Aeron Glyn Preston

Could this have been based on the Kilkhampton organ? http://cdmnet.org/Julian/muse/m004.htm

H00695 - I just tried to have a look and found it wasn't quite right.

I would certainly agree that there are a lot of very dull organs, which are designed to do no more than blend with voices, and which can do little else. This, of course, is not the approach one should consider. In terms of choral accompaniment, an organ does need some variety of quieter stops, but the stoplist is less important than factors such as the building and the position of the organ. Certainly an organ that overwhelms a choir when it's at 20% is not ideal either, and if a choir is important in a church, why would they build something that couldn't do this? This does not exclude a musical instrument of great quality. What I was trying to get at is how does one approach choosing a style that will play a lot of repertoire at least musically, if not authentically, and something that can also accompany a choir without drowning it out? I suppose the ideal approach would be to have a West-end Grand-Orgue for solos and an Orgue-de-Choeur in the chancel/quire. Any other thoughts? Perhaps JPM might be able to comment on this for us.

I feel I've been mis-characterised here. I didn't suggest that an organ suitable for choral music and a historically-informed organ are mutually exclusive, I simply asked how difficult it is to design an instrument that plays a wide variety of repertoire musically. But obviously, much twentieth-century Anglican repertoire was written with a late-romantic organ in mind, though there are other types of organ on which Anglican choral repertoire can be accompanied very musically. Stephen Bicknell talks in his book about St Ignatius Loyola in New York, and how he felt that although the instrument there was conceived clearly with a French bias, that most repertoire was playable on it musically, and that choral accompaniment was well catered for by this organ. What I was trying to get at is the question of which organ traditions were most able to deal with music which may not have been written for them. Any strong opinions? For example, a Schnitger organ, though tierces can occur, would not offer a Jeu de tierce required for French classical organ music. Implicit also in this question is which type of repertoire is more important in British churches. I would be intrigued to hear people's thoughts on this.

They are still doing it! Did anyone play the previous Harrison there? From its specification, it looks more like the right kind of instrument for accompanying Anglican services. Enjoyable and valuable as historically informed quasi-replicas are, there is something to be said for an organ designed for choral accompaniment, especially in such places as the Oxbridge colleges. The same could be said of this proposal to move the CC to Sheffield Cathedral, couldn't it? For my part, I've enjoyed listening to the organ at St John's, Cambridge, which seems to handle an extraordinarily wide range of music with aplomb, both accompanying and as a solo instrument. Just how hard is designing an instrument that can play a fair bit of the repertoire musically?

I've heard the organ at Esztergom Basilica on YouTube, sounds rather amazing! I think the chamade trumpets were being used on the video of "Wien bleibt Wien" played on that organ, they sounded very fiery. The video of Olivier Latry playing Dieu parmi nous was also rather awesome. Does this organ have a particular national style in its sound, or is it a mixture of different styles? I gather the organ will have roughly 140 stops when it's finally finished.

In that case, they look like a very early stab at a neo-classical organ, with "stab" being the operative word! Where would the idea for that Cornet have come from?

What a bizarre specification! Were the Cornet and mutations a later addition? I just don't see how they fit with the rest of the scheme.

I think this one probably needs a West Midlands accent!

Surely this should be "Oggi-taf"... :angry: "heva", I'm afraid I don't understand your last post. Am I missing an obvious pun? Pull-down: removing someone that shouldn't be at the organ from the bench... Shutter: loose lid to the console, that threatens to fall on the organist's fingers at any time... geddit?

This one is rather lovely. How could I have forgotten it? Isn't is unplayable at the moment? I've never heard it, and no organ events have been held there in the past few years. This is an excellent instrument, with the full organ particularly impressive, being rich but not overpowering.

"Tierce!" - drunken organists chinking glasses.

http://www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi...ec_index=D02032 This is pretty awful - I'll get some photos up onto the NPOR soon. I'm still trying to find out who restored this, because the new console that was tacked onto the old case was so badly designed. I'm only 5' 10", yet I could only just fit my legs under the console to play the pedals, and the swell pedal I could just about reach with my big toe! The music desk was placed only three inches above the swell manual, for no obvious reason, and the base of the music desk is only about an inch deep. The wooden 'floor' below the pedalboard does not connect to the base of the choir stalls behind, leaving a gap of a few centimetres where the back feet of the organ bench can fall into, making even the elementary pedalling in hymn-playing fraught with danger!

