Saarana for Organ

Dédication "à Carson P. Cooman"

Composed May 2005

Première: July 24, 2005 St. Thomas Episcopal, Rochester, NY Carson P. Cooman, organ

It took a long time before I began to write for the organ. Oddly, this is perhaps due to my origins. Haven been « born in an organ », so to speak, I knew the machine and its different forms so well that to have to make a aesthetic choice between the two famous instruments that I was brought up with (the marvelous Cliquot of Poitiers Cathedral and the equally remarkable Cavaillé of Notre Dame de Paris) seemed impossible.

As is often the case, this conflict was finally resolved, and I believe that I have found with these pieces (Dialogues sur les Pleins jeux and Saarana) a mix of the two genres which avoid a compromise. I did this by using registrations which would be usable on the greatest variety of organs possible and by never allowing the musical language to impose a single specific timbre. I construct different sonic planes which are well differentiated, leaving to the performer the responsibility to find on the organ « du jour » the registration which would work on that particular instrument, also bearing in mind the acoustic and his or her own personal tastes. These pieces may be played on a neoclassical, romantic or symphonic organ. (The only exception would be an organ which is tuned to an unequal tuning which would inevitably lead to a musical catastrophe.)

Saarana is a work of romantic inspiration, a kind of rhapsody made up of successive emotions in which different moods are presented in a contradictory manner. This is a sort of « slice of life » which may be melancholic or quite buoyant, funny or violent, and always a bit excessive. In spite of this, it remains concise and distanced. One can, if one knows how to go about it, express extreme emotions without using a single impolite word. I believe very strongly in placing familiar ideas in different contexts.

Jean-Thierry Boisseau