Dupre

[acc]

.

[octave_dolce]

to swap the RH and LH parts from 23 bars before the end (the Eb7 chord?) of the G minor Prelude until Dupré swaps them anyway 11 bars before the end...

 

Had another go on the pedal chords and they don't feel that bad anymore. I haven't had a chance to work out the fingering. My hands are also very small. If I decide to learn this piece later on, I will have to rewrite some of the chords.

 

I am busy with the B major at the moment, which is hard but not too bad.

[gazman]

A few organists have told me that tracker organs that are built properly are not supposed to feel very heavy even when the manuals are coupled. Is this true? Can the weight of the keys be adjusted on a tracker instrument like the keys on an EP instrument?

 

If well built and adjusted, they shouldn't be unnecessarily heavy at all. Modern organ builders who specialize in tracker instruments understand much more of the physics involved in building mechanical action than did organ builders a hundred years ago.

[handsoff]

I remember playing for Evensong at Dorchester Abbey, Oxfordshire in about 1970 and had sore fingers and wrists for a couple of days afterwards. The action of the 3 decker was very heavy with Swell coupled to Great. Does anyone know the organ today and if it was "lightened" during the 1980 rebuild?

 

I can recall my disappointment during rehearsal that so many stops were "prepared for" - especially the mutuations....these have now been added according to the NPOR spec.

 

P

[pcnd5584]

If well built and adjusted, they shouldn't be unnecessarily heavy at all. Modern organ builders who specialize in tracker instruments understand much more of the physics involved in building mechanical action than did organ builders a hundred years ago.

 

In theory this may be so; however, in practice, the fairly new instruments at Christchurch Priory and Sherborne Abbey do not bear this out.

 

In contrast, Chichester Cathedral and Christ Church Cathedral (Oxford) are extremely comfortable to play, even when everything is coupled to everything else. In fact, at Chichester, I actually switched off the electric coupling when playing for a full Sunday last January. I played the Fugue from the Choral Fantasy on Wachet auf by Reger after Evensong and I found it perfectly acceptable - and very clean. This really is a superb organ.

[gazman]

In theory this may be so; however, in practice, the fairly new instruments at Christchurch Priory and Sherborne Abbey do not bear this out.

 

In contrast, Chichester Cathedral and Christ Church Cathedral (Oxford) are extremely comfortable to play, even when everything is coupled to everything else. In fact, at Chichester, I actually switched off the electric coupling when playing for a full Sunday last January. I played the Fugue from the Choral Fantasy on Wachet auf by Reger after Evensong and I found it perfectly acceptable - and very clean. This really is a superb organ.

 

Yes, there are always exceptions. But I think we can agree that it's much more likely for a modern tracker organ to be lighter in touch than most similarly sized instruments built in Victorian times!