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GrossGeigen

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Everything posted by GrossGeigen

  1. What previous experience in the field of designing cathedral organs will the Professor be drawing upon?
  2. As one who has regrettably never heard this instrument, is there any reader out there who has played Southwark Cathedral and can describe the tonality and effect of the Cornet III-V on the Great there? Is it a solo and/or chorus register?
  3. Anybody know more about this "staged process of re-engineering and refinishing" - seems surprising after 13/14 years?
  4. Cinq Prieres pour chant et orgue - Milhaud. Never heard them, sadly, but they do exist.
  5. I'm sure if you can email H&H, they could accomodate a photo when the site is next updated. I would personally be more interested to see what they have done with the Salisbury console, which I gather has been relieved of all Willis III ebonised finish - no doubt some will consider this treachery.
  6. Many thanks - this sounds like an excellent booklet.
  7. Thanks for this interesting information - do you have details of the publisher of Plumley's history, please?
  8. Have I imagined this, or did I indeed read that a full-length 32ft reed from this organ has had to be dumped for reasons of space?!
  9. One wonders if it is only a matter of time before this instrument is being discussed in the past tense.
  10. Perhaps not as well-known is John Langdon, who presided at King's, I believe, between the tenures of Preston and Davis. For the last 38 years he has lectured at the RSAMD in Glasgow where he is held in great esteem by colleagues and generations of students.
  11. Ayr Town Hall is definitely worth a mention - a fairly modest three manual Lewis & Co of 1903, limping along to this day without ever having been restored. Much smaller than Kelvingrove but similarly exquisite voicing.
  12. I have a newspaper cutting about Middlesbrough TH organ dating from about 1995. It concerned a proposed £200, 000 restoration scheme (no builder named) and a pending lottery application, the hope being to have the instrument restored by 1998 - its centenary. The organ was last overhauled c.1973, allegedly by HN&B although I understand John T. Jackson carried it out.
  13. This is intriguing - I'm sure we are all hoping it IS still in situ.
  14. GrossGeigen

    Go Organs Ltd.

    I have similarly heard favourable reports from a distinguished recitalist who played there last year. Do you know where it might be possible to get hold of the stoplist and other technical details of this project? The GO Organs website appears to have been discontinued. Hope the big ivory "mushroom" drawstops have survived!
  15. Gordon Stewart has presided at Huddersfield Town Hall (job description "Kirklees Borough Organist"!) since 1989, overseeing the fortnightly Monday lunchtime series. He has recently relinquished the post, and although the recital series for next season is now in place, it is not known as yet if the post will be continued. I was pleased to be able to get a copy of the re-released Priory recording of Kidderminster - it's a miracle the organ has survived so relatively unscathed.
  16. Does anyone have experience of some of the lesser-known Town Hall organs which still remain? I'm thinking of the likes of Cheltenham, Darlaston, Dover, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, West Bromwich. I suspect some of these places may continue to employ a "Borough Organist".......
  17. Wakefield's Choir division (12 ranks) also remains on a slider chest, happily returned in 1985 to its own Pearson case where it had resided from 1905 until the Compton rebuild. As an (exiled) West Yorkshireman, I should own up to a soft spot for this instrument, but I wonder if anyone has tried St. Mary Magdalene, Paddington? I tried, and enjoyed it, about 15 years ago. It was certainly not in the greatest condition mechanically, but it was good to try a console with the "light-touches". MM has mentioned mixtures elsewhere (David Wood may enlighten on Wakefield) but I recall a six-rank Plein-Jeu on the Paddington Great, and superb Posaune rank(as also at Wakefield). I recall the church itself at Paddington as magnificent also. I wonder if the Compton console has survived at Derby?? Wakefield (drawstop) is extremely comfortable and in no way daunting.
  18. GrossGeigen

    Rco

    My own suspicion is that there weren't very many firms interested in taking on the contract of rebuilding a C-C instrument, although it was undoubtedly a potentially lucrative project. The Lewis firm had received C-C's endorsement ("...my closest disciples etc....") some decades earlier, so it seems reasonable to assume they might have been approached from the outset. Apart from the additions and the reed re-voicing, they were asked to "remove the Gamba tone" from the fluework. I've only heard the instrument on Radio 3, about 20 years ago, in a recital given by Stephen Cleobury. I don't have any distinguishing memory of how it sounded, so the comments from those who have played it are all the more interesting. The use of wooden resonators for their new 32ft Bombarde seems uncharacteristic of Lewis & Co., yet they would no doubt be beautifully made.
  19. Elvin's "Pipes and Actions" has an interesting and substantial chapter on Compton. I know Wakefield well, an instrument enhanced by the conservative work done in 1985 by Wood of Huddersfield. It's perhaps a shame about Compton's treatment of the much-admired Lewis at Ilkley, but I suppose most other builders wouldn't have given that approach a second thought either.
  20. GrossGeigen

    Rco

    The Tubas were part of the Solo division which Cavaille-Coll added in 1893, and revoiced by Lewis & Co's reed voicer (possibly Tunks if he was still there) in 1913. There has quite recently been talk of a possible restoration of the instrument to either the 1877 or 1893 design, although as yet there hasn't been much progress. I gather there are some who wish the instrument to be preserved in its current form.
  21. GrossGeigen

    Rco

    The Manchester Town Hall rebuild was completed by Lewis & Co. Ltd (as they had been known since 1884) in 1913, some six years before the "tie-up" with the Willis firm. Old man T.C. Lewis (away from the firm from c.1898) had, therefore, no responsibility in this scheme. The two Tubas formed part of the Cavaille-Coll six stop Solo division of 1893. Revoicing, of a surpressive nature, was not confined to the reedwork alone. Together with the various additions, the scheme as realised appears to have resulted, as MM suggests, in a very "uneasy" tonal alliance, yet it would be difficult to think of any builder who, at that time, would have been any less invasive.
  22. Did the "tinkering" not start between 1958-1960 when the pipework of the original unenclosed Choir department was replaced? Was this carried out at Rawsthorne's instigation, I wonder? Does replacement of soundboards, as carried out for the Westminster Cathedral Choir and Solo divisions in 1984, count as "tinkering"?
  23. Jonathan Bielby at Wakefield - 36 years with his Bass Cornet.
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