The Influence of the Organ in Musical History

Extract

Gazing at the stones of some great Cathedral, filled with wonder and admiration at its grace and beauty, as we watch the sweep of its Gothic arches, the intricacy of its tracery, the perfection of its proportions, our eye falls upon the organ, and we are set a-musing. Some five hundred years ago the last word was said in the development of Gothic architecture. Since then fashions have come and gone; one generation has praised its virtues, another has ignored them altogether, but none has been able to improve upon them. Reproduction and imitation we have had in plenty, but no advance. The architecture of the Middle Ages culminated some time in the fifteenth century; it has left its witness in stone poems all over the land. Since then all attempts at development have meant decadence, all endeavours after improvement, corruption.