Organ matters - Organs matter!

Quote from: Steve Best on November 02, 2010, 07:12:36 AM
Although the Allen Organ Company was listed as one of "consultants" on a "position paper" circulated by the church, the Allen Organ Company was NOT, I repeat, was NOT involved in the destruction of this organ.  The first time that the Allen Organ representative knew that company was listed by the church was when I contacted him yesterday. 

Thanks for this Steve, it is good to hear that Allen weren't complicit.  However, do I still understand that the church claimed that Allen were advisors, whether directly or indirectly.  Perhaps you could clarify this, and if so surely Allen should have some come-back in the law against the church for misrepresentation at the least.  I am relieved that Allen have been cleared, and apologies to them for linking them to this disgraceful act, although I still don't like their organs!, I am a pipe organ builder, so perhaps that is understandable!!

Jonathan

Apparently the name of the electronic builder in question came directly from the church, althogh even by me it is third hand!

Thank you Eric.  And I'm just waiting for Manders to remove the thread, they have a habit if its in the least bit controversial!

Jonathan

The problem with commercial electronic organ speaker systems is that they cannot recreate the sound of a pipe organ with the number and size of speakers they provide.  Apart from the vandelism that is caused by the installers themselves, for which a good example is an organ we are about to acquire, which when one well known English electronic organ firm installed the speakers in the organ case, they trampled some of the pipes, and just heaped the rest into the Swell box.  The pipe organ will be restored, lovingly, as it is the organ I learnt to play on!  However, back to speakers, my understanding, and I'm sure that I will be corrected if I am wrong, is that to fully recreate the sound of a pipe organ, we need a speaker to represent each pipe, and one of appropriate size.  This matched to a fully sampled organ, not just sampling one note from a rank and recreating it throughout the compass.  This latter point is particularly true if you want to recreate a French romantic organ, where the pressures vary thoughout the compass and the scaling means a straight octave transposition of the sound does not reflect the actual size of the pipe an octave higher or lower.

Jonathan

There is some information that one of the advisors to the church prior to destruction of the organ was **** Organs.

Quote from: David Pinnegar on September 24, 2010, 04:48:49 PM

What I really hate to see is the online and paper publications of the electronic touts who score up their "installations" supplanting pipe organs, often making a facadist development of the organ case, their publications looking like trophy hunters' scoreboards. I also find the electronic manufacturers' literature patronising and appealing to people with an IQ of 90 or 95 at most. But there again, perhaps that's just the sort of person who would be daft enough to throw out the investment of a pipe organ for the lure of a fancy load of television set and computer circuit boards.

I think you have hit the nail on the head, but they will always get sucked.  I spend half my free time sourcing secondhand but decent electrical gear for church, because it is better than the cheap stuff people try to sell you new!  Recently we have purchased off eBay a digital recording mixer which retails at £7K, I paid £160 and it took me 1.5 hours to fix, we also have a £900 DAT recorder which cost £41, and a £15K broadcast TV camera which cost just over £200. 

What I constantly see is churches getting sucked in by it will only cost you X amount and won't be any trouble after you have installed it.  Until the guarantee runs out that is!  I make no pretence that our organs are more expensive than electronic ones, but I also guarantee them for longer than your average electronic will last.

Jonathan

Quote from: revtonynewnham on September 24, 2010, 03:22:05 PM
Hi

The organ is on NPOR  - http://www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi?Fn=Rsearch&rec_index=D08090  Hint - only put the minimum search terms in for an NPOR address search - I used "Bartholomew Crewkerne" - and make sure you spell the names correctly - computer's don't have the intelligence to spot wrong spellings in database queries!

This is actually quite worrying, as the organ had work done just 6 years ago.  Why the sudden urge to get rid of it?  Maybe there's been a new incumbent who dislikes organs and want's to "modernize" - or church politics at work?

