Lucchesia’s rich heritage must include its remarkable legacy of organs. While the UK suffered a terrible devastation of this king of instruments as a result of the reformation and the civil war, our area, in common with other parts of Italy, preserves instruments dating back to at least the seventeenth century.

In fact, the reputedly oldest organ in Europe is the one that used to be in Florence cathedral until 1966. This instrument can now be seen (dismantled) in the refurbished Museo dell’Opera Del duomo nearby. It conserves parts built by Matteo da Prato in 1448. This is the same time that the choir stalls by Donatello and Robbia, now also in the museum, were erected.

One of the oldest organs in the diocese of Lucca is that at Pieve Santo Stefano. Built by Onofrio Zeffirini it dates back to 1551.

(The UK’s oldest organ, incidentally, is that in St Botolph, Aldgate, and London – the church where Daniel Defoe got married. Built by Renatus Harris, it dates back to the start of the eighteenth century).

Like the UK there was a revival of organ building in Italy in the nineteenth century. One of the greatest of organ builders were the combined firm of Nicomede Agati e Filippo Tronci from Pistoia, surely the capital of Tuscan organ-building and home to the Tronci foundation – now concentrating largely on bell-casting and percussion instruments. (See their web site at http://www.fondazioneluigitronci.org/).

The organ at the convent of San Francesco at Borgo a Mozzano (now a retirement home run by the local Misericordia) is a fine Agati-Tronci instrument dating back to 1893. It has been expanded, especially in the foot-pedal department, and is capable of handling Bachian repertoire (which so many old Italian organs are unable to do). The organ needed considerable maintenance and friend Enrico Barsanti carried out this work. It’s important to distinguish in Italian ‘organaro’ (organ builder and restorer) and ‘organista’ (organist). Enrico is both (see his facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/search/posts/?q=enrico%20barsanti ).

The concert given at the convent two days ago was thus not only proof of Barsanti’s excellent ‘organaro’ skills (he had to remove, re-adjust and replace over eight hundred pipes) but also of his ‘organista’ ones. The concert included a flautist, trumpeter, soprano and bass.

This was the programme.

I’d never heard the Bach piece before. It’s a very early work dating back to around 1705 when Bach was in Lubeck where he met his great predecessor Buxtehude. A grand virtuosistic piece with two fugues of very different character divided by fantasia-like sections it certainly makes an organist sweat. Barsanti, however, carried it off adequately and showed the large sound range the restored instrument is capable of.

The other pieces were of a more ‘popular’ nature. The Albinoni is, of course, not by Albinoni at all but by 20^th century musicologist Remo Giazotto. The Handel is actually a transcription of ‘Ombra Mai fu’ from his opera ‘Xerxes’ fitted with words of a religious nature.

Although all soloists were good I thought the trumpeter Andrea Battistoni excelled.

The programme concluded with Lefébure-Wely’s ‘Bolero’. A fun piece, it was designed for the new symphonically inclined Cavaillé-Coll French organs. The fact that it could be played very decently on the refurbished organ of the convent shows that Barsanti did an outstanding job on the instrument.

It’s important to note that until the 1970’s there was little interest in restoring Lucca’s great organ heritage. Changed liturgical practise and the fact that an electronic keyboard was much cheaper than any money spent on the ancient instruments meant that many of them were in danger of falling into utter decrepitude and, if they were restored, they were restored unskilfully. This situation has happily changed now. For example, Borgo a Mozzano’s parish church organ, which dates back to the seventeenth century, is due to be fully restored next year, again by Enrico Barsanti.

Samuele Maffucci (L) and Enrico Barsanti (R)

After the concert came the ‘rinfresco’ which was generously presented with characteristic Italian ‘gusto’.

San Francesco’s Agati-Tronci will surely be a very valuable asset to Borgo a Mozzano’s flourishing musical scene especially when it enhances an already charming location: