Martin Owen
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Posts posted by Martin Owen
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I am very sad indeed to hear this. As others have pointed, out under Noel Mander they did some splendid post-war restorations under very difficult conditions.
Indeed, they have built many very fine organs in the last 20-30 years both here and abroad.
Like other contributors i feel very sorry for their workforce, some of whom I know well.
Martin
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I wonder why I find the excesses of Broadwalk, such as the 64ft Diaphone, so unmusical.
To me they sound like pneumatic drills digging up roads.
Yes, I accept a great feat of engineering but perhaps not of organ building.
Martin
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Organist on the Hill I couldn't agree more with you about painted pipes, whether cased or uncased.
The organ you quote was formerly in Llandaff Cathedral. Have you seen the new, current on? Stunningly good looking and sounds magnificent.
I had drinks and dinner at The Royal Academy of Music last night with someone I suspect was a colleague of yours at Harrow. I think you won The Organ Club competition last December. If so, well done.
Martin
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Like OrganistOnTheHill I find the above advise very useful and wish I had heard such many years ago.
However, I suspect many of us would love to know which school is so lucky to have BOTH a Willis and Lewis. My former school is now very fortunate in having a Hill, Norman Beard of 1968 and a re-sited Schulz of 1862. The former in the Chapel, that latter in The Big School.
I left shortly after the chapel was destroyed by fire (NOT the reason for leaving as I had finished my A levels!) so both organs are after my time.
OrganistOnTheHill do please let us know which school it is.
Martin
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Not sure I can enlighten you as to the rationale. Matthew said that he wanted to make the organ brighter, though perhaps that might be the only concern you expressed.
I thought it was a very clever and artistic instrument as it was. However, anything in that acoustic sounds good, even the former electronic.
Martin
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Perhaps users aren't aware that most of the organ has been re-voiced in the last few weeks by Ruffatti. The DOM, Matthew Martin, last week told me in detail what has been done. I look forward to hearing it now, wonderful though it was before.
Martin
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Does anyone have specification details of the new Sidney Sussex organ? I can't find it on their website. Those I know who have heard or played it say it is fantastic. David Titterington echoes their sentiments in telling me that is beautifully voiced for the chapel.
Martin
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Good news indeed.
Brindley was a very good organ builder though sadly little of his work remains in original condition.
It will be good to learn more about him and his instruments and I will order a copy.
Thank you, David, for notifying us and thank you too for showing members of The Organ Club over your factory last week.
We greatly enjoyed it and it was good to meet you.
Martin Owen
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I couldn't agree more with both Sotto Voce and Innate.
Indeed, I attended Robert Qunney's installation as Director of Music and an electronic was used as the organ's blower had broken down!Martin -
I was privileged to be asked to the Dedication of the new Mander organ in the Lady Chapel of Westminster Abbey yesterday evening.
For those who don't know, the organ was commissioned by The City of London as a gift to Her Majesty to mark her jubilee and for the last few months it has been in the Mansion House.
The Queen (in the person of The Earl of Wessex) has presented it to The Abbey and after the Dedication James O'Donnell gave a brief recital to demonstrate its considerable versatility.
It sounds very good indeed in its new, somewhat more sympathetic, setting.
Hopefully there will be some recitals on it in the not too distant future.
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For those who can't wait until 29th November to hear Robert Quinney play they should attend his opening recital on the newly completed organ at Llandaff Cathedral at 19.30 on Friday, 8th November. The programme should show of this remarkable instrument brilliantly let alone his incredible virtuosity.
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The new organ at the RAM is now fully installed. The first recital was given this last Monday by both students from the RAM and distinguished recitalists, such as Susan Landale and Clive Driskill-Smith.
It sounds very fine indeed and whilst clearly inspired as a symphonic instrument it handled the classical repertoire extremely convincingly.
From the computer generated image that had been published I had had reservations about how it would look in the Edwardian Duke's Hall. However, it fits in perfectly, largely helped by exquisite proportions, the use of light maple wood for the case and what coloured decoration there is being derived from that used elsewhere in the Hall.
Two organist at the reception following the recital, who had both been inside the instrument, said that the workmanship was of the very highest standard and the instrument beautifully finished.
Although during the concert the instrument was used with a solo trumpet and also a brass band it would be interesting to see how it stands up to battling with or against a full orchestra. I also wonder whether the lack of a 32ft flue might then become apparent.
As wil be seen from the RAM website there are a number of opportunities to hear it between now and December.
