With this volume all of the surviving organs and organ façades from the workshop of Arp
Schnitger have been gathered together for the first time. These instruments can be found in
North Germany and the northern Provinces of the Netherlands as well as Portugal and Brazil.
Arp Schnitger (1648¿-¿1719) was in his time the organ builder with the most extensive Opus
list and the widest geographical distribution of his instruments: in the east to Moscow in the
west to England and in the south to Portugal. When an organ originally built for Lisbon was
given to the Cathedral in Mariana (Brazil) in 1752 Schnitger's area of influence was extended
even to the Western Hemisphere. From over 160 original Schnitger organs forty-six organ
façades survive and give a fascinating impression of the organ culture of northern Europe in
the Baroque Era. In the period around 1700 Arp Schnitger was a dominating figure in the
context of European organ culture and he has assumed a similar role again in our time. Today
Schnitger's surviving instruments have been copied and heard in recordings throughout the world
and thus have become an integral part of the global organ culture. The authors who are
counted among the most knowledgeable experts on the Schnitger style present the first
comprehensive view of the art and design of Arp Schnitger's organs. The publishers are two
societies one in North Germany and the other in the northern Netherlands whose shared mission
is to support and communicate the Art of the Organ as widely as possible.