Any trigger swell pedal that covers the top parts of the pedalboard... A pain in the backside!

Is it really that bad? I've played it, and it didn't seem all that bad. The reed in the box was a bit odd though.

I rather like St John's, Cambridge, though the Trompeta Real is a bit fierce. Because I'm an old Johnian, I've heard one story of the purchase of that stop. Whether it is true or not is another matter. George Guest had gone to the college council to ask for money, and he'd put his case before them, insisting on the necessity of the stop. The council were largely satisfied with Guest's arguments for the stop. One member of the council is alleged to have asked, "Where is the nearest place where we can hear one for ourselves?" Without irony, Guest replied, "Madrid." I only really know the Cambridge organs. Emma is not bad, and the fact that it's used for Music Tripos organ recitals shows that it's held in some esteem. I've enjoyed playing on the one at Magdalene, but it's really too big for the chapel. Not mad on Clare tbh...

I was glad I re-read your post properly. This is great news!

This is what I'd heard second-hand. The church is definitely closed, has been bought by a Mr. Powell and is going to be turned into a children's fun centre or some such thing. I had been to the church only a few times; for one thing, it was in the next diocese to me. I wonder if there is something in this idea of state protection for organs of value.

Mr. Cynic, I see from your website that you were once at Shrewsbury, so your having played at Welshpool doesn't surprise me, but did you ever play the Willis at St David's, Newtown, further up the Severn ? (www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi?Fn=Rsearch&rec_index=N11857) I never got the chance to hear it myself, and it was sold off for scrap a few years ago now. All I have is reports that it was a gem, but I can tell you little else.

"Gwas Bach" is the Welsh for "dogsbody" or "errand boy"! Thank you for thanking me! I just pointed out what I have seen, living as I do in a musical wilderness (in relative terms). I agree with all your addenda, I did not intend to be entirely comprehensive. I have tried to make the point to local clergy that a choir brings extra congregation in because the choir families come along to services to listen to their relatives. The "agnostic novice" comment seems very apt to me. There's a desperate scrabble to be accessible, with plain liturgies bordering on the theadbare, and a desperate fear of saying anything vaguely controversial, or seeming too stuffy or traditional. It flatters no-one, is rather patronising to people who don't go to church regularly, and just makes the church look weak. In fact, people who want church weddings but don't otherwise go to church want the traditional! What a sad irony, that the iconoclasts don't understand this! I have been asked by local clergy and churchwardens about electronic organs, and I always tell them that a small pipe organ is more cost-effective, being more reliable than electronics, depreciating much less in value, and not becoming obsolete within 5 years! In addition, for an electronic organ to resonate within a space properly as a pipe organ would, the speakers need to be pretty big, taking up just as much space, if not more, than a pipe organ of the appropriate size. I happen to know the Wallbanks well, they were the couple caught in the long legal battle with the church over glebe land. I´m sure they could tell you all about the C of E's darker side. Speaking of organ heritage, the church where this organ (http://www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi?Fn=Rsearch&rec_index=D00050) resides/resided is now redundant. Unfortunately, since the church now contains a dwelling built inside it, so if the organ is still there, it might take persuading to ask to remove the organ. It has an HOC, so presumably it's worth keeping.

