Reger: Organ Works Vol. 1 (1998)

A Good Introduction To Max Reger

The budget-priced Naxos CD label offers an unparalleled opportunity for the adventurous listener to explore unfamiliar music. For example, this CD is part of Naxos's collection of organ music in its "organ encyclopedia" and is the first volume of a projected series of the organ works of Max Reger (1873 --1916). The organist is Bernard Haas, professor of Organ at the Stuttgart Acadamy. He performs this CD on the three-manual Link organ at Giengen an der Brenz, Germany.

Many lovers of music are unfamiliar with the literature of the organ beyond the works of Bach. As this CD shows, composition for this glorious instrument has continued. There is much to get to know and to appreciate.

But why Max Reger? Reger wrote prolifically for the orchestra and piano, but his love was for the organ. In some ways, he represents a meeting of Brahms and Wagner in late romanticism as reflected on the organ. Like Brahms, Reger was a scholar of baroque music. He immersed himself in counterpoint and in the study of Bach. But Reger combines his knowledge of the baroque with Wagner's chromaticism and harmonic shifting. This is an intriguing combination which sometimes makes for difficult listening.

Reger was a twentieth century composer, and the two collections on this CD are from early in his career. The more accessible of the two is the three (of four) preludes and fugues of opus 85 composed in 1904. I found that in these three pieces the fugues flow seamlessly from the opening preludes The first and the third of the set, in C sharp minor and in F major, begin quietly and work slowly to a dramatic close. The second prelude and fugue, in G major, begins with a strongly rhythmical figure in the low register echoed in the upper register. A climactic passage at the end of the prelude is followed by a piping fugue.

The other work on this CD is the ten pieces for organ, opus 69, composed in 1903. There are several types of works in this collection, including an extensive, and harmonically ambiguous, prelude and fugue in E minor, a fiery toccata and fugue in D major, and a concluding and intense Prelude and Fugue in A minor. The remaining four pieces consist of single movements in a variety of styles, a basso ostinato in E minor with a swirling figure over a pulsating figure in the bass, a quiet moment musical in D major, a short, lively d minor cappricio, and a hushed romance in G minor.

The pieces in this set are in a variety of moods, but many of them are difficult. The music seems to sway at times from key to key and there are abrubt changes in the organ's register. I am not sure whether these passages, in which Wagner rests somewhat confusedly with Bach, are due to Reger or to the performance. It probably has something to do with both.

After listening to this CD several times, I came across a review by Stephen Haylett in the July, 1998 "BBC music". Haylett's review is posted on a fine website devoted to the music of Reger. With respect to the recording of the ten pieces, opus 69, Haylett writes: "Bernard Hass ... gives competent readings of these minatures, but his technique lets him down on occasion, smudging textures and compromising the rhythmic flow of the music through changes of registration. He isn't helped by a rather foggy recorded sound." I found Haylett's comments highly perceptive. In other words, this is late-romantic chromatic music combined, uneasily in places, with a deeply contrapuntal style.

Listeners wanting to know something of Max Reger and to learn about modern music written for the organ will want to hear this disk