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13 and 14 April 2008: masterclass by Joel Speerstra, USA, pedal clavichord

Joel Speerstra is also a very good teacher. He started his class with a very adequate description of the research and redevelopment of the instrument that was now reassembled in the organ room at the fine Music Academy. In this room there is a tracker action organ and the affinity between Joel's reconstruction of the pedal clavichord and this better know instrument rang entirely true.

The function of the clavichord appears to be simple. It consists of a stick of wood with a copper striker placed on a pivot and the finger presses down on the other end of the stick and the striker then hits the string. It is apparently, but not actually, simple to construct, and also not so simple to play. During the masterclass Joel took a range of established musical figures and carefully explained the subtleties of the movement of not only the fingers, but of the whole body to achieve the required sound. His thinking seemed to fit very well with the concepts of music current at the time of the clavichord; and it was a period when even craftsman joiners were able to construct ornaments to fit the physical design of a building.

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