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I have read all of this with great interest because I, too, was on the Organ Club visit to Edinburgh in May this year and was astounded at the shear quantity of interesting and distinguished instruments in that City and its environs.
However, if time (and family) only allow for a visit to one organ I would unhesitatingly suggest it should be that in Reid Memorial Parish Church, West Savile Terrace, EH9 3HY.
This is an extraordinary instrument (as is the Church) and not at all what I had expected of Rushworth and Dreaper. Whereas the Stirling organ has been tampered with this is exactly as it was built in 1930, though the Church wasn't opened until 1932.
It sings - there is no other word for it - into a large and acoustically sympathetic space.
So good is the voicing that, although the only mutations on it are Sesquialtera,19,22, on the Swell and Octave Quint on the Great one would be forgiven for thinking that there are a multitude of mixtures.
the French Horn on the Solo - there is no Choir Organ - is the finest I have ever heard.
Colin Menzies, who arranged the tour and wrote the very detailed and informative notes about both the buildings and the instruments in them, also made the point that when Rushworths were good they could be very good indeed. Furthermore, he noted that the Edinburgh branch, which built this organ, was almost an autonomous company from that in Liverpool.
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I find this fascinating. I went to a performance in Liverpool's Anglican Cathedral of Britten's Burning Fiery Furnace in 1967 in the presence of the composer and I believe one was used then.
I notice from the internet that there is one in St Lawrence's Church, Caterham, Surrey.
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The recital mentioned above at St Stephen's, Rochester Row in London on the transplanted Binns is, I believe, on Wednesday, 25th April not the 5th as stated.
Martin
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I couldn't agree more with Malcolm's comments and am listening to William Whitehead's excellent new CD recorded on the organ there.
Martin
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James O'Donnell with the YMSO orchestra in Symphony for Orchestra and Organ by Francois-Joseph Fetis.
Also Overture Prince Igor Borodin and Brahms Symphony No 2.
7.30. Wednesday, 21st September at St John'd Smith Square, London SW1.
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I know that this post is about awkward organs but Cynic's comments about the comfort of HNB consoles is worth supporting. Probably the most comfortable instrument I have ever played is the one they built in 1967 in the chapel of my old school, Ellesmere College.
Harrison and Harrison consoles are also usually extremely comfortable, well at least for someone of my height and stature!
Martin Owen
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I am 100% sure that there were three cases and that the cathedral won all of them. You will appreciate that I only have word of mouth for the reasons. Downes was sued because he had authorised alterations to the historic pipes which were supposed to receive pride of place as historic and original. They had to be cut up to get them to go at all - see page 209 of Baroque Tricks. Essentially his pressures and those pipes were incompatible. It could well be that he was also trying to get too much tone out of them. Additional cutting-up is generally required when something speaks with too much harmonic, i.e. when it's being blown too hard - or when the foothole has been opened too wide.
Apparently, HN&B were sued by Downes because when he tested the pressures on the completed organ, he found that they had raised them from his specification.
The Cathedral were profoundly dissatisfied with the finished organ (essentially because it wouldn't behave as its predecessor had done - not go as soft or as loud) and turned on them all. I understand that because HN&B lost, the firm changed substantially. The Normans (both Herbert and John) went and Frank Fowler was appointed managing director. A watershed in fact.
Do I hate it?
Actually, at the risk of repeating myself from other postings ad nauseam..I don't exactly. I'm more sorry than anything.
There is a lot to admire. If it had been a new organ, or if it had been in another building I'd quite like it. Above all, I disagree with pcnd that it is good for accompaniment. Like Christ Church Oxford, it will accompany if there is someone particularly skilful at the controls, but accompanying in the traditional Anglican style works only with major effort. We are told that the Choir Stopped Diapason was matched to a solo boy's singing, that may well be, but there are very few stops that sit comfortably under a choir. I fondly remember Roy Massey's (typical) remark after he had been covering a brief sub organist gap (in RM's early retirement). He bounced up with glee saying
'I've found out how to accompany at Gloucester!'
When asked what the trick was, he said
'play the whole service on 8 stops.'
p a u s e
'mind you, don't draw them all at once!!'
When I used to take my school choir to sing there (twice a year) we had a standing rule, 'no Mixtures while they're singing', and that certainly helps.
