldest repertory of all musical instruments. Because of the organ's prominence in worship in Western Europe from the Middle Ages on, a significant portion of organ repertoire is sacred in nature. The organ's suitability for improvisation by a single performer is well adapted to this liturgical role and has allowed many blind organists to achieve fame; it also accounts for the relatively late emergence of written compositions for the instrument in the Renaissance. Although instruments are still disallowed in most Eastern churches, organs have found their way into a few synagogues as well as secular venues where organ recitals take place.
Jeanne Marie-Madeleine Demessieux was a French organist, pianist, composer, and teacher. She was the chief organist at Saint-Esprit for 29 years and at La Madeleine in Paris starting in 1962. She performed internationally as a concert organist and was the first female organist to sign a record contract. She went on to record many organ works, including her own compositions.
The Juno Award for Classical Album of the Year has been awarded since 1985, as recognition each year for the best classical music album in Canada. It was a split from the prior category for Juno Award for Classical Album of the Year, alongside a separate new category for Classical Album of the Year – Large Ensemble or Soloist with Large Ensemble Accompaniment.
Wolfgang Friedrich Rübsam is a German-American organist, pianist, composer and pedagogue.
Hermann Schroeder was a German composer and a Catholic church musician.
The Sonata on the 94th Psalm in C minor is a sonata for solo organ by Julius Reubke, based on the text of Psalm 94. It is considered one of the pinnacles of the Romantic repertoire.
Fantasie und Fuge über das Thema B-A-C-H, title in English: Fantasy and Fugue on the Theme B-A-C-H) is an organ fantasy on the BACH motif composed by Franz Liszt in 1855, later revised in 1870.
The Fantasy and Fugue on the chorale "Ad nos, ad salutarem undam", S.259, is a piece of organ music composed by Franz Liszt in the winter of 1850 when he was in Weimar. The chorale on which the Fantasy and Fugue is based was from Act I of Giacomo Meyerbeer's opera Le prophète. The work is dedicated to Meyerbeer, and it was given its premiere on October 29, 1852. The revised version was premiered in the Merseburg Cathedral on September 26, 1855, with Alexander Winterberger performing. The whole work was published by Breitkopf & Härtel in 1852, and the fugue was additionally published as the 4th piece of Liszt's operatic fantasy "Illustrations du Prophète" (S.414). A piano duet version by Liszt appeared during the same time (S.624).
Harald Feller is a German organist, choral conductor and composer teaching at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München. He was awarded the 1983 Grand Prix du Disque Liszt.
Conrad Graf was an Austrian-German piano maker. His pianos were used by Beethoven, Chopin, and Robert and Clara Schumann, among others.
The Fantasie in C, Op. 17, was written by Robert Schumann in 1836. It was revised prior to publication in 1839, when it was dedicated to Franz Liszt. It is generally described as one of Schumann's greatest works for solo piano, and is one of the central works of the early Romantic period. It is often called by the Italian version, fantasia; the word "Fantasie" is the German spelling.
Gabriel Dessauer is a German cantor, concert organist, and academic teacher. After studies with Diethard Hellmann and Franz Lehrndorfer, he was responsible for the church music at St. Bonifatius, Wiesbaden from 1981 to 2021, conducting the Chor von St. Bonifatius until 2018. Besides normal church services, he conducted them in regular masses with soloists and orchestra for Christmas and Easter and a yearly concert. In 1995 he prepared the choir for a memorial concert commemorating the 50th anniversary of the end of World War II, performing Britten's War Requiem with choirs from countries involved in the war, and concerts in Wiesbaden and Macon, Georgia. Programs of choral concerts included Hermann Suter's Le Laudi in 1998, the German premiere of Rutter's Mass of the Children in 2004, and the world premiere of Colin Mawby's Bonifatiusmess in 2012 which he had commissioned for the choir's 150th anniversary. The concert of 2008, Vivaldi's Gloria and Haydn's Nelson Mass, was also performed at San Paolo dentro le Mura in Rome.
Alexander Winterberger was a German organist and composer. He is mostly remembered for his association with Franz Liszt, in particular his close involvement with the two great organ fantasies Liszt wrote for the Merseburg Cathedral organ, the Fantasy and Fugue on the chorale "Ad nos ad salutarem undam" and the Fantasy and Fugue on the Theme B-A-C-H.
Giovanni Bellucci is an Italian pianist.
Bernhard Haas is a German organist, music theorist and academic.