Sonja Kahler plays the Lively-Fulcher organ built in 2002 for the Franciscan Monastery church in Washington, DC, a building with grand and inspiring acoustics.

Anðelko Klobucar 1931-2016: Intrada, Pastorale e Toccata (1994)

Bedrich Wiedermann 1883-1951: Two Chorale Preludes:
   I:  Angel Gabriel, composed 1913 on a Moravian folk hymn
   II: O sacred head, now wound­ed, composed 1934

Ronald Arnatt 1930-2018: Sonata for Organ in three movements (first recording, not the "Hymn Sonata") 
  I: Grave–Allegro–Più mosso e tranquillo–Allegro
  II: Threnody: Andante tranquillo
  III: Dance in Five (Vivace)

Sonja Kahler B. 1968: American Ternion, Settings of Three American Hymntunes:
Scherzo on ENDLESS SONG: How can I keep from singing?
Perpetuum mobile on WONDROUS LOVE: What wondrous love is this?
Blues ternion on NETTLETON: Come, thou fount of every blessing

Sonja Kahler: Drei Moderne, Settings of Three German Communion Chorales
INNSBRUCK O bread of life from heaven
SONNE DER GERECHTIGKEIT At the Lamb’s high feast we sing
SCHMÜCKE DICH Soul, adorn yourself with gladness

Capital Finds
by Sonja Kahler

This is the first solo recording on the grand Lively-Fulcher organ which was built in 2002 and is situated in the lush acoustics of the Memorial Church of the Holy Sepulcher at the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America in Washington, DC. The organ is played for Masses, a recital series and other periodic concerts, but in its first quarter-­century of musical service it has not been featured on a solo album until this one.

All of the music recorded here has one or more connections to America’s capital city, Washing­ton, DC, to another nation’s capital, or both. All of it comes from the 20th and 21st centuries. And, it’s all capital music! Each piece is “a find”— surprising, attractive, useful, but not widely known—and so deserves a broader audience. To quote Jirí Ropek, a former student of Bedrich Wiedermann and editor of some of his organ works, including two on this recording, ”As a matter of course we are interested in compositions for organ that deserve a greater publicity.”

All of these compositions work in recital, and—really more important—most of them work well in a church service.

Anðelko Klobucar 1931-2016:
Intrada, Pastorale e Toccata (1994)

A Vacation Find: During a July 2017 trip to Prague, Czech Republic, my husband and I chanced upon an international organ festival at St. Vitus Cathedral with­in the Prague Castle complex. In a Croatian organist’s program that included several toc­catas, we found the best takeaway to be this versatile triptych by his elder compatriot—the com­pos­er, professor, and longtime organist of Zagreb’s cathedral, An­ðel­ko Klobucar.

Bedrich Wiedermann 1883-1951: Two Chorale Preludes 
I:  And l Gabriel (Angel Gabriel), composed 1913 on a Moravian folk hymn
II: O, hlavo, plná trýzn  (O sacred head, now wound­ed), composed 1934

A Revisited Find: As a high school student im­pressed by the Pipedreams organ program on public radio, I ordered a volume of Bed­rich Wiedermann’s music after admiring a loud concert piece of his. Years later, I paid more attention to the Two Chorales quietly waiting within the same book, composed for Advent and Lent.
Czech organ virtuoso, composer, and professor Bedrich Wiedermann has been called the “Czech Dupré.” His compositional output comprises 350 opus numbers of widely varied instrumental and vocal music. He concertized extensively in his home country and performed abroad between the world wars (in England, New York City, Sweden, Germany, Belgium). The Angel Gabriel chorale prelude treats not the well-known Basque Advent carol, but one from Moravia—the region where Wiedermann grew up and where he researched folk and sacred songs in the early 1900s before moving to Prague. The classic Passion chorale, Herzlich tut mich verlangen, forms the basis of the Lenten prelude.

Ronald Arnatt 1930-2018:
Sonata for Organ in three movements
I: Grave–Allegro–Più mosso e tranquillo–Allegro
II: Threnody: Andante tranquillo
III: Dance in Five (Vivace)

Seek, and Ye Shall Find: When Dr. Arnatt visited my undergraduate school, Valparaiso University, in 1989, I enjoyed his organ recital and especially this sonata. I did not get to meet him that afternoon but wrote to him asking about the piece; he kindly mailed me an inscribed copy with a handwritten letter.

