flûte harmonique Posted December 16, 2012 Share Posted December 16, 2012 http://www.hostingpics.net/viewer.php?id=633475Capturede769cran20121213a768212635.png At the occasion of the restoration of the electronic part of the organ, the console has been changed (Quoirin). Many comments in France about this "esthetic". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJJ Posted December 16, 2012 Share Posted December 16, 2012 What was wrong with the not so old previous one? A Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MusingMuso Posted December 16, 2012 Share Posted December 16, 2012 What was wrong with the not so old previous one? A ============================== It was French !!!!!!! Best, MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidh Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 In 1999 it was controlled by two IBM PS/2 with 80486 microprocessors working at 16Mbps linked by a token ring, and two CRT displays, controlling the pipes via MIDI. There was also a synthetic voice so that the console could inform a blind organist of its settings. All state of the art at the time, but some people have expressed the view that MIDI would have too much latency to work effectively on an instrument that size. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJJ Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 There's a moral there somewhere I think... A Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 ============================== It was French. Best, MM Sorry, but this is nonsense. I have seen this console from the point of view of the organists' bench. It was well made - certainly of rather higher quality that the previous console. The design (allowing for the Anglo-American features) was reasonably elegant and comfortable. Simply to condemn it because it was French is unhelpful. Look at the workmanship inside a large Cavaillé-Coll instrument - with its staircases, polished wood building frames and other sumptuous appointment of details which the player was never likely to see. This was also, I believe, a French company.... I doubt that the quality fell short of the best work in any other European country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MusingMuso Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 Sorry, but this is nonsense. I have seen this console from the point of view of the organists' bench. It was well made - certainly of rather higher quality that the previous console. The design (allowing for the Anglo-American features) was reasonably elegant and comfortable. Simply to condemn it because it was French is unhelpful. Look at the workmanship inside a large Cavaillé-Coll instrument - with its staircases, polished wood building frames and other sumptuous appointment of details which the player was never likely to see. This was also, I believe, a French company.... I doubt that the quality fell short of the best work in any other European country. ===================== It was meant to be nonsense. However, my suspicions about anything electronic and French suggests that they are well founded. They have a fondness for technical novelty which often fails spectacularly after only a short time. Best, MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidh Posted December 17, 2012 Share Posted December 17, 2012 Sorry, but this is nonsense. I have seen this console from the point of view of the organists' bench. It was well made - certainly of rather higher quality that the previous console. The former console was made by Hermann prior to his death in 1964 (of course) and should have been solid wood, but when the 1990 restoration took place it was found to be chipboard with a rosewood veneer. Alterations were impossible, so a completely new console was built by Philippe Emeriau. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Drinkell Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 ===================== It was meant to be nonsense. However, my suspicions about anything electronic and French suggests that they are well founded. They have a fondness for technical novelty which often fails spectacularly after only a short time. Best, MM Seeing my parents' and sister's experience with Peugeots and my father-in-law's with a couple of Citroens, I'm inclined to agree with you. Besides, being rude about the French is a British tradition which goes back hundreds of years.... They're good at food though. There's a little island called St-Pierre just off the coast of Newfoundland which belongs to France (they send an MP to Paris). Population 6000, no chain stores, but five patisseries, and the food, even in the most humble B&B, is superb. The organ (there's only one) in the cathedral (there's only one church) is pretty good too (Casavant rebuild of Mutin). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christine Jose Rigby Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 This is the time to remember Louis Vierne playing the Notre Dame organ in 1929 - the first year that sound was recorded electronically. AND Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Seeing my parents' and sister's experience with Peugeots and my father-in-law's with a couple of Citroens, I'm inclined to agree with you. I once owned a Morris Marina* - and some friends possessed an Austin Allegro. Personally, I think that these trump both of the above. * Not out of choice, you understand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 ===================== It was meant to be nonsense. However, my suspicions about anything electronic and French suggests that they are well founded. They have a fondness for technical novelty which often fails spectacularly after only a short time. Best, MM With regard to the idea of the computer-controlled transmission (installed in the 1990-92 restoration) this was true, unfortunately. However, the workmanship was not sub-standard, as far as I am aware. The idea of the technology was simply in advance of the available standard of practical application at that time. Does anyone have a link to more photographs of the new console - perhaps from a more frontal aspect, please? