Colin Pykett
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Posts posted by Colin Pykett
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This is only related very tenuously to organs, but today as the clocks go forward it reminded me that Robert Hope-Jones's younger brother Frank, who is still remembered as a famous horologist, gave a talk on the 'wireless' in April 1923 about changing the clocks. It was re-broadcast in 1932 and more recently a brief excerpt was included as part of a Radio 4 Extra programme (27 October 2012 at 8 pm). It is still available as archived material at:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01nk1d0
The excerpt starts at about 06m 50s.
Frank, who also invented the 'Greenwich Pips' time signal, died in 1950. His inventions changed the world of clocks and timekeeping just as his brother had changed that of organs.
I found it fascinating to hear his clipped accent from the Victorian era which probably takes us as close as anything can to the family which also gave rise to Robert the organ builder.
CEP
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I know little of the Alexander Technique, but would only point out that an important but sometimes overlooked detail of organ console design is the amount by which the pedals are recessed under the manuals. The optimum measurement differs according to the number of keyboards. If it isn't correct (not recessed enough), you can (for example) find yourself tipping forward when playing on the top keyboard while pedalling at the same time. This requires correction of posture via the back muscles. If the pedalboard is too recessed, you have to arch your back backwards to maintain balance. Both conditions are not conducive to good posture and, I have been told by a physiotherapist, are likely to cause or aggravate chronic back pain.
There isn't a single optimum 'recess' measurement but a small range within which consoles should be designed. The range depends on the number of keyboards.
Therefore good posture would seem to depend on the instrument as well as the player.
CEP
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His book 'The Organ', written with Barbara Owen as one of the New Grove series in the 1980s, is more scholarly than other similar tomes, such as that of Sumner who was, in my opinion, rather an amateur in comparison (and he doesn't even appear in the index!). It also has the advantage of comparative brevity (2.2 cm thick compared with Sumner's 4.2) considering the breadth of the remit. Yet its comprehensive selection of appendices, references and indexes ensure nothing of substance is left out or cannot be amplified elsewhere. I have long found it one of the most useful books on my shelves.
CEP
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Yes, I'm getting the same problem if I search for it on either Google or Yahoo. But their website seems to be still intact because if you go via 'yell.com' you can get to it OK. Maybe a DNS error somewhere? If so, it will probably correct itself in due course.
But clearly something the firm needs to look into ASAP.
CEP
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As correctly mentioned above, the scale of any pipe whose length is increased by whatever means (i.e. collars or adding bits on), will be changed. This will alter its tone quality, which is strongly influenced by the retinue of natural resonant frequencies characteristic of the resonator. This happens because the natural frequencies are influenced by scale. They are anharmonic, i.e. they are not harmonically related, and the degree to which they amplify the corresponding harmonics generated at the mouth (which are exactly harmonic) largely determines the steady-state timbre of the pipe. Pipe scale determines the frequencies, amplitudes and Q-factors of the resonances because it affects the end corrections at the mouth and top.
Whether or not the change of timbre effect is large enough to be perceived, when the scale is only being modified slightly, is another matter.
I was interested to see the brief shot of the risk assessment document and, later on, the dirty hands of the organ builders. I have often wondered whether the dirt, which must contain an appreciable amount of lead, is a health hazard considering that they handle the pipes for many hours each day and every day during a job like this, and therefore whether it is taken into consideration when preparing the risk assessment. I once raised this with a retired consultant physician who is now a relatively well-known organist, teacher and organ consultant, and his view was that organ builders might consider wearing thin plastic disposable gloves. I have seen some who do this.
CEP
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The clavichord demonstrates that exploiting the possibilties of 'aftertouch' by a skilled player arose centuries before today's electronic keyboardists thought they had invented it (realised in the 1980s thanks to MIDI of course).
CEP
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I have a recollection that a young George Thalben Ball played there, though not as its permanent organist if I recall correctly. But that was on an earlier instrument which was destroyed in WW2.
CEP
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In George Thalben-Ball's '113 Variations on Hymn Tunes':
Aberystwyth
Gwalchmai
Hyfrydol
Llanfair
Ton-Y-Botel
If you aren't familiar with this volume, be aware these are not singable last-verse arrangements but stand-alone variations in their own right - some short, some longer, some easy, some difficult. If you did want last verses, maybe Noel Rawsthorne's '200 last verses' would be useful (I have two volumes of them, 400 in all, and perhaps there are others as well).
