FRANK MORANA
AmerOrganist 36/5

GIOVANNI WALTER ZARAMELLA, 20 Piccoli Trii per Organo. Editioni Carrera (n. 4512), Bergamo, Italia. These 20 short trios (none exceeding two pages) are of moderate difficulty, within a rigorous paratonal style. They are grouped by tonal centers into sets of 8 and 12 pieces, the first set comprising the eight tones C-D-E-F-G-A-B-C, and the second set comprising the 12 semitones from C to B. The work thus aspires to a didactic functionality similar to Bach’s keyboard collections, though here, the nominal “tonal centers” are really “tonal exteriors”––mere convenient starting and ending points for otherwise tonally elusive musical excursions. The second set is the more interesting of the two, though it would have been desirable had the composer introduced more inversion or imitation into the contrapuntal scheme. The pedal never really gets a “subject,” although it is quite obbligato, and marked with careful phrasing and toe-heel indications throughout. There is a sensible, basic registration indicated for all the pieces, and detailed phrasing in the manual parts in the first set. These pieces make for excellent intermediate studies in organ playing as well as for compositional studies in tonal organization, and though a complete rendering of such collections is not normally good recital programming, a selective regrouping for recital purposes would certainly be feasible.

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