On Saturday, September 19, the Tacoma Chapter of the American Guild of Organists kicked off its program year with a fascinating presentation at Christ Episcopal Church in Tacoma. Titled “Clavichord and Organ, Companions for the Ages,” the session was led by noted organist and clavichord enthusiast Kevin Birch, Director of Music at St. John’s Catholic Church in Bangor, Maine.

For an appreciative audience of chapter members and local music lovers, Birch offered an exploration of the intimate world of the clavichord—an instrument historically tied to the daily study and artistic development of generations of organists and composers.

The Instrument: Mechanics and Expressive Nuance

Birch began his presentation by examining the clavichord properties that set it apart from its keyboard cousins. Unlike the harpsichord or piano, the clavichord possesses a unique design feature: direct physical connection. When a key is depressed, a small brass blade called a tangent strikes and remains in contact with the string for the duration of the note.

This direct contact gives the player control over the sound even after the initial attack. Performers can subtly vary finger pressure to alter the volume (“portato”), create a delicate vibrato (“bebung”), or execute expressive micro-variations that make the instrument feel almost human. Composers sometimes indicated their specific preferences with specialized markings in the score. CPE Bach, for example, used 3 to 7 dots under a slur to indicate the number of times the note should waver.

Birch contrasted two fine instruments provided for the day by Tacoma AGO member and owner Dana Robinson:

• A larger instrument built by Lyndon Taylor (modeled after a historical instrument in the Leipzig Museum, known as “Leipzig 21”).

• A smaller, highly portable instrument built by Edward Kottick.

Demonstrating both, Birch noted that the smaller Kottick instrument possesses a bright, lute-like clarity, while the larger Taylor model offers broader dynamic range—even allowing a player to simulate a four-foot organ stop by playing an octave higher.

Historical Context and Repertoire

The presentation explored the rich historical footprint of the clavichord, noting its resurgence through modern builder craftsmanship and active scholarly groups like the German Clavichord Society.

Birch highlighted the deep bond between composers and their clavichords, sharing the poignant example of C.P.E. Bach. After selling his beloved clavichord, Bach penned a formal, emotional farewell to his instrument, explicitly writing performance indicators like repercussions (wavering a note multiple times after a key strike) directly into the score. Birch brought this repertoire to life with performances of C.P.E. Bach’s music and the Haydn Sonata in F Major, demonstrating the instrument’s range from its lowest notes to its highest.

Companions for the Ages

After a lively question-and-answer session covering mechanical action, string physics, and historical temperaments (noting that the large instrument was tuned in Kirnberger and the smaller in meantone), Birch turned to comparative repertoire. He connected the morning’s acoustic discoveries to his broader exploration of keyboard literature—linking works by Antonio Valenti (La Romanesca con cinque mutanze) and Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck (Toccata) to the expressive worlds shared by both the organ and the clavichord.

The morning concluded with an engaging open-house period, giving attendees time for discussion and a hands-on opportunity to play the clavichords. It was an inspiring, educational start to the Tacoma AGO’s seasonal programming, reminding all present of the profound, quiet intimacy at the root of keyboard art.

Birch provided two handouts, reproduced below.

First Lutheran Church of West Seattle announces the next program in its Soli deo gloria series, commemorating the life and work of Andrew J. King and celebrating the fiftieth anniversary of the Noack organ in the church’s gallery. The gala concert will feature works for organ and orchestra, with First Lutheran Organist and Choirmaster Dana Robinson and Seattle Bach Festival Orchestra, led by Tekla Cunningham, as well as works for two organs, with Paul Tegels at the Church’s Noack chapel organ.

Opus 83, the Noack Organ Company’s first installation on the West Coast, is considered a pivotal instrument in the late Fritz Noack’s output, marking a departure from an earlier adherence to the neo-baroque ideals of the Orgelbewegung. It is notable for the use of a high lead-content pipe metal, high mouth cut-ups, and a flexible supply of wind. The 18-stop organ comprises two manual divisions housed in a historically inspired case—a Great division in the upper portion of the case, a Positive division in “brustwerk” position, directly above the keydesk, and a five-stop Pedal division in a separate case behind the main case. Unison couplers, a tremulant and a wind-driven cimbelstern complete the stoplist. Although fundamentally German in its tonal makeup, the organ nonetheless nods to modern eclecticism with the inclusion of French-inspired reed stops. It is the first organ in the Seattle-Tacoma area to utilize suspended mechanical action. There is no enclosed division. The organ replaced an ailing Balcom & Vaughan unit organ; for half a century, it has provided a foundation for the church’s musical life.