CEP
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Thank you for drawing our attention to this. A most enjoyable experience.
The sound quality was pretty good though I wondered whether I was missing some of the extreme bass. I was listening on audiophile headphones and would certainly have heard it if it had arrived at my computer.
And might we have had a lady performer in the mix perhaps ... ?
CEP
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Indeed it is a lot of money. My church couldn't afford to have "my" 7 stop single manual and pedal organ tuned this year...
Gloucester diocese still insisted on a 17% increase to the £4000+ "contribution" paid in 2014. What a way to run a business.
I could be wrong of course, but one tends to assume that King's is able to disburse the sort of money being dicussed here because they are who they are. And many will benefit from it, of course, even if it's just hearing the new organ on TV and radio. But in the case of handsoff's situation, I should like to think that the diocesan contribution he mentioned will be spent in a way that he and his congregation approve of. It does seem a rather large increase in these days of 0.1% inflation.
CEP
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One aspect of this is particularly interesting to me. There must be very few extension organs (in fact I know of none apart from that above, though my knowledge is far from encyclopaedic) in which all the stops are the same on all divisions. Yet this was originally the concept bruited by Robert Hope-Jones in his lecture to the College of Organists (they were not 'Royal' then) in 1891. It was merely a paper concept at that time as he had yet to build a fully extended (unified) organ, and he did not do so for many years, mainly because of power supply difficulties for the huge number of action magnets.
I recalled HJ's idea only a few days ago when looking at an analysis of a meduim sized extension organ by John Compton in the mid-twentieth century (it's actually in Sumner's book 'The Organ' in the Specifications Appendix at the back). There's quite a reasonable amount of 'real' pipework, including four independent principal-toned flue ranks (named diapason, principal, prestant and gemshorn), yet the actual stoplist spread over two manuals and pedals seemed somehow a bit contrived, as though he was trying to prove a point rather than make a musical instrument. It occurred to me to ask myself - wouldn't it have been better just to have all stops the same on both divisions rather than strive to build more traditional-looking but necessarily incomplete pseudo- choruses?
At the risk of being thrown off the forum, I'll reveal that I've decided to do this by simulating such an instrument digitally, starting with the same basic material that Compton described. So thanks to Messrs Manders for making me feel slightly less daft about such an outrageous idea!
CEP
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I agree with everything that AJJ has said! I'm not convinced that is 'a sign of the times' either! I think that you can sell the youth almost anything providing that you do it convincingly, and that they see it as being 'quality' with a certain amount of 'cool'!
I don't know the set up at Leeds Minster either but I do know that, across the city, there is a thriving music department in St. Anne's Cathedral where the Office and Mass is sung daily and where they have Junior and Senior girls and boys choirs who sing quality music by themselves and with the choral scholars.
Of course the press enjoy this kind of sensationalism. I don't see what is happening at Leeds Minster as being particularly sad. Sometimes it's good to say 'that's enough', stand back, re-evaluate the situation and.reform. It's hard to do it but what comes out of it is often stronger and more successful and, reading the article in the 'Yorkshire Post', that seems what the new Rector is looking for!
I experienced an occasion last night (Sunday) which tends to confirm these remarks. It also seems to me that it's not so much that youngsters don't want to participate in church itself or its musical activities, but they are less likely, I think, to come of their own volition towards a passive church which just sits on its hands in a large posh medieval building (worrying in the meantime more about the roof than anything else), than if that congregation reached out to meet them on their own territory. Incidentally, I'm not implying for a moment that Leeds Minster is like this as I know nothing whatever about them, but many other Anglican churches of my acquaintance are I'm afraid.
The occasion was an annual carol service run by the Salvation Army in a large city centre. They had hired a theatre for the occasion, and besides several carols in which the audience participated heartily, there were many others sung by the participants (very well IMHO) to some quite novel arrangements in some cases. The place was packed out. There was a large local junior school choir which did some very creditable two part singing, and youngsters of both genders ranging in age from about ten to teens who played in the excellent brass band as well as taking part in the well-rehearsed tambourine and songster numbers which are the hallmark of the Army.
