Toccata and Fugue, BWV 565

The opening flourishes and pauses were written for a single organist. Stokowski spreads them across an orchestra with a large brass section, two harps and celesta.

On 6 April 1927 Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra recorded the work at the Academy of Music. The orchestration was Stokowski’s own. This side holds the opening portion of the recording.

The toccata alternates quick runs with chords. In the organ score, long pedal notes sound beneath the hands. Stokowski keeps this contrast between moving notes and sustained bass in his orchestral transcription.

In 1938 Stokowski and Walt Disney discussed music for Fantasia. Stokowski favoured Bach’s “Little” Fugue in G minor, and Disney wanted the Toccata and Fugue. Disney’s choice was adopted, and this orchestration was used in the film.

The organ opens with a mordent on its first note, pauses, then descends in octaves. Over a held low D, a diminished-seventh chord is built up one note at a time.

The fugue’s subject is made entirely of semiquavers. It returns repeatedly to a fixed note, an implied pedal, while a second melodic line falls and rises around it. Other voices then take up the subject in turn.

The earliest surviving copy bears the name of Johannes Ringk. On the title page he wrote Toccata con Fuga and named Bach. Inside, the pedal part is written on the keyboard staves, and small letters mark where the feet play.

The closing section leaves behind the steady semiquavers of the fugue. It is marked Recitativo and moves in runs, pauses and broad chords. Several changes of tempo lead to the final Molto adagio and the close in D minor.