Publisher: Sonus Paradisi
Website: sonusparadisi.cz/en/organs/discontinued-organ-models/litomysl-organ-model.html
Format: HAUPTWERK
Quality: 16 bit 48 kHz stereo
Size: 8.85 GB
Litomysl Organ Litomysl is a beautiful town in East Bohemia, practically on the border with Moravia. It is widely known as the birthplace of one of the most outstanding Czech composers: Bedrich Smetana (1824-1884). Although he was celebrated as a pianist and composer of opera and orchestral music, he also left several short works for organ (6 preludes, 1 fugue, 1 chorale).
Organ in the Church of the Holy Cross
Little is known about the organs in the Church of the Holy Cross in those early times. There was a late Baroque instrument by František Pavel Horák (1723-1822), built in 1780. It had two manuals and a pedal with a total of 22 registers.
It was later completely rebuilt in 1902 by Josef Kobrle (1851-1919). The old organ, in a purely Baroque style, seemed out of step with the fashion of the early 20th century. Kobrle’s instrument bore the hallmarks of a “romantic” or symphonic organ, which was in demand at the time. It also had 2 manuals with 22 registers, like the previous instrument, but the brilliant aliquots and high mixtures were replaced by registers with a lower sound of various colors: flutes, strings, reeds.
A hundred years later, the ways of assessing the qualities of an organ have changed again. Now we admire the brilliance of the baroque sound, we like the logic of the WerkPrinzip hierarchy, but at the same time we do not want to lose the diversity of the romantic registers of coloring. Therefore, many organ manufacturers tend to prefer large organs with a large variety of registers to meet the needs of all musical styles. Well, the purity of style is lost, but the advantages of a “universal” organ seem to prevail.
With this in mind, Vladimir Grygar (whose company is well known in many countries of the world for its craftsmanship) built a completely new organ in the Church of the Holy Cross. The work was completed only in 2001. The new instrument has 4 manuals and 51 sounding registers (not counting the couplings and other assistants).
