innate

That’s absolutely true, and not just for Aubertin organs. But this forum would be even duller if we weren’t allowed to speculate based on stoplists. Aubertin himself mentions an organ providing all the essential stops for eg French classical repertoire, so I think discussion along those lines is legitimate.

It’s also struck me that there’s an alternative sort-of' Cornet at 4' pitch using the Portunal 4', Flageolet 2', Quinte 1 ⅓' and the Tiercelette.

I can imagine the high Tierce rank giving an almost cymbale quality to the Positive plenum, and adding a useful piquancy to solo combinations. Is a Suavial a flute? I always thought it a string, perhaps like a Geigen principal. 3' used to be standard for a twelfth, even on some mid-late C19 English organs. For higher mutations you need a more specific fraction to tell the difference between a 17th and a 19th, I suppose.

Not sure if this counts as late Baroque or early Organ Reform Movement: http://www.npor.org.uk/NPORView.html?RI=K00981

I sometimes play on an Allen with a terrible music desk—too high, too close to vertical, no metal “stays” to keep books open, and a ridiculous light in the bottom of the music desk which is covered by any music you put on it.

I did this a couple of months ago and used the (recentish?) Novello edition, as did the singers. Some of it is hard to get to work on the organ but not impossible. A pageturner is a big help.

Yes, very high notes are much harder to identify (as flute, reed, brass, string) from their timbre alone; attack and envelope are much more important up there.

In the Brustwerk at Clifton RC Cathedral too. http://www.npor.org.uk/NPORView.html?RI=N01276

Never using a 16' fractional reed when it is the sole reed on a manual implies that there are situations you might use it were it not the sole reed on a manual. If you could tell us what the latter situations might be we may be able to provide some for the former.

Are they Pipe-istrelle bats?

Stainer’s Crucifixion. I think if we’re getting paid to perform a service for a church we should do our best to provide what has been asked of us. If you’re a volunteer helping out then you have more “leverage” to call the tune. Getting the choir on-side is obviously an astute political move but who knows how many of the congregation might have been looking forward to the original choice.

I saw a post on Facebook that might fit your thinking on this, DHM.

This is a general question but prompted by a specific example. I played this organ http://www.npor.org.uk/NPORView.html?RI=A00714 in the City of London today. Old case positioned over the West door. Swell box (painted to match the wall and ceiling) can just be seen protruding above the case at the rear. The spec is a 35-stop 3-manual and pedal organ with apparently 6 independent 16' stops (I’m assuming the 32' has no pipes of its own although NPOR doesn’t say) in a case that’s not much larger than the 8-stop Norman & Beard tracker I grew up with. Access for tuning must be extremely precarious. I remember seeing photos of the insides of 3- or 4-hundred-year-old European organs and marvelling at how compactly the pipes had been fitted onto the chests. I gather there can be problems if this isn’t done extremely carefully. My question is: have internal designs changed in recent years for practical and Health & Safety reasons? Could a new organ be manufactured with the same space-saving as was used in older organs?

On a Mac the built-in Garage Band software should do the multi-track recording you need just fine, with plenty of edit features should you need them. Just using the built in mic would be good enough for practice tracks, I’d have thought.

It’s like the 1930s never went away. I’d prefer OD, Gamba, SD, Harmonic Flute, Gemshorn. Or even an undulant. Of the two IV compounds on the Gt is one a Cornet or a high mixture?

There seems to have been a shift from placing the only manual 16' flue on the Swell (often only down to Tenor C) in many small- and medium-sized English church organs in the 19th century to the Great in the 20th century. I suspect for much of the solo organ literature it might be more useful on the Great but what about service playing, hymns etc? Might a (full-compass) 16' flue be more useful on the Swell? Particularly if there is no Swell sub-octave coupler? Would the presence of a 16' reed in either division change your answer?

There has been significant inflation since decimalisation in 1971. Perhaps UK house prices have risen slightly less than Joshua Fit but some strange economic factors may be involved. In any event ridiculous price is not a permissible defence for theft under civil law as far as I am aware (I am not a lawyer).

Hi, rogbi, I was hoping someone would reply with more info about the Christ Church, Oxford Rieger. Perhaps they will later. I must admit to feeling slightly worried by your news. One would have thought that the combination of Rieger craftsmanship and Christ Church guardianship would ensure a long trouble-free existence for the instrument. Is the old Willis 2-manual tracker no longer in the building? [i’m sure npor will tell me]

The 1662 Book of Common Prayer and the KJV are Crown Copyright in the UK in perpetuity, I believe.

Interested to read the responses to this. My experience in theatres is that modern digital CCTV has a noticeable delay due to conversion into the digital domain.

I’d put a fiver on “Clarinette”.

I wonder how much organs are, or have been, used in small-to-medium sized ensembles. I’m excluding continuo in baroque-era music and use in symphony-sized orchestras. The Britten Church Parables, and the organ-harp-percussion version of Chichester Psalms come to mind immediately. I think there’s a version of the Duruflé Requiem for organ and string quintet (+optional brass and percussion). Many of the older, grander theatres used to have pipe organs 100-150 years ago—were they only used on their own or were they ever part of the theatre orchestra sound? Partly I’m asking as I’m currently playing keyboards for a production of Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd and I’m using a [whisper it] digital organ for much of the “meat” of the keyboard sound. It’s working quite well but would be even better with a proper instrument.

Henle Urtext Edition have made what seems to be a perfect implementation of a tablet-compatible non-copyright-infringing music reader. https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/henle-library-urtext-score/id1021283948?mt=8

Very good idea, David!

Thank you for that information, JJK. I remember Mark Blatchly’s despondence when discovering that he couldn’t play Le Banquet Celeste with the specified 2⅔' coupled to the pedal on the then brand new Rieger at Christ Church, Oxford as the only isolatable twelfth was the Nazard on the Récit which was providing the Celestes. The stop on the Positif labelled 2⅔' was the 12, 17 Sesquialtera. If only that Sesquialtera had been a double draw.