The Allen Digital Computer Organ, the world's first digital musical instrument, has been acquired by the Smithsonian Institute, Washington, DC. The organ was manufactured by Allen in 1971 and installed in St. Andrew's Lutheran Church, Easton, PA. In the mid-1990s this organ was placed on display in Allen Organ's factory museum.
Allen's web site it: www.allenorgan.com.
Organbuilding in the United States and Canada is a thriving art practiced in hundreds of shops throughout the continent. Emerging from decades of stylistic extremes, organbuilders are combining a wealth of knowledge from the past with new technologies to meet contemporary design challenges. North American builders, compelled by a unique spirit of cooperation and openness, are successfully raising the artistic standards of this time-honored craft. (American Institute of Organbuilders, descriptive statement.)
The organ has occupied a prominent place in the musical culture of Canada since the days of the first European settlement, chiefly because of its close connection with church music and the ambitions of many congregations. The first organs, brought from France, were installed in Québec City around 1660. An anecdotal report mentions the acquisition by a Halifax church of a Spanish instrument that had been seized on board a ship in 1765.1 Following a period in which organs continued to be imported from England and France, organbuilding began as early as 1723 and flourished mainly in Québec and Ontario from the mid-19th century onward.2 By the second half of the 19th century, organ building had become a relatively important industry in Eastern Canada, where companies had acquired sufficient expertise to compete in the international market, including the United States.3
The development of organbuilding in Canada proceeded through several phases, beginning with early builders.4 The first known organbuilder was Richard Coates, who arrived in Canada from England in 1817; he supplied mainly barrel organs to several small churches in Ontario. Joseph Casavant, the first Canadian-born builder, installed his first instrument in the Montréal region in 1840; he transmitted his skills to his sons, who later established the company that achieved world-wide recognition. The arrival from the United States of Samuel Russell Warren in 1836 marked the introduction of professional-calibre organbuilding into the country. His family firm had produced about 350 pipe organs by 1869; it was sold in 1896 to D. W. Karn (see below). Other prominent organ builders included Napoléon Déry (active 1874-1889), Eusèbe Brodeur (a successor to Joseph Casavant in 1866), and Louis Mitchell (active 1861-1893) in Québec, and Edward Lye (active 1864-1919) in Ontario.
The years 1880-1950 were marked by unprecedented growth in organbuilding, beginning with the establishment of Casavant Frères in 1879 in Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec. The Canadian Pipe Organ Company/Compagnie d'orgues canadiennes was established in 1910 by some former Casavant staff, also in Saint-Hyacinthe (when the firm closed in 1931 its equipment was acquired by Casavant). Prominent Ontario builders included the firms of Richard S. Williams (founded 1854 in Toronto), Denis W. Karn (commenced 1897 in Woodstock), C. Franklin Legge (founded 1915 in Toronto, joined by William F. Legge 1919, who later established his own company in Woodstock around 1948), and the Woodstock Pipe Organ Builders (an organization of skilled craftsmen in that Ontario town, 1922-1948). Several smaller, independent builders were active for a time in Ontario, the Maritime provinces, and Manitoba (late 1880s). British Columbia, on the other hand, seems to have had no indigenous organbuilders, for instruments were imported from the United States or from England on ships that sailed around Cape Horn; one of the earliest arrived in Victoria from England by this route in 1861.
In the early 1950s some organbuilders, encouraged by younger organists who had played European instruments, as well as the increasing availability of sound recordings of these organs, turned to classical principles of organbuilding to counter what they perceived as the colorless sound palettes of Canadian organs of the 1930s. The return to earlier tonal aesthetics, inspired by the so-called 17th-century "Baroque organ," found expression in the construction of bright-toned, tracker-action instruments. The "new orthodoxy" was enthusiastically assimilated by Casavant Frères and by a number of independent builders in the same region, some of whom had received their training in Europe. Karl Wilhelm, Hellmuth Wolff, André Guilbault and Guy Thérien, Fernand Létourneau, Gabriel Kney, and Gerhard Brunzema were prominent in this movement, and many of them are still in business. Their accomplishments, along with the activities of other known organbuilders of the 1990s, will be described in chronological order, according to their founding dates, in the remainder of this article.5
Casavant is the oldest continuing name in organbuilding in North America. Joseph Casavant (1807-1874), the father of the founders of the company, began his organbuilding career while still a Latin student at a Québec religious college, where he completed an unfinished organ from France with the help of a classic treatise on organbuilding. By the time he retired in 1866, after 26 years in business in Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec, he had installed organs in 17 churches in Québec and Ontario, but none of them survive. His sons, Joseph-Claver Casavant (1855-1933) and Samuel-Marie Casavant (1850-1929), worked for Eusèbe Brodeur, their father's successor, for a few years. They opened their own factory in Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec, in 1879, following an extended tour of western Europe inspecting organs and visiting workshops; Claver had apprenticed briefly with a Versailles builder before the tour. In the early years the Casavant brothers were conservative in their tonal design, emulating the ensemble sound of the kind they had heard in old-world instruments that they had examined during their European tour. But from the outset the brothers were innovators, beginning with improvements in the electric operation of their organs in the 1890s. As their reputation spread beyond the cities and towns of their province, production increased steadily.