What this (and other churches looking at the same options) need to realise is that, although the electronic might be cheaper initially, and need less maintenance, it will never sound as good as the real thing, nor will it last as long.  They're looking at spending some £30,000.  Being generous and giving the new organ a life of 20 years, that's costing them £1,500 a year, not taking into account inflation, etc.   Try asking the church treasurer to put aside that amount every year and see what response you get!  That's the realitiy of the situation.  The pipe organ, if properly rebuilt, will last a minimum of 50 years before needing major work, and then will go on for at least another 50!  If they can use tracker action, it will last even longer.  The chamber organ here had survived getting on for 200 years and at least 5 changes of location with no evidence of any professional work - certainly, the last 2 moves were done by an amateur, and quite possibly the others were as well.  I wish churches would look at the total cost of ownership, and not just the short-term cost implications.

Every Blessing

Tony

Agree totally Tony.

I'm afraid I have to laugh as well as cry at what the lady church warden has said.  A quote from the article:

'But churchwarden Dorothy Tozer said the cost of renovating the existing organ would be around £80,000, whereas a new electronic organ would cost £35-40,000. And there was a positive response to the organ at its debut service on Sunday. She said: "We don't have the money to do either of these things at the moment and we are still raising money to repair our roof as it is. If the organ stopped working, we would be forced to use a piano. But it is something we are looking into as the pipe organ isn't expected to last much longer. This past winter was the death knell for it. We need to look at the long-term future and if we were able to get an electric organ put in, it would be much simpler to repair if something did go wrong with it.'

They are looking at spending £40K on an electronic, which would by a medium quality instrument, as opposed to £80K to maintain their pipe organ.  Perhaps a few facts are relevant, from anecdotal as well as proven evidence.  If you are lucky your electronic organ will last 20 years before a major upgrade is needed, whereas the pipe organ will last many more, a new pipe organ of high quality should see 200 years out.  An organ the size of that at Crewkerne would cost up to £500 per year to tune, whereas a single callout for repair on the elctronic may well exceed that (a friend's electronic organ needed a single part at £450 plus two visits by the engineer to allow it to even work at all, the chance of a pipe organ being put totally out of action is rare.)  Most organ builders would carry out essential maintenance on a standard tuning visit, which ensure potential problems are dealt with swiftly, whereas a fault with an electronic organ is unpredictable and therefore unpreventable.  One electronic organ I played had to have four callouts in as many weeks when it was less than three years old, but not under the guarantee.  I'm not sure how long electronic organ builders guarantee their organs for, but we conditionally guarantee all new material for 25 years.  If the church in question had contacted me they might be looking at a simple and straightforward solution, but my feeling is, lack of investment over the years since Brian Daniels did the last major work may well have caused them to reap what they do now (and knowing Brian personally, I am sure his work at Crewkerne was up the the typically high standards of his other work.

Jonathan

Quote from: Holditch on September 10, 2010, 01:56:32 AM
I think this post may have strayed slightly from the original thread, but it is interesting.

I am one of only two organists within a group of four churches in south Manchester. The congregations have been dwindling at most of the churches and unfortunately we are about to lose two of the organs, the first as one of the churches has now closed (the average attendance was less than 10) and the second because of the reordering of the church (again average attendance 10 to 20).

Now may I add the radical view that if worship groups, or basically any other form of musicianship had been introduced along side the usual pipe organist and so involving more of the youngsters that the church is always trying to attract, then these churches would not be closing or having to radically alter (so losing their wonderful pipe organs). When I talk about youngsters I mean from the age dot!

The church within the group that appears to be flourishing is the one that has involved the youngsters and does now have a worship band. This church due to swelling of the congregation has managed to plough a considerable amount of money, which is definitely not plentiful in this area of south Manchester, into the restoration of the pipe organ. The music is not especially evangelical but just modern, and for your information not my cup of tea but yet I am just one person!

My point is that whatever our opinions of what type of music should be played on a Sunday morning service and on what instrument, surely we need to cater for all ages, and also for all types of music. As long as we decide to not forget where we have come from, i.e. not reject or forget pipe organs, then the two forms of music can work together and in fact help the continued life of the church so saving pipe organs from redundancy.

