News:

If you have difficulty registering for an account on the forum please email antespam@gmail.com. In the question regarding the composer use just the surname, not including forenames Charles-Marie.

Main Menu

Historic 1937 Hammond Model E with woodworm needs rescue

Started by organforumadmin, April 01, 2010, 12:37:10 PM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

organforumadmin

Hi!


This thread is intended for pipe organs, for reasons of extremis and in view of the museum nature of the instrument, I hope that readers will excuse my posting here.


Many years ago I acquired a 1937 Boosey and Hawkes Hammond model E.


This instrument served in a subsidiary chapel of a major public school and was replaced by an extension unit pipe organ that is arguably "worse" than the Hammond it replaced. One of the first, it has typewriter style preset buttons, full 60 note manuals and a full 30 or 32 note pedalboard. Despite being a lifetime old, it still works, although I abandoned the amps and took the outputs to stereo mic amps and power amps with which it operates very effectively. It also has the infamouse second set of tonewheel generators to create the chorus effect, which is much more alive than the synthesised version that was developed for later instruments.


This was a legend of an instrument, probably of the nature of the type infamously installed in Canterbury Cathedral (by Percy Vickery himself), and about which many senior musicians (who had probably lost the upper frequencies of their hearing) were persuaded to give endorsements.


However, I have seen today a clutch of piles of dust from woodworm holes . . . and seeing also the first holes in a bourdon pipe of the pipe organ in the same room, and not having used it in a long time, it's clearly time for this instrument to go somewhere else for more loving care than I have time for . . . .


So if anyone is interested, please contact me.


Best wishes


Forum Admin

David Pinnegar

#1
Hi!

The final part of
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=45OeT8E37FM
is the Hammond in question and really although it's useful for academic illustration of harmonic construction of sounds, it's not being appropriately appreciated here.

So if anyone is interested please ring 01342 850594

Another thought - in view of its second set of tonewheel generators for the chorus effect, which is much more subtle than the later famous effect, would anyone like to sample it for Hauptwerk or Grande Orgue?

Best wishes

David P