H·S·M· | Kom Heÿliger | Geist: |

2 clauier | pedaliter
  Lüneburg Tablature KN 208/1

  (Franz Schaumkell, Lüneburg, before ca 1655–60) 

This chorale verset by Scheidemann is rather atypical of his output in that area: where most of his versets – as befits their intended use in alternation with sung verses – feature a chant melody played straight through, with perhaps a brief introduction and conclusion, this one makes use of certain techniques of extension of the chant melody, such that it stands convincingly on its own, whatever its intended function.

‘Komm, heiliger Geist, Herre Gott’, a medieval German religious song ultimately based upon a Latin antiphon, was often sung at the beginning of services, and it spawned many organ settings. Scheidemann’s single setting features the somewhat long and sprawling melody in both the treble (played on a reed, Sesquialtera, and Mixture combination) and the bass (played here on the Trommeth 8 and Corneth 2, which latter brings it into the treble range), the latter stated mostly plainly, the former elaborated with coloratura writing. The kind of dialogue that results is often to be seen in Scheidemann’s longer, more elaborate chorale fantasias but is unique in his versets. I have transposed the piece from F to G, and rewritten the first sixteenth-note figure in bar 62, to make the treble voice playable on a half-stop, in preparation for a live recording. (I like to think this is still in the spirit of Scheidemann: more than one slightly later organ setting of this chant, such as those by Weckman and Tunder, is set in G; this transposition still respects the upper limit of the keyboard compasses available to Scheidemann; patterns of figuration were often modified to fit the upper limit of the keyboard compass; and the figure as rewritten is identical to the analogous figure, in a phrase of the chorale beginning in identical manner, in bar 35.)
program notes
