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notebasher

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Everything posted by notebasher

  1. St John Bowling (Anglican church) had an Anneessens organ which was scrapped off maybe 20 years ago. At the time I was at St Wilfrid Lidget Green and we bought the pedal reed off them and installed it in that organ. As I recall the rest of the organ was scrapped. R
  2. I wouldn't have thought the balanced swell was an original feature, given its date. R
  3. Well this one may be OK but it's vital you check out the wind pressures - both of the organ and the blower, as described on e-bay there's not that sort of information. Also the static blower pressure is that usually quoted, but you need to make an allowance for the falling off of pressure that occurs when the blower is supplying wind when the organ's played. So you will need the blower pressure to exceed the highest pressure the organ works on. But you can maybe check the old blower output which may cover it. You could look too at this website http://www.bobstevenson.co.uk/organ_blower_fans.pdf but I can't read the scanned bits which are the ones you want! And it's an idea to make sure your electricity supply is correct - in this case, single phase. Some churches used 3-phase supplies for blowers. 3-phase supply to a 1-phase motor can be done, but not the reverse. Also suggest you ckeck the motor bearings. Hope this helps and good luck! Ron
  4. Yes Peter I liked the bit about the 32' reed too - we'd all like one of those! But without knowing the internals of the cathedral organ, they do take up rather a lot of space! Some would say that organ needs a great 16' double first, the only manual double is a 16' quintaton on the choir. Shame about your lunch though... R
  5. Yes it was quite the highest attendance I've seen there at a recital for some time, and an excellent start to the Bradford Association's centenary year. And then this morning up here in the frozen north we woke up to some 3" of snow to negotiate - the 15 minute journey to Shipley took twice as long... R
  6. Lutterworth (Gern 1885, Taylor 1950-ish) had/has these small stops. I was organist in the late 70s and these were never a problem, you very soon got used to them. The pistons were adjustable by lifting the console lid and moving a setter, they also had double touch which was very useful for both the manual and pedal pistons had it. I've no idea how much Taylors altered it, the spec didn't change much although I'm certain the reeds had been revoiced, especially the Great reed which was labelled Tromba and was certainly voiced as one. But a convincing organ too. I last played it about 7 years ago when there was talk of a rebuild. Wonder if that happened? R
  7. The swell is C compass. I suppose it could have started as a TC department, but if they went to the trouble of adding a bass octave, you'd have thought they'd add a coupler as well. It always puzzled me when I used to play it, but nobody seemed to know much about it! Not much changed then. It was a good solid village organ, don't know if it's in use nowadays. R
  8. Hello Will I remember the Gilmorton organ, having last played it in the late 70s when we lived in Lutterworth. If it's in a poor way now, it wasn't much better mechanically then. Porritt's organs sem to just go on and on, and as I recall this one is totally unaltered apart from the addition of the choir organ. On the few occasions I played it I was quite impressed, even then thinking how good it could be if restored. From what you say it doesn't sound as if anything has been done to it. The only other Porritt I played was Bitteswell, small 2 manual with no Swell - Pedal coupler for some reason. Also, the NPOR survey gives the pedal compass as C-f, but my recollection is that it was c compass, two octaves (I nearly fell off going for a top d that wasn't there!). Did the firm do many slightly quirky organs like that? Hard to imagine quite why!!! R
  9. Warning though: if you do watch it don't expect to necessarily enjoy the rest of the music - I can't say I'm a fan of the foot-tapping, big-band style renditions of the hymns on this programme. Apart from the organ bit, I found the rest of it rather a let-down - the choice of hymns lacked variety, if the organ was played for any of them it was inaudible, swamped by the band. It seemed a shame that having showcased the organ we weren't allowed to hear it in an accompanying role. The audience were 'twitchy' sporting inane smirks as if they'd all been on a magic mushrooms trip, and what's all this clapping at the end of every hymn, who were they applauding? Themselves maybe? And as for the conductor, well I know it's the pantomime season but he looked as if he was going onstage straight after the show. Otherwise, very enjoyable... R
