Definition of "organ-point" [organ-point]

• In music, a single tone, usually the tonic or the dominant, held or sustained by one of the voice-parts while the other parts progress freely without reference to the sustained tone, except at the beginning and end of the passage. (noun)

The Century Dictionary (Public Domain)

• "A sudden hush and the motive of warning is heard high in the wood-wind, in C flat major, against a double organ-point -- C natural and C sharp -- in the lower strings."
• "There is a brief hint of the Marseillaise woven into the finely varied tapestry of martial music, and when the lover comes trudging home, his joy, his sudden knowledge of Perrine's faithlessness, and his overwhelming grief are all built over a long organ-point of three clangorous bride-bells."
• ""The Zephyr" is dangerously like Chopin's fifteenth Prelude, with a throbbing organ-point on the same A flat."