I have to admit to an interest as my one year old grand daughter took part at one point as an Angel. Beyond that I have no background as a Salvationist, but I was mightily impressed by their outreach and commitment to the youth community which enables them to present such events. The collection was not for themselves either but for the local Downs Syndrome Association. This alone marked a difference between their approach and that of so many more conservative congregations.
What has this to do with organs? Not much, and of course there wasn't one in that venue, but then this thread is not about the organ. The music was provided by a very good pianist and the band. But the thread is about drawing children into church music activities, in particular singing, and the event showed that the Salvation Army is still as alive and well, and still able to pull them in, as I knew it when I was growing up in the 1960s in Nottingham (where it was invented of course). There aren't many other churches today which can say that about themselves.
SL mentioned 'quailty' as a factor important to attracting youngsters. Their musical offerings have always had that - their bands are peerless. How different to the worship bands often seen in other denominations. He also mentioned the importance of being 'cool', and I would say they have that also, as their enthusiasm is irresistably infectious without being trite or tacky. Top marks to them.
CEP
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Always a pleasure to hear organ music on R3 and the opening Willcocks arrangement of Widor V was something I hadn't heard before.
Unfortunately the experience was spoilt by poor sound engineering. I find it hard to believe that Stephen Cleobury and the assembled forces of Kings could be out of synch with the organ, but the BBC made them sound so. Such a pity that sound engineers feel they have to use multiple microphones and re-engineer the acoustic - they should try recording from a single point and let the radio audience hear what someone in the chapel would hear and get the benefit of the wonderful acoustic that the building has.
You are so right and I absolutely agree. Apart from anything else, multi-micing always introduces phase interference effects when the multiple tracks are electronically mixed down to stereo. This means certain frequencies will be attenuated or reinforced quite artificially. It produces exactly the same unfortunate effects experienced with many electronic organs, which have too many stops whose signals are forced through an inadequate number of amplifiers and speakers. Only a few CDs are recorded using a single stereo pair as Choir_Man recommends. But this argument (multiple vs single point mics) has raged since the dawn of electrical recording in the 1920s, so it's not going to be resolved at a stroke here, I regret to say.
There are some demo sound clips of the awful consequences which can happen to electronic organs with insufficient independent audio channels on my website at:
http://www.pykett.org.uk/EndOfPipeOrgan.htm#MixingDemo
The physics of the multiple-micing scenario is no different. This article, too, continues to cause controversy some years after it was first written I might add. But everything it says is true because it's only simple physics at the end of the day.
CEP
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That's wonderful, firstrees! But there is declining activity across all the forums I'm interested in, and these cover not only organs but other subjects as well. They seem to go quiet for long periods, briefly to recover with spikes of activity, and then go quiet again. Is it because people prefer Facebook, Twitter, etc these days?
I was reading the recent Organists' Review this week and thought at the time maybe there's material there to stimulate activity on this forum. For example, what about John Norman's remarks about two cathedral organs yet to be built? Or the articles about house organs? Or even the apparently declining sales of that magazine, judging by the remarks of one contributor? But then, if one wanted to do this, the more natural home might be the OR Facebook pages. If so, then it's QED.
CEP
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He was an innovative thinker in the physical and engineering design of responsive mechanical actions, a subject which I have also researched myself. I learnt a lot from his perspectives. He wrote an early and scholarly article on some of his conclusions in a BIOS publication, which was no doubt eagerly consumed by many at the time, including myself. Not only is he to be congratulated on his work per se, but also the fact that he was prepared to share it so readily. A very refreshing mindset, and from the little I knew of him, a kind and gentle man as well.
CEP
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It's a long time since I read Charles Reid's biography of Malcolm Sargent (who was an articled pupil of Keeton at Peterborough) so some details may be approximate. I've still got the book somewhere - I'll see if I can dig it out.
There are indeed many reminiscences of Keeton retailed in Reid's biography of Sargent, too many (some of them several pages long) to reproduce here.
He even gets a mention in Ralph Downes's book 'Baroque Tricks'. He remarked that he had his first 'real' organ lessons on the organ of St Werburgh's, Derby, presumably from Norman Hibbert whom Downes described as "one of Dr Keeton's famous Peterborough brood".