The saddest part of the rebuild is that one constantly misses stops that were there before. You think, wouldn't it be lovely to have just one nice solo stop at mp - like a Willis Corno di Bassetto for instance - then you remember, the beeper is still there, it's just been castrated. In the same way, you long for a nice Swell Clarion, a blending Swell Mixture or a 32' - well, they were all there! David Briggs of course found his solo noises...in some of his transcriptions you hear a splendid solo reed mp, it's the pedal Schalmei and he's turned the whole piece inside out and upside down simply because he could and there's no alternative!
People who judge the organ now are hearing it after interventions. One major intervention was the raising of the roof over the Great. David Briggs had this done - it has greatly increased both the power and resonance of that division. There were also some revoicings carried out (somewhat under wraps) at the Nicholson 'restoration'.
The fluework remains all of a piece and is all (mixtures apart) beautifully voiced. It is the work of one Philip Prosser* (still extant and living in Ireland). He managed to get on with Downes, who would (according to every report from every builder who ever worked with him) try the patience of a saint. PP also voiced the reeds, and once again they have a certain integrity albeit, because of the pressures, they sound like no traditional English reed ever did. It still creases me up to recall a comment by Herbert Norman in the inaugural booklet
'we have retained the Willis reeds, but they have been fitted with new shallots in accordance with the new tonal scheme'.
Q. What is a Willis reed with new shallots? A. Emphatically not a Willis reed at all!
Worth remembering in everyone's defence: the figures spent on organs now is out of all proportion bigger than what was spent on those (even the most high-profile) rebuilds of the 1970s. For a firm to be able to spend the time and money on the scale they now do in places like Redcliffe, Hereford, Cornhill etc. would have been unimaginable. In those days everyone cut corners. I am surprised at the suggestion that HN&B just had a spare four-manual console frame sitting around. I won't say they didn't, but it is hardly the sort of thing you make by mistake and have hanging around at the works. HN&B were generally very good with consoles. You can keep those (practically unvoiced, harmonically rich and therefore unblending) mixtures, but a 1960/70s HN&B console is always a most comfortable affair - with the possible exception of those square pistons which look smart but attack innocent knuckles as pcnd has said.
I'll get my coat now.
*He wrote an (unpublished) book about the Gloucester rebuild which I have seen and read - it's illuminating stuff!
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I banged my head a few years ago on the low stone arch leading to the console. Blood everywhere and mild concussion - and little recollection of what it was like to play.
JS
Many years ago I, too, hit my head on the same stone arch, the flow of blood being too excessive to play without serious damage to the manuals and I am only 5ft 6ins!
Martin Owen
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Did anyone hear today's broadcast of Choral Evensong from Chester Cathedral? Am I alone in thinking it particularly poor and the singing somewhat ragid?
Martin
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Can I too send my best wishes to all boards members and particularly to the Mander team who provide such pleasure throughout the year to all of us? Thank you very much.
Martin
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As the contributor mentioned above in Colin Richell's response I don't recollect receiving a reply from Noel Bonavia-Hunt. Nor would I have expected one. Furthermore, as Henry Willis points out, my letter indicates that all this was a long time ago, 1964 to be precise. Besides, the primary purpose of the letter was NOT about the Alexandra Palace organ but to draw attention to the urgent need to restore the Grove.
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Until now I have deliberately resisted commenting on the various observations about the Grove organ. However, in view those made by Contrabombarde (and others) I will quote from a letter I wrote, as 16 year old schoolboy, to The Organ and which was published in their July 1964 edition.
"Sir, May I support Noel Bonavia-Hunt's appeal for the restoration of the organ in the Alexandra Palace? May I also appeal for the restoration of another equally fine instrument, the Grove organ, built my Mitchell and Thynne, in Tewkesbury Abbey? For organ lovers fortunate enough to have heard this noble instrument it must have been a memorable experience. What aural excitement we unfortunates who have never heard this instrument are mising with that bold Schulze-type diapason chorus, those Willis style reeds and Mitchell and Thynne's own conception of string tone.
Where else is there so fine an example of the combined characteristics of three of the finest organ builders? This organ, together with the instrument in Alexandra Palace, should be restored: then England can once again boast about two more very fine organs!"
Please don't let the Grove deteriorate to such a degree that a similar letter will need to be written.
Incidentally, I wrote that letter whilst at a school which some years later puchased the Schulze organ from St Mary's Tyne Dock. Alas, by then I had long left!
Wayne Marshall
in General discussion
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James O' Donnell most certainly. Though surely rather more than a CVO. Many of this predecessors have had knighthoods, and, as you say, he and his choir have performed at a number of important Royal occasions. Besides he is one of the best choir trainers even and a great organist.
Martin