Frank Fowler

I am sure these days that the sky is the limit - many years ago when HNB pioneered the first single cable electronic transmissions and recording/playback systems I was called "a disgrace to British Organbuilding" as such ideas might encourage people to think there was an acceptable alternative, under the right circumstances to mechanical action. I see with a wry smile that often where there are now two actions and consoles to an instrument, it is usually the electric version is the one that gets used. What goes round comes round? FF

Forgetting your personal preferences and that tastes change over the years, the Rundle family were superb craftsmen who produced the reeds that were required at that time. If they had been required to produce Spanish, French or any other reeds I am sure they would have been superb. I would also like to add Billy Jones to the list, another great reed voicer of past years. FF

How wonderful, I have been hoping for something like this for a long time but please will you `click' on you name and put the information on record in you personal file so that future and existing members will be able to look people up long after this thread is lost. FF

Usually because of architects, committees and people in charge who don't know what the hell they are talking about. I have suffered! FF

The thickness of the ivory was the accepted depth of movement before the contact `made'. I remember that Peter Hurford and Francis Jackson had totally different ideas of where the contact point was to suit them which could mean quite a lot of work resetting things to accommodate them - and as was pointed out, with mechanical action you simply accepted what was there and got on with it, as indeed do most professional pianists. FF

I was so amazed at only three years use I pressed the wrong button! Something funny here somewhere. Idle thoughts are that the original contact block positions have been moved and there is too much movement on them. I cannot remember contacts in my whole life ever being a disaster other than serious damp or incensce troubles . FF

Many years ago I had to show a management group round our metal shop who came from the Steel Company of Wales and wanted to see how organ builders cast their pipe metal. As they watched a casting being done they fell about laughing, mentioning the Fred Flintstone approach. When they had calmed down I pointed out we were not rolling metal to get the required thickness but casting it to any thickness we wanted and if they could come up with a better, more cost efficient system for what we needed I would like to know it. They thought hard and long but had no answer. They were decent enough to apologise for their earlier comments though. FF

It's all a question of what you want. Erudite antiseptic education of your audience or bums on seats, which can still be done with a bit of education thrown in. I was in Glasgow with Carlo on one occasion and the night before he had given a recital in Edinburgh. The next morning crit in one of the paperers was scathing, a personal itch being scratched, unkind and gave an impression that was enough to put anyone off ever coming to organ recitals. Carlo read it and was visibly upset. He turned to me and simply said, "They forgot to mention the church was full and they had to bring in extra chairs". Is it not a British trait that when something is successful we have to try to destroy it? FF

I seem to remember from my Physics studies that it was basically the length of a flue pipe governed the pitch - not the volume of air inside it. FF

I feel that I could almost sponsor it!!!!! FF

It would be interesting to know how many organist have got someone else to play a service for them while they have sat in the congregation to listen to their instrument as it is heard by the majority. FF

I like the hint of nudity seen in the mirror in one of the photos. FF

I have come across membrane chests that under horrible heating and nil humidity conditions have caused the membrane leatherwork to dry out and become taut causing very interesting and unwanted problems. FF

If you must have an encore, build it in as a short last piece in the context of the programme - not a lollipop to go home with. FF

Barry, The organist was one Duncan Ward (16) pianist/organist of the NYO who also played the piano part in the Stravinsky. It really was a youth DIY evening. Regards, FF

I have just come back from tonights Albert Hall Prom given by the National Youth Orchestra. One of the items was Taras Bulba by Janacek which calls for the `mighty organ' in the last movement. It appeared and was wonderful, as was the orchestra conducted by Sir Colin Davis. I file this under `memorable moments'. FF