In post #3 David Drinkell said that he had "read somewhere (Bicknell The History of the English Organ, I think) that Keeton wanted Hope-Jones to build the new organ at Peterborough, but the donor specified Hill". That's true - it is in Bicknell's book. Also to be found there is an extract from a testimonial Keeton wrote concerning the 1896 Hope-Jones organ at Worcester cathedral:
"In my opinion this organ is, from the power, dignity, and smoothness of the reeds, the grandeur of the diaphones, the delicacy of the softer stops, the beautiful touch of both manuals and pedals, and its ingenious mechanism, the finest I have ever heard or played upon".
CEP
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Sorry to start a new topic but I had a good look first and couldn't see anything relevant under other headings.
This article from The Independent is interesting:
It reminded me of the time when I was working in Whitehall (London). I would sometimes go down the road to Westminster Abbey for Evensong when things permitted, returning to the office to make up the time by working later. Several others did the same thing. I have never found anything which compensated so well for the stresses of life as that. The only thing preventing more people doing it, I suppose, is that very few have the luxury of a cathedral on their doorstep in the way I did at that time. Therefore I wonder how effective Guy Hayward's otherwise laudable initiative will be.
CEP
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I recently received a request for help from someone who has purchased two reed organs with (to my mind) curious faults. From the description they both seem to be F compass American suction organs, though I haven't actually seen them. The symptoms are: very hard to blow; not much noise; the touch gets heavier when the instruments are blown.
The last is the strangest because the pallets in both suction and positive pressure instruments are arranged to slightly lighten the touch when the instrument is in wind, if anything. This is unlike the pipe organ of course. It suggests to me that someone has tried to convert these to positive pressure operation for some reason. Probably the most difficult aspect of this would be that the springing and direction of movement of the reservoir would both need to be reversed. If this was not attempted, or was unsuccessful, it would explain why the instruments are very hard to blow - there might well not be an effective wind reservoir at all. Also, reeds arranged for suction would barely operate if the direction of air flow were to be reversed unless they were inserted upside down in the cells. This would be next to impossible if only because of the rivets.
And apparently the instruments have been "beautifully restored"!
Any other ideas anyone? Is this pair of instruments notorious for doing the rounds on the market, looking for an unsuspecting buyer perhaps?
CEP
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Wonderful, innit? Not for the first time a link I post gets promptly taken down.
I've experienced this too, and rather too often for it to be mere coincidence. It also happens sometimes on my website when I insert a link. I can only conclude that people suddenly get embarrassed by the publicity.
CEP
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As for the future of the organ? I'm afraid I am, slightly, more pessimistic! Soon, I fear, it will become an instrument nearly always studied by ex-public school students at Oxbridge! We are, I suspect, not that far away from that situation now - even the more reputable music colleges have 'thinned down' their organ departments and some barely have any first study student organists! And yet the standard of playing is higher now, I think, than it has ever been!Thank you SL for this, which answers my question about what is happening in the various music colleges. However it seems not to be all good news.
As to your other remarks about Wikipedia, one only has to turn up the entry concerning Robert Hope-Jones to take a random example which I have just looked at again before writing this. Among many other things, it places an entirely misplaced emphasis on a book by G L Miller, a work which any half-reasonable student of the subject knows to be a laughable travesty. To quote other shortcomings of the article would be out of place here, and waste readers' time and mine. Anyone trying to do the decent 'wiki' thing and edit such an entry would have to spend hours doing it, and then quite likely find that an 'edit war' had been declared and thus the original version would re-appear. The whole Wikipedia edifice is so shocking for an otherwise advanced intellectual culture that further words fail me. Among other consequences, it has put traditional and respected scholarly reference sources such as Encyclopedia Brittanica and New Grove under financial strain to the extent one wonders how long they will be able to continue.
I sometimes think the only solution will be to starve Wikipedia to death if and when sufficient right-minded people refuse to donate to their usual Christmas begging appeal.
Thank you again for your interesting reply.
CEP
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This is an old forum to post into but I found it compelling to read, not only because Musing Muso sought more than once to whip a discussion into existence. So I'm using that as the excuse to add, belatedly, my two pence worth on a rather hoary old topic. However I do come at it from an unusual direction.
My website, dealing mainly with detailed technical material relating to pipe organs, has now reached its sixteenth birthday, and this made me realise that it therefore spans a whole generation of those interested in the subject. For example, today's young players or organ builders in their early twenties would still have been small children at junior school when the site first made its appearance.
