St. Paul's Cathedral

[Iain]

Hi there.

 

Dose anyone know if the organ at St. Paul's is going to have any work done on it this year? There was talk about having a second console. Be most grateful for any insight.

 

Iain

[heva]

Hi there.

 

Dose anyone know if the organ at St. Paul's is going to have any work done on it this year? There was talk about having a second console. Be most grateful for any insight.

 

Iain

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Ask Mander Organs - they should know

[Guest paul@trinitymusic.karoo.co.uk]

Hi there.

 

Dose anyone know if the organ at St. Paul's is going to have any work done on it this year? There was talk about having a second console. Be most grateful for any insight.

 

Iain

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No information, I'm afraid, just a very envious miow!

 

Apparently, St.Paul's were left a very considerable amount of money about three years ago which according to the wishes of the donor has to be spent in regular maintenance and improvement of the organ. This has not been made public so far as I know - I have a strong suspicion that the legacy came from that well-known supporter of organs and organ music, the late Commander Beckwith of Hythe. You can expect regular work either partially announced or just so 'ongoing' that it never stops and is never referred to.

[pcnd5584]

In a recent interview with Malcolm Archer, he stated that a second (mobile) console was planned in the not-too-distant future.

 

I had also understood that there has been (for somewhat longer than three years) regular money allocated for improvements to the organ; I was further informed that if each year's allowance was not used, it could not be carried-over the financial year.

 

I would be interested to know if there is any substance to this. Certainly, the organ has been subject to a number of additions and alterations over a number of years; for example, the GO flute, a new Choir 16p stop, and one or two other ranks; furthermore, a new sound-board was also made for one of the Choir sections - I believe that it might have been the South Choir Organ.

[Jeremy Jones]

Does anyone know whether the planned refurbishment of the St Paul's organ has started yet?

[Ronald Shillingford]

Does anyone know whether the planned refurbishment of the St Paul's organ has started yet?

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Well theres nothing sbout it as yet on the manders website. Perhaps they are still in discussion over it. As I understood it it was gong to take 2 yrs to fully refurbish the instrument.

[heva]

Maybe they've hired stevebournias as a consultant. Will take some years before he's finished writing the stoplist.

[MusingMuso]

Maybe they've hired stevebournias as a consultant. Will take some years before he's finished writing the stoplist.

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Then they would have to find the resident "organ-curator" a house, a workshop and at least a dozen permanent-staff to carry-out running repairs and constant tuning.

 

 

MM

[parsfan]

Is there any one out there that can clear up this mystery?

 

I understood that the restoration would begin around 23 April and that Sunday organ recitals would then cease.

 

However, it is clear from the St Paul's website that these recitals continue. Has the restoration been dealyed? Funding issues perhaps?

 

Perhaps John Pike Mander could bring us up to speed.

[Martin Cooke]

I attended the Organ Forum at St Paul's back in March. I think this was part of a compulsory charity-friendly "consultation process." It was quite fun really but the audience had a very wide appreciation/understanding of organs. Questions put to the panel (JPM, Malcolm Archer, the consultant whose well-known name escapes me a moment, Canon Lucy Winkett) were pretty plodding - "how many pipes are there in the organ?" when one of the panel had only just said how many there were, etc! The new console seems to be the only innovation - certainly nothing new like last time in terms of divisions and new stops. I would have expected the work to have begun by now but I don't recall a start date being mentioned.

 

I have to say that the organ was sounding wonderful - Howells' Coll Reg at evensong. What a pity though that cathedrals have made a virtue of having almost no organ music at the start of a service these days - just that rush of cassock up the stairs at the last second and whoops, there we are!

 

Christopher Dearnley had a secret device fitted under the console that allowed him to have the west end reeds playing together at 8ft pitch. Is this something that is standard practice elsewhere and has anyone ever come across it elsewhere? Indeed, has anyone tried the effect at St Paul's? I wonder if the current organists ever use it.

Martin