The organ has been called the “king of instruments,” and when it’s used in an orchestral work, the challenge is to keep it from overpowering everything else—unless, of course, that’s the point, as in the opening moments of Richard Strauss’s Festival Prelude for Organ.

It’s a challenge that’s been faced and met by a wide range of composers, as we’ll explore in this hour, with works by Handel, Haydn, Liszt, Saint-Saens, and Copland, among others.