Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck - Fantasia Cromatica

- Composer: Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck (April/May 1562 -- 16 October 1621) - Performer: Helmut Walcha - Year of recording: 1977 (On the Schnitger organ at Cappel, Germany) Fantasia Cromatica in D minor/dorian, SwWV 258. The Fantasia Cromatica is Sweelinck’s most famous work—probably because of the spectacular nature of the theme (a chromatic descending fourth) and the extreme turbulence at the end when the theme appears double-diminished. Sweelinck was called the “Orpheus of Amsterdam“, he spent almost all of his long and productive musical life, a 44-year career, playing the organ and harpsichord for Amsterdam’s Oude Kerk. In Reformed Amsterdam the organs were the property of the town, so he was a civic employee, with duties to play twice every day, an hour’s concert in the morning (before church if there was a service) and an hour in the evening. Sweelinck attracted a large number of talented young musicians to travel to Amsterdam that they might study with hi