My trip through the Baltic States lies already about 3 months in the past, but of course I am still far from finished putting everything I saw on paper or rather on a blog post. Yesterday I listened to a concert, a pipe organ concert in Riga Cathedral, which popped up by chance on Facebook. And that inspired me to write this blog post on the Riga Cathedral. The cathedral is a landmark and is featured in paintings, phographs and so on. I had already mentioned Riga Cathedral in a German text in August 2024 [1].
Riga had a wooden cathedral before the Riga Dom had been built [2]. The wooden structure was destroyed by a fire in 1215. The first bishop of Riga, Albert von Buxthoeven, laid the foundation stone for the cathedral and in 1226 it was completed to the point that a synod was already taking place there, welcoming a papal legate. However, in 1595 the region changed to the Lutheran confession and the cathedral wa handed over to the Evangelical Lutheran community. The Riga Dom is built of bricks as many churches and other buildings in the north of Europe anyway. If you look at the Hanseatic cities, you will find such buildings regularly.
Just so I don't forget, the cathedral in Riga also has excellent windows and in fact I am even more interested in stained glass than pipe organs. In the area where I live I can refer to a very good website [3], the one that explains the stained glass windows and in particular researches which artists created these windows. I don't have such information for the cathedral in Riga. Nevertheless I also want to show a picture of one in this beautiful stained glass windows.
This brings me to the Walcker organ from the year 1883. The lavish early baroque facade of the predecessor instrument by Jakob Raab from Lübeck in 1601 was well preserved. The organ building company Walcker from Ludwigsburg built the current organ with a total of 6,718 pipes in the year 1882/883. Back in the day this organ has been the largest organ in the world. Already during the period between 1601 and 1883, changes had to be made to maintain the instrument, but that digs to deep into the history of this organ. And of course, the Second World War did not completely pass the instrument, neither did the Soviet era. Nevertheless, for the 100th anniversary, the Walcker organ was restored in 1983 and 1984 by the Dutch organ building company Flentrop.
During my stay in Riga I was able to hear a short concert by Larisa Bulava [4], who played short pieces to introduce the organ to the audience. Now I have a live recording by Liene Andreta Kalnciema [5], who played “Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV 565” by Johann Sebastian Bach on the organ of Riga Cathedral [6]. The recording lasts 9:17 minutes and those are minutes of time well spent. The transition from the toccata to the fugue will always stay in my memory.
I have two recommendations: visiting Riga Cathedral first of all and of course taking the 9:17 minutes to listen to “Toccata and Fugue in D minor” played by Liene Andreta Kalnciema.
Links and Annotations:
[1] ReiseGedichte - #KurzGedichte - Riga
https://rheumatologe.blogspot.com/2024/08/reisegedichte-kurzgedichte-riga.html
[2] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dom_zu_Riga The German text is much longen and thus gives more information especially on the pipe organ. However there is a good text in English, too: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riga_Cathedral.
[3] „Forschungsstelle Glasmalerei des 20. Jh. e.V.“ based in Mönchengladbach is a center for the documentation and research of stained glass. https://www.glasmalerei-ev-web.de/pages/b6742/b6742.shtml
[4] „Larisa Bulava is a professor at the organ class of the Latvian Academy of Music.“ https://doms.lv/en/pages/190
[5] Liene Andreta Kalnciema is one of the most outstanding Latvian organists of her generation who has won a wide international recognition.“ https://doms.lv/en/pages/192
[6] J.S. Bach Toccata and Fugue in D minor BWV 565 Liene Andreta Kalnciema live at Riga Cathedral https://fb.watch/vesFmoKKeF/
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