In parallel, I have pondered on the shifting pattern of interest I have experienced over this period in dealing with a vast amount of correspondence from across the world. Initially this must have been from those at least of an age to be the parents of the aforementioned younger generation, and it was generally of 'high quality': most of those who contacted me were obviously educated in and keenly interested in the more arcane details of the instrument. Over time though, this has changed and now there seems to be far less interest in such matters. Not only that, but more people apparently feel disinclined nowadays to conduct a civilised and polite dialogue. Simultaneously they are also obviously less well educated at several levels, not the least of which are basic literacy and numeracy. I assume, perhaps unjustly, that these interlocutors are members of the new, younger generation without necessarily being players or technicians.
I shouldn't be surprised of course, as this merely reflects what has happened to the internet as a whole during this millennium. Its earlier role as a repository of often useful information has become submerged in a sea of inconsequential claptrap, peddled predominantly by social media sites rather than those acting as an electronic reference library. In addition there is Wikipedia, one of the worst culprits for encouraging unattributable intellectual sloth which did not even exist (like the social media sites) when I first posted my website. It is unsurprising that some universities block access to Wikipedia on their intranets. As well as all this we have seen the rising tide of redundant organs on sites such as ebay, narrowing the pool of playable instruments and mirroring the decline of interest outlined above over a generation.
I am not by nature a pessimist. On the contrary, my glass is usually more than half full. But I am now having difficulty seeing where the organ is going. Presumably it still has some sort of future, though will it become more elitist in the UK as the ranks of those able to play it well are drawn increasingly from the public schools and Oxbridge? And will the focus of activity continue to converge only on cathedrals and a few large churches and concert halls? Is this picture shared by others, or do the numbers of aspiring players entering other music colleges from a broader educational background tell a more encouraging story? I don't know as I don't have access to this side of the picture. I should like to know.CEP
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Listening to it now, it has none of the brilliance, tone or regulation which is apparent in the recordings I have of it before the 1950s rebuild.
Which is remarkable, given the (by today's standards) still somewhat primitive analogue recording technology, often of limited bandwidth and high noise level. Tape recording was only a few years old at that time, though it could have been used to produce a master tape around 1950. Some of Helmut Walcha's early post-war recordings were made that way. Were you listening on 78 rpm discs or very early 33 1/3 microgroove records (which were only introduced in the late 1940s)?
I'm not 'having a go', merely curious as to how you formed your judgement, which I don't question for a moment. I would be the first to acknowledge the remarkable properties of our ears in being able to somehow 'listen through' material which is far from hi-fi by today's definition.
CEP
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Despite what you said above, It's still not quite clear to me what type of stories you want. To give the briefest synopses of two of them, a lay reader in a church I was playing at not so long ago said to me the day after 9/11 words to the effect that "the Americans deserved it" for some contorted quasi-political reason which resided in her brain. The then incumbent at the same church is now languishing in jail for child molestation, a fact which gives me the shudders whenever I recall the number of times he came into our home.
If amplified versions of these stories are of interest, just let me know.
CEP
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Like those who have posted above, I too am sometimes less than impressed by the BBC (in more ways than one), but also like them, I agree we should perhaps not go there. Trying to be positive, I did think Howard Goodall's 'Organ Works' series in the 1990s was eminently watchable and I know for a fact that it attracted interest from beyond the organ world, but If I recall correctly, I think that was broadcast on channel 4. I believe it was also made available on DVD but for some perverse reason the disc set was not available in the UK, at least at the time.
(How do I know "for a fact" that it attracted wider interest? Simply from my wanderings through life at the time, including a visit to an organ builder in Dorset where there happened to be a couple who had seen the programme and had asked the organ builder if they could come and look round his workshop).
CEP
GTB on Desert Island Discs
in General discussion
Posted
Thank you, Vox Humana, for posting this.
I also know of two later broadcasts dealing with his life. One was in late summer 1979, coinciding with the publication of Jonathan Rennert's biography. The other was on 18 June 1996 to mark the centenary of his birth (R2, 9 pm), entitled 'Thalben Ball: Titan of the organ'. I had recordings of both on audio cassette but sadly these have long since become unplayable owing to 'binder ooze'. There does not seem to be any mention of either programme on BBC radio iPlayer, though I am probably not an expert in making this work to its best advantage.
CEP