The cover of the score states, “Commission­ed by the Kindler Foundation, Washington, DC, USA 1982.” Created in 1953, this foundation commemorates Hans Kindler, the Dutch-­born cellist and conductor who was the founder and first conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington (established 1930-­31). Its central purpose has been to commission new musical works annually and to have those works performed in Washington as part of the city’s cultural life. The Kindler Foundation has overwhelmingly commissioned dozens of instrumental chamber works, not solo keyboard pieces. So this sonata is most likely its sole commission for organ. It was published in 1984 by Basil Ramsey Music Publisher.

Dr. Arnatt led a distinguished career as organist, choir director, composer, professor, recitalist, music editor, president of the American Guild of Organists, and recipient of numerous awards, prizes, and fellowships. London-born, he emigrated with his parents to the United States in 1945. He served in prominent posts in Washington, DC, for several years early in his career; his other liturgical and academic appointments were in St. Louis, MO, Princeton, NJ, and Boston, MA.

Sonja Kahler B. 1968: American Ternion,Settings of Three American Hymntunes
Scherzo on ENDLESS SONG How Can I Keep From Singing?
Perpetuum mobile on WONDROUS LOVE What wondrous love is this?
Blues ternion on NETTLETON Come, thou fount of every blessing

On finding, please publish: Publishers, please note: this hymn suite and the next one are manuscripts awaiting your discovery.

Sonja Kahler: Drei Moderne,Settings of Three German Communion Chorales
INNSBRUCK O bread of life from heaven
SONNE DER GERECHTIGKEIT At the Lamb’s high feast we sing
SCHMÜCKE DICH Soul, adorn yourself with gladness

Capitalizing on classic chorales: The first chorale setting uses key wedges. The second one swings. The third briefly quotes Messiaen’s landmark Le Banquet Celeste (1928), the final bars of which remind me of the end of the Schmücke dich chorale. So I thought, why not meld Johann Crüger’s serenely joyous communion melody from 1649 with some of Mes­si­aen’s mystical meditation on the timelessness of the Eucharist?


Francis Pott B. 1957: Introduction,Toccata and Fugue, composed 2001
Score stolen, then found: I am grateful for the introduction to the striking music of Francis Pott by his longtime friend, Dr. Jeremy Filsell, who gifted me a copy of this score. It unfortunately vanished on a sunny midday in 2019 in northwest Washington, DC, when my car window was smashed and my music bag was stolen. Over the course of that afternoon and evening my labeled reading glasses, checkbook, and purse contents were found scattered up and down the block. Ultimately at nightfall a helpful police officer shined his flashlight into a nearby dumpster full of cardboard and revealed my music bag! the Pott score! the Bach and Dupré scores! my organ shoes! and my favorite pencils! A lucky find.

British composer, pianist, and academic Francis Pott, who taught for many years in London, enjoys an international reputation for his compositions. They include numerous major commissions and have been performed and broadcast across the United Kingdom and in more than 40 countries worldwide, to critical acclaim. Dr. Pott has won both national and international composition awards, and his sacred choral and organ works have received particular recognition. In 2021, he was named the recipient of the Medal of the Royal College of Organists, its highest award.

Sonja Kahler
Sonja Kahler has served as musician for Lutheran churches in the metro-Washington, DC region since 1995. She holds a graduate performance diploma in organ from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University (with professors Jeremy Filsell and Don­ald Suth­er­land), a master’s in organ performance from Northwestern University (with professors Richard Webster and Wolfgang Rübsam), and a bachelor’s from Valparaiso University (with professors Martin Jean and Philip Gehring). She also majored in journalism as an undergraduate. As a copy editor and writer she has appeared on the mastheads of Kiplinger Magazine and the Oakland Tribune, written tour guides for the FDR Memorial, Rock Creek Park, Arlington National Cemetery, and other National Park Service sites around the nation’s capital, and edited documents for businesses ranging from nonprofits to Fortune 100 companies.

