Matej Kubes

I was wondering if anyone could point me to a place where I can subsribe to/order this book. I have found this email address theorgan@hotmail.co.uk in another thread on Mander Forums. I have not received any reply thus far. Anyone knows if this is the valid email?

The NPOR builders' database mentions several builders named "Otto" - Rudolph Otto, (brother-in-law of Carl Schulze/Schulz), his sons Frederick William and Ernest R. Otto, as well as a London-based organ builder born in Hull named Rudolph P. Otto. The first three are listed as employees of Brindley-Foster. I haven't found any information on Carl Otto. Would you know by any chance which one(s) was the one that went on to work for Keates? Would anyone know of some good read on Brindley and Foster (other than R J Knott?). I am also wondering if there is any literature on Violette... When disassembling the Keates organ, we thoroughly documented everything, including photos of the pipework - would there be a way to tell a pipe comes from the Violette workshop? On another note - the builder we are working with had transferred and restored another 1894 Keates organ from Stockbridge Methodist church in Sheffield that was being reorganized in 2008 . This organ didn't have the builder's plate but was later identified as a Keates instrument - thanks to an inscription found in the wind chest that read "Schulz". I could not find this organ in the NPOR database {I wonder why}, I am therefore attaching its description in English and Slovak from an organ festival bulletin. If anyone would be interested, I can share a picture folder with some shots before/during/after the restoration (as well as higher-quality scans of the bulletin) of this neat little Keates with pipe stenciling in the facade.

Thank you for pointing out this article; I will definitely order it - hopefully, it will shed some light for me on the topic of Tierce mixtures and their popularity in England back then.

Thank you for the pointer, I am somewhat confused by the name of Keates' head voicer you mentioned - "Herr Otto". Would "Otto" be his first name, perhaps? There was a Swiss organ builder named "Johann Andreas Otto" who, however, didn't seem to have left Switzerland. I was under the impression that the connection between Edmund Schulze and Keates was a man named "Karl Schulze" {not related to E. Schulze, only employed by him). It looks like there must have been more Germans working for Keates then... Neither the tierce mixture, nor the "Harmonics" mixture are common at all in our neck of the woods (Central Europe, south-German organ building tradition), especially if it is to be the only mixture in the organ. But it seems to me that the English tradition (at least as represented by Keates) seemed to have preferred the Tierce mixtures over quint mixtures - that is if there was to be just one mixture stop in the organ. Would this be true for other English builders of the time as well?

Thank you for this page; it is quite informative. It even features an archive photograph of the Baptist chapel {now demolished} where our Keates organ stood originally. What caught my attention was the assertion of the writer of that article that "A visit to some of Keates' surviving organs reveals work of surprisingly variable quality; his instruments are less like each other than those of any other builder in my experience." I understand that Keates' organs have all quite different facades, but would the quality of the craftsmanship and voicing vary greatly, as well?

Our parish church in Slovakia has bought and transferred a 2-manual, 17-stop tracker Albert Keates organ (1908) from a closed church in Derbyshire. As part of the restoration project of this fine instrument, which will hopefully start sometime this year, we would like to add a Mixture rank for brilliance. I understand that most Victorian and Edwardian countryside organs in England wouldn't posses a Mixture. Nevertheless, would anyone be familiar with examples of Mixtures built by Keates for two-manual organs and potentially their composition {including the break points and potentially the scaling}? I would also like to ask whether anyone is familiar with any relevant literature on Keates - thus far, I have come across a Wikipedia article {in English, and the more extensive one in German} as well as a book called "Some Sheffield Organs" by C.G. Andrews. The Ars Organi article on a Keates organ transplant basically paraphrases the information listed in the German Wikipedia article. Disappointingly, neither Thistlethwaite, nor Bicknell mention Keates in their works. Any pointers would be highly appreciated!