Worst Organ Ive come across

[Barrie Davis]

On Friday I had to play for a funeral service at Enville Church, I had been looking forward to playing this organ as I knew it in its previous home at St Leonards Bridgnorth. I now wish I had declined the service. The console and Choir Organ (unencl) is in the chancel, the Great and Swell is situated in a corner at the very back of the church. When the church is empty you can just about hear those 2 divisons but with a congregation it is impossible. The only thing to do is couple the Choir to the Great to hear what you are playing. I was warned before the service that at the back the organ was very loud, from my past memories it certainly filled its former home. This is one instance of an instrument being moved without much thought. Both of the specs can be found on NPOR.

Barrie

[NonPlayingAnorak]

Real pity, that... those old Walkers are (generally) stunningly good. My local, the Sacred Heart RC (Jesuit), Wimbledon (IIIP/50, three 32s and a HUGE Tuba! Plus a delightful 4ft Octave Oboe, a stop every big organ should have...) is a very strong candidate for "the best organ in the country"... well, it was, when it was playable. Sadly, in recent years, it's become rather derelict, but it was removed last year to a certain large workshop in Bethnal Green and will be back around Easter, fully restored for the first time since it was built in 1912...

Also, this one (Enville) looks to have lost quite a few stops, including a Trombone - Walker's pedal reeds were generally excellent - and also I see a 1929 Rushworth rebuild - 20s Rushworth work was generally of fabulous quality. Look at Malvern Priory.

[Barrie Davis]

Yes old Walkers are usually very good, Malvern is stunning and Nicholsons did a really good job restoring it.

The pedal Trombone and Tromba unit from Bridgnorth would have been too large for the church the organ went to. I wish they had retained the Fagotto in the Swell and maybe placed it on a seperate soundboard to have made it independent on the pedals.

Within the Bridgnorth area there are several Walkers, Broseley was moved and mutilated, Coalbrookdale was rebuilt by Arthur Harrison and is the best of the lot. (I am biased as I was brought up on that organ!!!)

There is an organ at Bromfield which has simply been restored and is stunning.

Incidentally and totally away from the subject, if any members of the board are ever in the Stourbridge area and would like to try the organ I play at Wordsley please send me a pm and I would be pleased to make you welcome. I think you will enjoy it!!!

Barrie

[NonPlayingAnorak]

What is your organ at Wordsley?

As for a JWW/AH rebuild being stunning, I can well believe it. There are quite a few Walkers round here - little but lovely at Mickleham (a stone's throw from the spot where George Meredith heard the lark which then inspired RVW to put pen to paper), big and wonderful at Wimbledon and Purley. Wimbledon has a second big 3m Walker at Christ Church (a few doors up from the hospital where Stirling Moss was treated after the crash at Goodwood that ended his F1 career) but it was only a medium 2 until Walker rebuilt it in 1952, then it was further rebuilt by Wood Wordsworth in the 70s, and there is no health in it...

We also have quite a few Arthur Harrisons (Tooting, Charterhouse, Sutton Baptist with its huge Newcastle/Edinburgh Cathedral tower and crown), all big 3-manuals, and, at Woodham, just outside Woking, is what was a 1913 Walker, of whcih NPOR has no spec, but it was rebuilt in 1929 by Harrisons, enlarging it to 23 stops. All AH's best men were on that job too - Colonel W. C. "Billy" Jones, the head voicer, personally finished all the reeds. It's a wonderful organ.

We've also got five biggish Hunters, quite similar in character to the Harrisons, at Aldershot, Redhill, Wimbledon PC, Woking and Surbiton - St Andrew's Surbiton being the best of a brilliant bunch. We also have quite a few wonderful Hills (Aldershot, Godalming, St Paul's Dorking, Croydon, Streatham), several Willises (Fetcham, Ewell, Reigate, Redhill, Guildford, South Croydon [III], West Croydon, Wonersh, Horsham), two Rothwells (Guildford and Headley), countless Lewises (John Courage lived near here - they can be found in Kingston, Chilworth, Bramley, Wonersh, Holmbury and I could go on), Gray and Davisons in Aldershot and Warnham, Norman and Beards in Wimbledon, West Byfleet and the stunning Pearson convent chapel at Maybury, near Woking, a lovely Walker/Norman and Beard in Old Woking, a fine Hele in Aldershot, a big Compton in Albury, plus a 1766 Parker/2009 Goetze and Gwynn here in Leatherhead, and Betchworth is about to get a new Tickell (a builder whose output seems VERY variable in quality, ranging from Wonderful Worcester through Dull Dulwich to Horrid Haywards Heath and Horrible Honiton)

Plus we have a lovely Saxon Aldred in Guildford (light oak, spotted metal, tracker action, Werckmeister III), four Frobenius instruments (the first, Stoke d'Abernon is wonderful, the rest - Kingston, Shirley, West Horsley - a bit mediocre), a glorious Beale and Thynne (pronounced Tyne) in Richmond, a big Binns in Surbiton, a big Brindley and Foster in Aldershot, the ravishing new Saint-Martin at Petersham, the Cavaille-Coll at Farnborough, the wonderful 1990s Harrison at Twickenham PC, a similar-vintage Nicholson at Abinger, a similar-vintage Mander at the prep school I attended the nursery of, Cranmore, another such vintage Kenneth Jones at Compton (pronounced Cumpton), two GDBs in Tooting and Cranleigh (though the latter has recently moved elsewhere and been replaced by a new Mander).