  10. Bradford Organists' Association are organising an 'Organ Extravaganza' featuring Carlo Curley at Bradford Cathedral on Saturday 20th February, 7.30 p.m. Tickets £10 (£8 concessions). This is part of the Association's Centenary Year celebrations. BOA is 100 years old and 100+ members strong (no founder members now, sadly!). Ron
  11. Yes thanks for doing this, it does work, even I can print off from it. Fantastic! R
  12. Now that's a good idea. But how to implement it? R
  13. You don't perhaps have a sound clip as well??? R
  14. According to Jonathan Rennert's book GTB was born in Sydney of Cornish parents, returned to UK aged three. I don't know what that made him - technically Australian I would think. R
  15. St Paul's Shipley, West Yorkshire. Saturday 28 November at 2.30 p.m., Organ Concert by Paul Fisher, see http://www.paulfishermusic.co.uk/index.php who will play this programme:- `Mr Men & Little Misses` - arr. Fisher; A Ground (from `Little Organ Suite`) - Nigel Allcoat; Prelude & Fugue in C major BWV547 (`The Great`) - JS Bach; Clair de Lune (from `Pieces de Fantaisie`) - Louis Vierne; Fantaisie in A - Cesar Franck; `Sheila`s Rock Cakes`(World Premiere) - Paul Fisher; Love Song - Paul Fisher; Penguins` Playtime - Nigel Ogden; Toccata - Eugene Gigout. It's £6 and there will be tea available too. Concert in aid of the church's 1892 3 manual Binns restoration appeal. Ron
  16. My observation on accompanying Anglican chant on this organ was a thought as a result of playing it fairly recently. I agree, the sounds available are wonderful - there are quiet stops of great beauty on this organ - and tonally they certainly would fit the bill quite adequately. But the real issue is the C-C console. There are of course no pistons, there are foot operated ventils bringing on groups of stops in the usual C-C way, and the console is laid out in terraced row of stops as you would expect. Certainly as psalm accompaniment is practised in many cathedrals, this style of console would present considerable practical difficulties with choral accompaniment, and whilst not totally impossible, the subtleties of registration expected would be very difficult to achieve, and I would think very frustrating to most players. Yes, you can do it well enough on traditional English consoles with angled draw-stop jambs and hand registration - earlier generations of organists did it perfectly well and many still can, but to translate this to the Warrington console is another matter altogether and would in my view be a very different challenge. Mind, I did hear the suggestion that perhaps it could be restored with the C-C console and Barker lever action and have added to it a modern electric conventional British console for service accompaniment... R.
  17. Well, how would you like to accompany Anglican chant psalms on it? Never heard any in French churches. And yes I have played the Parr Hall organ. R.
  18. Well, how would you like to accompany Anglican chant psalms on it? Never heard any in French churches. And yes I have played the Parr Hall organ. R.
  19. I have a copy of the Novello publication. If you have problems gatting a copy you're welcome to borrow mine. R.
  20. Many thanks to all who contributed to this discussion. We've had to 'dumb it down' a bit in the end, due to limitations of time, and work on the basis of 'if in doubt, leave it out'. But I've discovered how complicated and confusing copyright law is. If I ever do another recording I'll know to allow much more time for research. Ron
  21. Hi David Thanks for this. The descants and alternative harmonies are the work of the DoM and myself, so no copyright issues there. However, would their use constitute messing around with the composer's work so as to affect their copyright, would you say? For example, for one worship song I've transposed and rearranged the harmony totally to make it more suitable for (my) organ accompaniment. Would there be any issues with this would you think? Again, thanks for yours and Guilmant's responses. Ron
  22. I appreciate that this isn't strictly speaking an organ topic, but if anyone can give some guidance I'd be very grateful. At my main church we're recording A CD of the church choir singing popular hymns and songs, for sale to church members and friends in aid of the organ appeal. Maximum quantity 100. We've arranged a CCLI MRL licence, but a question has arisen as to whether a number of home-grown descants and organ last-verse re-harmonisations would be covered. We don't want to infringe copyright, but equally we don't want the music to be too boring either! Any help anyone can offer would be appreciated. Ron
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