I'm sorry to be a terrible spoilsport, but I should point out something which, as far as I can recall, hasn't appeared on this thread yet. (Please feel free to correct me on this point.) The vast majority of churchgoers would know relatively little/next to nothing about organs, yet it is people such as these who would be involved in making decisions about organs. Even if we organ-lovers can easily see the merits of a particular instrument, or its historical importance, even if it's not to our taste (let's ignore the question of objectivity in such judgements for a moment), how on earth are we to persuade those not in the know that an instrument for which they are responsible is worth maintaining? If an instrument is not in good working order, it won't sound good for all the world, even if all that needs doing is a particular kind of renovation, for example, repairing split soundboards, or sorting a leak in the wind supply, etc. It may have the best pipework ever made, but if it's not working properly, it won't sound as it should, and thus persuading a church of its merits and getting it renovated may be very difficult, unless someone who is in the know is involved. In addition, if it can't do the job that is required of it in a particular church, for example, if it is at just the right volume for accompanying the choir but too quiet for a full congregation, then any investment is that bit less likely to be forthcoming. Another important issue is money. In many cases, an organ may have been the gift of a wealthy benefactor, or a church in a once-prosperous area may have been able to pay for an organ at one time. If a church's financial situation is such that it barely keeps going anyway, it doesn't really make sense to spend a large proportion of their money on maintaining an organ. It does seem to me that many (smaller) churches require little more than a machine for playing hymns, and perhaps the odd voluntary for funerals and weddings. In such churches, if a new organ is needed, the provision of a good-quality smaller organ whose upkeep costs are much smaller, and which can do all that the church asks of it, is of much greater advantage to everyone than a larger organ. The main reason for wanting an unnecessarily large organ is vanity, whether that of a benefactor, or of an organist! I don't intend to be comprehensive in my amateur-ish assessment of the threats facing our organ heritage, but I think I should point out another foe, namely self-proclaimed church modernisers (in the Anglican churches). These people have a deep-seated antagonism towards anything that smacks of traditionalism (by definition, just in case anyone wishes to accuse me of generalising), and the organ is just one of many of their pet peeves. Of course, I don't wish to deny people the opportunity to worship in the way they see fit, and ultimately everyone has to make their own spiritual journey, but all I see from self-proclaimed church modernisers is another kind of iconoclasm, partly guided by a Romantic notion that any order or discipline is antithetical to freedom (I have seen this at first hand spelt out by the actions and practices certain modernising clergymen, and for my part think it's complete bunkum), but also a Puritan antipathy towards anything that smacks of High Church. This latter point is obviously informed by the former. Choirs and organs are clearly the most obvious manifestation of discipline and order in worship, and are also, for obvious reasons, associated with High Church, but in the Anglican church the tradition of organ and choral music has stubbornly survived, despite all that's been thrown at it, including Cromwell et al. Ironically, the main excuse given for not having a choir by such modernisers as I have met is that is detracts from congregational singning, whereas my own experience tells me that a congregation often needs a strong lead from a choir (or at the very least a dedicated group of leaders in the singing, called codwyr canu in the Welsh chapel tradition). It is to these self-proclaimed modernisers that we need to appeal, if we possibly can, if we are to have a chance of saving our organs before it becomes too late.

Thank you both for your informative replies. How did later Italian organs evolve, e.g. in the nineteenth century? I saw on this board somewhere a comparison of a recent Mascioni organ to the style of William Hill. How was the Italian organ tradition affected by trends elsewhere in Europe?

At our church, we're lucky to have an architect on the PCC who advises us on such issues as heating. We have now set the thermostats to come on for a short while every day, even though the church is only generally used on Sundays. This is, I'm told, cheaper, and keeping the church at a fairly constant temperature is much more efficient. There are extra heaters just below the base of the roof arches, and these apparently reduce the size of the convection current in the church by warming a layer of air, thereby stopping the warmed air from the floor heaters rising too far. Again, this is more efficient. I think it's important to ask a heating expert/architect rather than a plumber or electrician about heating in a church. The organ is also much more reliable for being in a room with a more consistent temperature.

I've seen the odd reference to Italian organs on this forum, and, if I remember rightly, JPM mentioned certain similarities between English organs pre-1850 and Italian traditions, which were too close to be coincidental, yet which he could not explain. I'm completely ignorant about Italian organs, so can anyone here enlighten me on them? Which other major organ tradition does the Italian tradition resemble?

Sorry to re-open a long-dormant topic, but I'm always amazed that many small-ish Victorian organs have a double flue much more often on the Swell than on the Great. Swell flue Doubles always muddy the sound of the division (to my mind at least), and in my playing I put it on only when approaching Full Organ. It would seem more useful IMHO to have a flue Double on the Great, and Sumner says that a Swell Bourdon is of little value, which is also my experience. Any thoughts on this?