Noack opus 83 was dedicated September 26, 1976, in a recital by David P. Dahl, Professor of Organ at Pacific Lutheran University, who delivered an eclectic program showcasing the instrument’s versatility. The organ’s German Lutheran roots were on display in works of Bach, a Chorale sung by the congregation in alternatim with settings by Bach, Andreas Armsdorff, Georg Friedrich Kauffmann, and J. P. Kirnberger. An exploration of canonical pre-Bach works from around the European continent included works by Correa de Arrauxo, Nicolas DeGrigny, and Melchior Schildt. A canzona of Max Reger represented the romantic period, and the organ was heard in a work of a living composer in Peter Planyavsky’s Toccata on Nun danket all und bringet Ehr. Dudley Buck’s Concert Variations on the Star Spangled Banner might seem like an unusual programming choice—until one remembers that 1976 marked the bicentennial of the signing of the American Declaration of Independence!

Next month’s program will feature encore performances of some of the works David Dahl played fifty years ago—Bach’s Pièce d’orgue and Allein Gott in der Höh’ sei Ehr, BWV 663, along with the Kirnberger and Kauffmann settings of the same chorale. The Tierce en taille from Pierre DuMage’s Livre d’orgue will represent the repertoire Andrew J. King played on a recital to observe the organ’s fortieth anniversary. Although 2026 may be the semiquincentennial of the Declaration of Independence, listeners might have to wait until 2176 A.D. for a reprise of Dudley Buck’s variations!

In 2002, the church accepted delivery of Noack’s opus 142–a single-manual, four-stop organ with pull-down pedal. The organ stands on casters at the front of the church adjacent to the side chapel where it can be turned to face either into the chapel or into the nave. Having the chapel organ at the opposite end of the nave from the gallery organ allows for the exploration of music played on the two organs at once—no doubt a common practice during the Italian renaissance and Baroque periods when so many churches were furnished with two or more organs. Although no repertoire from the period has been identified specifically for two organs, the practice of intabulating or arranging vocal and instrumental music for keyboard instruments was widespread at the time; a sound argument can be made for arranging divided-choir music from the period for two organs. Our program will include performances of two canzonas and a toccata from the Italian renaissance, arranged for two keyboards by the late Liuwe Tamminga, who was for many years the Organist at the Basilica of San Petronio in Bologna, with its famous “Epistle” and “Gospel” organs that face each other across the choir.

Some of J. S. Bach’s most elegantly re-purposed music is found in the Concerto in d minor for Keyboard and Orchestra, BWV 1052, with its brilliant harpsichord scoring and thoroughly developed left-hand part. Long thought to have originated as a (now lost) violin concerto, the music of BWV 1052 also turns up as movements with soloistic obbligato organ parts in Cantata 146 (movements 1 & 2), and in the fragment of a sinfonia belonging to Cantata 88 (third movement.) The earliest version of the work, however, is found in a score and parts copied by C. P. E. Bach, with the keyboard part indicated for “cembalo.” The keyboard part as written out by C. P. E. Bach closely resembles J. S. Bach’s arrangements for organ in the two cantatas—it is mostly two voices, with the left hand following the bass part. Some unusual octave transposition, along with some passages that seem to call for the use of organ pedals, hint at the work’s origins as an early organ concerto by J. S. Bach, as proposed by eminent Bach scholars Christoph Wolff and Gregory Butler. The concerto will be offered with an orchestra of ten string players from the Seattle Bach Festival Orchestra.

Rounding out the program will be Mozart’s beloved Church Sonata XVII, K. 336.

The concert will take place on September 27, 2026 at 3:00 p.m. at the First Lutheran Church of West Seattle, 4105 California Avenue S.W., Seattle. Admission is free and open to all.