The secret of the Spanish organ: Piffaro’s rare musical find

Four hundred years ago, an absentminded organist left a score tucked into the case of an organ in Lerma, Spain. The score lay there through most of the upheavals of the last four centuries, including the machinations of a villainous 20th-century choir director who stole all the other items in the church’s valuable manuscript collection. When the hidden manuscript finally came to light in 1980, musicologists discovered it was a rare treasure — a set of scores created for a group of professional Renaissance wind players. Much of the Renaissance music we hear today survives in scores created for vocalists, with no indication of the instruments played by the musicians who accompanied them. For their October concert, Piffaro’s musicians will play selections from the Lerma manuscript using the same arrangements of Renaissance reeds and brasses their predecessors used 400 years ago. They even know the names of the Renaissance musicians who used the scores and the number of ducats they were paid.

Piffaro Renaissance Band will present “Hidden Treasure: The Lerma Codex, Music for a Spanish Wind Band” on Friday, October 17, 8pm at Trinity Center for Urban Life, 22nd and Spruce Streets, Philadelphia; Saturday, October 18, 8pm at Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, 8855 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia; and Sunday, October 19, 3pm at Sts. Andrew & Matthew Episcopal Church in Wilmington. Tickets are $40 for preferred seating (front rows), $40 for general admission, $35 for seniors, and $15 for students, and they’re available by calling 215-235-8469, visiting www.piffaro.org, and at the door.