Anyone who says that good organs are much more common Oop North is talking through their hat =P

[Barrie Davis]

Hi

Wordsley is Bevington/Halmshaw/Nicholson and Lord/Conacher/Sheffield and is now looked after by Trevor Tipple. The spec is on NPOR although the Positif is now Stopped 8 Flute 4 Nazard 2.2/3 Flute 2 Tierce 1.3/5 Crummhorn 8 Tromba 8.

Barrie

[NonPlayingAnorak]

Looks vaguely familiar from the pics. It's a pity the Choir was remodelled as a Positiv - that's something I'd undo. Plus, all that borrowing and extension of the Tromba rank... and what on earth motivated whoever was organist to get rid of the No1 Open Diapason but keep a bloody Dulciana?!

[revtonynewnham]

Hi

My worst organ must be the Morgan & Smith that I used to suffer at Rye Baptist Church - see http://www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi?Fn=Rsearch&rec_index=E00429.  In addition to the obvious neo-baroque intrusions, which never really worked tonally, the Gt flute was cut down open diapason pipes with cork stoppers - and a pronounced chiff - not unpleasant in itself, but at odds with the rest of the organ.  The action to the Dulciana was tubed from the Gt tone channels - so was painfully sluggish, and the position of the chest meant that the stop was nigh on inaudible at the console - although it did carry well down the building (or at least the middle section) due to the barrel ceiling.  It was pretty soft - and the problem was that the next stop on the Great, volume wise, was the Stopped Diapason at mf - so nothing to accompany the quiet sounds on the Swell.  The Schalmei stayed in tune for about a week after the tuner's visit - if you were lucky - and accessing it was a pain, as it meant either removing a 10ft-high case panel, or climbing over the top - being careful not to tread on the basses of the 4ft flute on an off-note chest!  The most effective use I found for it was in "Sheep May Safely Graze" - it made the right sort of "baa-ing" noise! The swell - even with the octave coupler - was only about 1/2 the volume of the Great - and shrieked because of the Tierce - and to add insult to injury, the combination pedals weren't altered at the rebuild - no.1 was Echo Gamba, no.2 was, IIRC, Echo gamba, Flute and Gemshorn - BUT although no.2 canceled the added stops, no.1 didn't - making it easy to end up with Echo Gamba (and the "Echo" in the name was well justified) and Mixture, or Echo gamba + Tierce!

Amazingly, long after I left, the organ was sold to an overseas buyer.  I wonder why - although to be fair, some of the pipework was quite good - but the rest & the action were pretty poor.

Every Blessing

Tony

[NonPlayingAnorak]

A Schalmei that stays in tune for a week at most? Eee, luxureh! When I were nobbut a twinkle in my ma's eye, the 1975 Frobenius at Stoke d'Abernon had as its only manual reed an 8ft Regal - that bloody thing were a right ****** to keep in tune, sometimes had to be tuned immediately before and during a recital... With apologies to Monty Python. Said buzzy Regal has been remade recently as a nice, fairly stable Cromorne sort of thing.

As for Rye, I remember it being advertised - indeed, some of the pipework should have been good. I know a 1905 Morgan and Smith, rebuilt by Walker in the 60s from three to two manuals, that's in the process of being installed at Our Lady of Consolation, West Grinstead (the priest house was a bolt-hole in the 16th Century for Catholic priests, one of whom, Francis Bell, was dragged from there to Tyburn - the local noble family were Recusant Catholics right through the Persecution until they disappeared from view in the 20th century) - this organ, as yet without casework, has some lovely sounds, but also the most OUTRAGEOUS Great Trumpet, like unto no other such stop I've ever heard - it's more like the Blenheim Palace Tuba, huge, a shaft of searing golden light. I think its new home is smaller than its old one, but the church is tall, narrow, moderately long and stone-vaulted throughout, giving a wonderful acoustic - it's an extraordinary sound. There's a bit of pipework is said to date back to the 1790s/1800s, possibly by G. P. England IIRC, and that was beautiful, but the whole thing was stunning. Now, if only I could persuade the priest (an extraordinary chap - Diocesan Organ Adviser, ex Rochester Cathedral Assistant Organist, married with two adult offspring, his son also a priest - if ever there was a case for dropping the priestly celibacy rule it's him and his family) to reinstate the Choir organ...




[Edited by Forum Admin: would you kindly please mind your language]