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 It was meant to be nonsense. ... This was not apparent to me from your original post. Perhaps the use of an exclamation mark might have conveyed this sentiment more accurately. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 The former console was made by Hermann prior to his death in 1964 (of course) and should have been solid wood, but when the 1990 restoration took place it was found to be chipboard with a rosewood veneer. Alterations were impossible, so a completely new console was built by Philippe Emeriau. Indeed. I believe that the 1992 console (frame and shell) was also dropped a few feet, whilst being winched up to the tribune, which necessitated some repair work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heva Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Morris Marina goes well with grandpiano's falling from the sky .... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
heva Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MusingMuso Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 This was not apparent to me from your original post. Perhaps the use of an exclamation mark might have conveyed this sentiment more accurately. ==================== I shall attend to this immediately. Best, MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MusingMuso Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Morris Marina goes well with grandpiano's falling from the sky .... ==================== I once saw a Lancia Stratos dropped from the top of a car-transporter before the start of the RAC rally. That didn't go too well afterwards! The Italians thought it hilarious. Best, MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 Morris Marina goes well with grandpiano's falling from the sky .... Well, quite. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 ==================== I shall attend to this immediately. Best, MM Well, I should think so too.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christine Jose Rigby Posted December 18, 2012 Share Posted December 18, 2012 The comments (when watched on YouTube) following this link of Pierre Cochereau playing the Cavaille-Coll console are very interesting --- in-as-much as the general comment is that the organ no longer sounded like a Cavaille-Coll. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pcnd5584 Posted December 19, 2012 Share Posted December 19, 2012 The comments (when watched on YouTube) following this link of Pierre Cochereau playing the Cavaille-Coll console are very interesting --- in-as-much as the general comment is that the organ no longer sounded like a Cavaille-Coll. Indeed - which is interesting. I would concur with this thought. I think that it is true to say that it is a similar case to that of the three Willis organs in the cathedfrals of Hereford, Salisbury and Truro. The sound is identifiably Willis - yet each instrument has its own tonal 'personality', as it were. Each is readily identifiable - and not simply in the case of the lack of a 32ft. reed at Truro. In the same way, the old Nôtre-Dame instrument was identifiably a Cavaillé-Coll organ - but one with a subtly different sound to other large instruments by this builder. Perhaps it was in part due to the unique family of reeds on the G.O. - all Bassons. Whilst there were 'big' reeds on the Solo and Grand Chœur, these Bassons must have had a quite different effect in the tutti to the usual Bombarde, Trompette and Clairon. With its large quantity of surviving material from the former Cliquot instrument, that at S. Sulpice was probably always going to sound different; but I would suggest on the evidence of recordings, that Nôtre-Dame did sound quite perceptibly different to this instrument - and that at S. Ouen (Rouen), Sacré-Cœur and, particularly, S. Sernin (Toulouse). Admittedly, in the case of the last-named instrument, the awsome tutti is dominated by the superb chamades (Trompette and Clairon) of the twenty-stop G.O. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jonadkins Posted December 20, 2012 Share Posted December 20, 2012 - and some friends possessed an Austin Allegro. Our Austin Allegro, of course, became an Austin Adagio, then an Austin Lunga Pausa. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MusingMuso Posted December 21, 2012 Share Posted December 21, 2012 Our Austin Allegro, of course, became an Austin Adagio, then an Austin Lunga Pausa. ===================== Great minds and all that.....I always wondered why they didn't bring out a souped up Allegro Vivace. Best, MM Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AJJ Posted December 21, 2012 Share Posted December 21, 2012 Indeed - which is interesting. I would concur with this thought. I think that it is true to say that it is a similar case to that of the three Willis organs in the cathedrals of Hereford, Salisbury and Truro. The sound is identifiably Willis - yet each instrument has its own tonal 'personality', as it were. Each is readily identifiable - and not simply in the case of the 'missing' 32ft. reed at Truro. Yes - mind you - having heard a full evening demonstation of the ND organ reasonably recently at the hands of Phillipe Lefebvre it seems that it can be made to sound like anything you want. He certainly found some ideal Clicquot sounds, managed to register both the earlier and later Romantics/Symphonists authentically and then Chochereau and post Cochereau - almost like different instruments - this I think is the success of the organ - in the right hands. ND always was a special case yet recordings of Latry playing Vierne (and Messaien mind you) still sound very CC at their core. It will be interesting to dig deep into the new CC DVD set - mine arrived yesterday and was spirited away as a Christmas present by Mrs AJ - looking forward to this - 'may need to leave the new Hammond Cochereau book for a while though! A Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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