Dylan Thomas would have liked that! FF

TEPMPRATURES AND TUNING This is a highly complex area and in trying to outline the general aspects in a basic way very much simplifies the subject which is a major part of a Physics study. AIR Air, a gas, can be likened to Golden Syrup, that as you heat it, moves more easily (or quickly) and, when hot you can write you name in you porridge with it. Likewise in dry air at 32’ (degrees) F the speed of sound is some 1087 feet per second. In dry air at 60’ F the speed increases to 1118 feet per second. OPEN PIPES If one blows over the open end of a pipe or tube, we hear a musical note which gives the natural frequency of vibrations of the air (gas) inside. The frequency (vibrations) of this column is proportional to the speed of sound travelling over that column. If the air is heated, energy is transmitted to the molecules, causing them to move faster which in turn increases the speed of the sound over said column of air, the number of vibrations per second becoming faster causing a rise in pitch as the air becomes less dense. To become a little more factual let us suppose that a pipe at 40’ F is giving 493.9 vibrations per second and the temperature rises to 70’ F then the vibrations per second will increase to 508.69 – which is virtually a rise in pitch of half a semitone. On first observations one might well say that the metal of the pipe will expand, lengthen and the pipe will go flat but this is so minimal (in our example a drop in pitch of around 0.12 vibrations per second) that it can be ignored as far as we are concerned at the moment. There is also the fact that wooden pipes don’t expand as metal pipes, but let us not confuse the issue at this point. REED PIPES In an open pipe the vibrations are activated (created) by air being forced through an aperture and across the languid and subject from the start to a change in temperature affecting the density of the air. In reed pipes the vibrations are activated by the set length of a beating reed tongue and therefore are constant. (Forget about loose wedges, dirt and bad tuning springs) thus in an ideal world it is the flue work that shifts and the reeds stay put. In actual fact the size of the reed resonator does affect the pitch as the column of air inside (but not the creation of the vibrations per second) is subject to the same laws of physics as in an open pipe when the temperature changes. The less volume of air that a reed resonator contains, the less it will alter in pitch. If a reed has a whacking great full-length resonator it will move more on the sharp side with the flue work and not appear to be so out of tune (pitch) as a Vox Humana with a tiny resonator, which moves far less in pitch. On reading this through I realised I have only scratched the surface of the subject as there are far more complexities to be considered, and wonder why I started on it. If the temperature changes, the pitch of the organ moves away from the reeds and French music sound more authentic, and that’s that! I will now pour myself a glass of wine and go to bed. FF

The problem with many British organists is that their instrument must be in tune at all times, no matter what conditions prevail. A country church, with one visit per year, usually in early summer the organ would often stand in tune like a rock. The organist just setting to and playing it through the rest of the year. With modern heating, soundboard shrinkage and temperature changes plus four tuning vivits per year it usually meant the tuning had to be hacked about constantly and never got a chance to settle. I tried, even on the large instrument to `set' the job in the summer when the temperatures were stable and then on other visits, whenever the flue work went out of tune with the reeds, would scale the reeds at their normal pitch and tune octaves up and down, thus disturbing them as little as possible - and usually, after a couple of visits, they became stable. It is far more acceptable to have a reed stop in tune with its self even if slightly out of pitch with the fluework than a reed stop that has everything out of tune everywhere. Unfortunately in doing this one was liable to be accused by so many organists of not tuning the organ properly. I had one organist who screamed blue murder when his departmentsl pitches went out of tune in the winter with a highly efficient, rapid, new hot air heating system, so efficient that it only needed switching on in a cold church at 9 am to being the temperature up for the congregation to be able to take their overcoats off in time for the 10.30 service. He even wanted me to come out one cold winter's Sunday morning when the pitches went adrift and he had the Bishop coming. The cure, I put thermometers in the Swell, Choir box and on the Great, tuned the job in summer when the heating was not used and the temperature was stable and told him whenever all the thermometers were the same and the organ pitches were out I would give him a free tuning, night or day - I never was called out! The truth finally dawned and he started to play hell with the heating system, instead of me. FF

Back in the days of the large firms, most of them had an `engineering workshop' of some sort where the ironwork components etc. were manufactured. i.e. reed stay supports, bellows counterbalances and supporting brackets, but I don't think there was anything to compare with Compton's set up. FF

There used to be a record/playback system that enabled an organist to go down into the Cathedral to hear what the organ sounded like to the listener. It can be a salutary experience but all takes up rehearsal time. FF

This was a great idea and various other devices such as in the foot of a large pipe, a circular piece of card on a dowell that could be rotated or a cord wrapped round a dowell that could be `wound in' to increase the wind way obstruction did the trick but so often it was simply blocks of wood jammed in the foot of the pipe that meant the pipe had to be heaved out to make any adjustment. This was fine in the `good old days' but with modern heating and resulting lack of humidity, these stopping blocks could shrink, fall out on to the pallet below causing all sorts of problems and often needed considerable strength to get the fault sorted out. FF