Notes from the Organbuilders
In 2001, Lively-Fulcher Organs was contacted by Jay Rader regarding the failing Henry Pilcher organ in the Franciscan Monastery Church in NE Washington, DC. Jay Rader was the organ adviser appointed by the Monastery Guardian at that time, Brother Fabian. Talks quickly moved to the vision of a new organ reusing a few ranks of pipes from the Pilcher into a new scheme with an Anglo-French bias as a starting design point. Based on the organ budget at that time, it was decided to design a fully equipped two-manual format but with a third Bombarde keyboard to include Tuba Magna 16’, Tuba Mirabilis 8’, and Cor Harmonique 4’ based on the French-style tubas of the Cavaillé-Coll organ in the Basilica of the Sacré-Coeur of Montmarte in Paris. A wide-­scaled five-rank mounted Cornet was also included to complete this small division.

It was decided not to intrude on the remarkable church architecture with a visible organ case, but to create a façade of 72% tin pipes (all speaking) fitted within the arches of the eastern first-floor overlook with an organ case proper behind. The console follows a low-profile, terraced, curved jamb design to facilitate good sight lines by the organist into the room.

Acoustically this space is just as remarkable as the architecture and was a real pleasure to work with. The pipes are generously scaled throughout the organ and voiced with warm, full tone designed to fill the space with abundant, well-blended sound. While the initial influence for the organ was an Anglo-French synthesis, care was taken in the stop-to-stop balances to afford the convincing performance of the well-loved classic literature of Germany and France. The new organ was installed and voiced in 2002 with the Organ Dedicatory Mass following shortly after completion.

2002 Lively-Fulcher Organ Builders
Memorial Church of the Holy Sepulcher
Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America, Washington, DC
3 manuals (61 notes), Pedale (32 notes), 38 stops, 41 ranks

Grand Orgue Man. I
16 Bourdon TC
8 Montre
8 Bourdon
8 Flûte harmonique TC
4 Prestant
4 Flûte ouverte
2 Doublette
IV Fourniture
8 Trompette
4 Clairon
Trémblant G.O.
Octaves graves G.O.
Récit sur G.O.
Bombarde sur G.O.

Récit Expressif Man. II
8 Diapason
8 Viole de Gambe
8 Voix céleste (from F)
8 Cor de nuit
4 Prestant
4 Flûte octaviante
2 Octavin
II Cornet
IV Plein Jeu
16 Basson
8 Trompette harmonique
8 Hautbois
8 Voix humaine
Trémblant Récit
Octaves graves Récit
Octaves aigue Récit

Bombarde Man. III
16 Tuba magna
8 Tuba mirabilis ext
4 Cor harmonique ext
V Grand cornet TC

Pedale
32 Contre Soubasse
16 Gross flûte
16 Soubasse
8 Montre
8 Bourdon ext
8 Flûte ext
4 Prestant ext
32 Contre bombarde
16 Bombarde ext
16 Basson RÉCIT
8 Trompette ext
Tirasse G.O.
Tirasse Récit
Tirasse Bombarde

The Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America, Washington, DC
In the Northeast DC neighborhood of Brook­land, home to the world’s second-largest concentration of Catholic institutions (after the Vatican), the 42-acre complex of the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land in America stands apart on the wooded hillside of Mount Saint Sepulcher. It includes the neo-Byzantine Memorial Church of the Holy Sepulcher; the neo-­Romanesque monastery; replicas of various shrines in Palestine, of catacombs in Rome, of the Lourdes grotto; relics of saints; elaborate gardens; and a retreat space, the Hermitage.

It was established in 1897 to extend the work of the Holy Land Franciscans to the United States. For more than 800 years the Holy Land Franciscans have served the people of the Holy Land and tended the sacred sites there. Founding Friar, Father Godfrey Schilling, OFM, sought specifically to encourage pilgrimages to the Washington, DC, monastery by replicating Holy Land shrines, so that people could experience them stateside even if they could not travel to the Holy Land.

As a sightseeing destination the Monastery can be easy to miss, even as guidebooks to Washington consistently list it as a top sight; in 1992 it was named to the National Register of Historic Places. It’s a find.