For your information here is the npor listing for the church which has just closed

Quite sad isn't it!

http://www.npor.org.uk/cgi-bin/Rsearch.cgi?Fn=Rsearch&rec_index=N10804

Just my opinion anyway

Marc

Hear, hear!  Marc, I agree totally.  Our colleague sadly thinks his way is the only way, and as I made it quite clear I think, I favour organs and choirs, but the worship band has brought young people in, and has meant the church has a congregation under 70!  The earlier service, traditional parish communion generally has no young people, in fact, at 46 I'm one of the youngest members there.  More important is that why do any of us have the right to ram our own style of worship down anyone elses throat.  There is room for all and each person has the choice to attend or not.  The modern service is growing week on week, the traditional one is declining week on week.  I'm not sure where our colleague has found these churches with bells and smells that are thriving and filled with young people, but in my professional musical role I have visited many churches, week in week out, across the UK, and have very rarely seen it.  He refers to university towns, a few hundred churches/chapels, what about the hundreds of thousands of other churches in the country that are not in university towns, or not near to them.  As an organbuilder, professional organist and former Master of the Choristers in a UK cathedral I find it appalling that someone spouts the same bogotted approach as the Florida pastor.  Tolerance is essential in this world.  It is essential that those who like worship bands tolerate traditional music, and all too often they don't (incidentally our teenagers do, but it isn't rammed down their throat), and that traditionalists tolerate the other viewpoint.  I am a Christian, and I know some here aren't.  I accept their views about the existence of God and his son Jesus Christ, but I believe I have been 'saved' by him.  That is my personal choice, as it is anyone elses to choose theirs, thats why God gave us free will.  I have had quite a rant on this subject now, so plan to refrain from further comment.  However, I just feel sad that one person's views can be so narrow minded as to exclude the thought that other people might have different tastes.

Jonathan

The problem with the RORC is that they don't respond to requests for information about organs they hold.  They had several instruments we could have rehoused but no-one responded and the opportunity is now lost.  They used to list the organs available but no longer, so we don't even know what they have.  As an organ builder wo would be delighted to use them, but they need to tell us what they have and then respond when questions are asked, otherwise they will continue to have no further space!

Quote from: NonPlayingAnorak on September 07, 2010, 08:02:04 AM

Quote from: Jonathan Lane on September 06, 2010, 05:12:36 AM
Yet again another organ that we would happily take if we had the storage space.  Our current storage is full and in Surrey with business in Poole, but as I say, if we had lots of space many of these organs would end up in our storage I suspect!

Try and borrow an aircraft hangar somewhere? I'm sure Aces High at Dunsfold (of Top Gear fame) could offer you some space, they've got more hangarage than most airlines.

Unfortunately nothing comes free, most people will charge several pounds per square foot for anything they have, so anything of any valuable size would be in excess of £40k per year.  This is not viable for us to 'save' organs, even though we may eventually be able to sell them on.  We would need to sell on three a year just to pay for the storage space.  Also Dunsfold is far too far away, our current storage is in Cranleigh, but I need something nearer Poole.  However, if we had a decent amount of space, we could save a good number of complete organs and much good pipework which at present is either going to scrap or overseas.  We get offered at least one organ a week and sometimes many more, for very little money (our time to remove costs quite a bit though).  At least half of these have some historic or tonal merit.

Well actually we have a worship band here, with mainly teenagers involved, aged 15-18.  They are extremely good, led by a 15 year old singer/guitarist.  They want modern worship songs, not the Bernadette O'Farrell type stuff, but Matt Redman, Soul Survivor and the like.  They are as I say extremely good, and a very positive influence musically on the church.  The choir and organ at the early service are very traditional, which is also fine, but the service the band plays at as grown from an average of 15 to average of 65 in the nine months we have lived here.  As a professional organist and now organ builder, who has held posts in a number of major parish churches and one cathedral I am wholeheartedly behind the band.

Yet again another organ that we would happily take if we had the storage space.  Our current storage is full and in Surrey with business in Poole, but as I say, if we had lots of space many of these organs would end up in oour storage I suspect!

We need something like this in England.  I have long thought if I had a 100000sq ft warehouse it would be used to store redundant pipe organs until a new home could be found for them!! Jonathan

Thanks David, I wholeheartedly agree!

The problem here appears to be a lack of knowledge in certain quarters about being able to sell (or give) organs on.  I spoke to the seller who has only acquired the material post breaking up, so its not all available, but of course if we had known about this in advance of the organ being removed maybe something could have been done.  The seller is doing a fantastic job of making sure the remaining material is preserved.