What is a Suavial?

[Guest Hector5]

Last week I had the honour of playing at the 70th anniversary service of the founding of the community at Taize in their chapel on the new Grenzing organ in front of 4000 people, playing a 30 minute Bach selection before the service as well. The community have finally installed a decent organ, built by Grenzing. It's small, and based on an either/or system of registration. The stoplist is available on the Genzing site. It's a small organ with a very big job to do, and despite the modest stoplist it really works very well indeed. One stop I couldn't leave alone was the Suavial - a deeply sensuous sound. It's clearly a string, but a new sound to me. Does anyone have any experience of similar stops with this name?

 

Hector

[John Sayer]

Last week I had the honour of playing at the 70th anniversary service of the founding of the community at Taize in their chapel on the new Grenzing organ in front of 4000 people, playing a 30 minute Bach selection before the service as well. The community have finally installed a decent organ, built by Grenzing. It's small, and based on an either/or system of registration. The stoplist is available on the Genzing site. It's a small organ with a very big job to do, and despite the modest stoplist it really works very well indeed. One stop I couldn't leave alone was the Suavial - a deeply sensuous sound. It's clearly a string, but a new sound to me. Does anyone have any experience of similar stops with this name?

 

Hector

[/quote

 

The name crops up occasionally in South Germany, a slightly fanciful name for a Viola or similar string-sounding stop. I believe Klais have made a few examples. English definition here Suavial

 

Winfried Ellerhorst's mighty tome Handbuch der Orgelkunde (1936) describes it as a 'mildly voiced Geigenprinzipal with narrow mouths (9/40th to 1/5th)'

 

JS

[AJJ]

Try here - much as described above - tuned to beat with another 8' I think.

 

A

[oscar_rook]

There is an 8ft Suavial on the Schwellpositiv of the 1960 Metzler organ at the Grossmünster in Zürich, a marvellous organ used by the young Lionel Rogg for his first (nearly-) complete JSB recordings and the three Hindemith sonatas. André Marchal also recorded there. What a pity this organ has made so few appearances on CD.

 

Regards

 

Oscar

[justinf]

With apologies to Hector, whose topic I don't wish to hijack (for long), can anyone say what a Souffle is? The only one I know of is in the Rieger at St. Giles, Edinburgh, but I haven't been there in more than a decade and cannot recall what it sounds like. All I can discover is that the name may have been borrowed from the Ondes Martenot.

 

Justin

[AJJ]

With apologies to Hector, whose topic I don't wish to hijack (for long), can anyone say what a Souffle is? The only one I know of is in the Rieger at St. Giles, Edinburgh, but I haven't been there in more than a decade and cannot recall what it sounds like. All I can discover is that the name may have been borrowed from the Ondes Martenot.

 

Justin

 

'Not much help but I seem to remember reading that it was something quiet - because not much else on the organ is! 'Can' remember where I read this though.

 

A

[John Sayer]

With apologies to Hector, whose topic I don't wish to hijack (for long), can anyone say what a Souffle is? The only one I know of is in the Rieger at St. Giles, Edinburgh, but I haven't been there in more than a decade and cannot recall what it sounds like. All I can discover is that the name may have been borrowed from the Ondes Martenot.

 

Justin

 

The story I heard is that Herrick Bunney was worried that he wouldn't have a really pianissimo stop for service accompaniment and the like, so Rieger, with a sense of fun, gave him a Souffle, a whisper.

 

JS

[Christopher Allsop]

The swell celeste at Trinity Cambridge (on the Metzler) is a Suavial. It makes a gentle and very beautiful sound with the Viola.