With ringing bells, distant drums, lavishly ornamented motets, and ancient plainsong, organist Abraham Ross will present an evening of diverse pieces from one of the most distinctive corners of the keyboard repertory: baroque organ music of Portugal and Spain. In a period marked by a trove of treatises and sources, the invention of new pipework and case designs, and the presence of the organ in both courts and cathedrals, it is evident that Iberian patrons considered the organ most capable of the sublime in music. Throughout a 250-year period of political upheaval, changing borders, and pressuring outside tastes, the idioms practiced by organists maintained their forms, developing within a microcosm relative to the rest of Europe. The written repertory exhibits an unexpected blend of stylistic influence, owed to a unique coexistence of a lingering Mozarabic diaspora, imperial conquest and exploitation of the Americas, and the religio-political leanings of authorities in the southern kingdoms.
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