The company experienced difficult times in the 1930s due to economic conditions, much standardization, and repetitive tonal design. Production was curtailed during the years of World War II due to a shortage of materials, and the company manufactured many unit organs during this period. Later, new initiatives were undertaken by several imaginative artistic directors who served with the firm between 1958 and 1965: Lawrence Phelps from Aeolian-Skinner in the U.S.A.; and European-trained Gerhard Brunzema, Karl Wilhelm, and Hellmuth Wolff.
Most present-day Casavant organs exhibit a conventional design that retains both symphonic and modern elements in subtle synthesis. Casavant organs are recognized for their special tonal qualities and the way the individual stops are blended together into a chorus at all dynamic levels. Time-tested actions include tracker, electrically operated slider windchests, and electro-pneumatic (since 1892; tubular-pneumatic was last used in the mid-1940s). The company workshop has eight departments: metalworking, woodworking, mechanism, consoles, painting, racking, voicing, and assembly. Virtually all components are made in the workshop, including all flue and reed pipes (to 32-foot-length), reed shallots, windchests, consoles, keyboards and pedalboards, and casework, although specialized wood carving and gilding are done by outside artisans. A few electrical components, such as blowers, power-supply units, electromagnets, solid-state combination and coupling systems, and hardware, are purchased from world-wide suppliers. All visual designs are coordinated with their intended surroundings; there are no stock designs. Organs are completely assembled for rigorous testing and playing in preparation for on-time delivery.
The company resumed the construction of tracker-action instruments in 1961 after a lapse of about 55 years, producing 216 such organs since that date. By the end of 1998 the total output amounted to 3,775 organs of all sizes, and many of these have received enthusiastic testimonials from renowned recitalists over the years. Although sales were limited mainly to North America until World War II, Casavant organs now have been installed in churches, concert halls, and teaching institutions on five continents. The firm's largest instrument is a five-manual, 129-stop organ with two consoles installed in Broadway Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Texas, in 1996. The great majority of the very large instruments have been installed in locations in the United States; the exception is the four-manual, 75-stop organ in Jack Singer Concert Hall, Calgary Centre for the Performing Arts, in 1987. The company also engages in renovation projects and additions to existing organs.
The key personnel include Pierre Dionne, President and Chief Operating Officer (from 1978), formerly Dean of Administration at the Business School of the University of Montréal; Stanley Scheer, Vice-President (1984), formerly Professor of Music and Head of the Department of Fine Arts at Pfeiffer University, Misenheimer, North Carolina, holds a Master of Music degree in organ performance from Westminster Choir College, Princeton, New Jersey; Jean-Louis Coignet, Tonal Director (1981), a professionally trained physiologist with a doctorate from the Sorbonne, contributor to music journals, the most knowledgeable authority on the work of Cavaillé-Coll today, was formerly organ expert for the City of Paris; Jacquelin Rochette, Associate Tonal Director (1984), formerly Music Director of Chalmers-Wesley United Church, Québec City, holds a Master's degree in organ performance from Laval University, performs regularly on CBC radio, and has recorded works by several French composers for organ; Denis Blain, Technical Director (1986), with many years of practical experience in virtually all aspects of organbuilding, is in charge of research and development; Pierre Drouin, Chief Engineer, holds a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Laval University, introduced computer-assisted drafting, and supervises the design and layout of each organ. In 1998 the company had 85 full-time employees, many with more than 30 years of service with the company. All levels of management and production personnel function as a team.
The company was established in 1945 in London, Ontario, by Bert Keates (he came from England in his infancy) and relocated to Lucan, Ontario, in 1950. When it was incorporated in 1951 the assets of the Woodstock Pipe Organ Builders (formerly Karn-Warren) were purchased. The company moved to Acton, Ontario, in 1961, a more central location in the province. In 1969 the growing firm took over the business of the J. C. Hallman Company, a manufacturer of electronic instruments and pipe organs, when it discontinued making pipe organs (but not parts for them). For several years some organs were manufactured under the name of Keates-Hallman Pipe Organs.6 The company moved to Guelph, Ontario, in 1994.
Dieter Geissler was born in Dittelsdorf, Saxony, Germany, where he began his trade as a cabinetmaker. At the age of 14 he commenced his apprenticeship with Schuster & Sohn, Zitau, where he remained from 1946 to 1950. In 1951 he moved to Lübeck, West Germany, where he worked as a voicer with E. Kemper & Sohn for five years. In 1956 he moved to Canada to join Keates's staff. When Keates retired at the end of 1971 Dieter Geissler became president of the firm, which he purchased in 1972, and adopted the present company name in 1982. His son, Jens Geissler, joined the company in 1978.
Keates-Geissler organs are offered in all types of action and are custom built to any required size. Altogether, 147 new organs7 have been installed at locations in Canada, the United States (about 15), and Barbados, West Indies. The output includes a number of four- and five-manual instruments; the largest is a five-manual, 231-stop organ, installed in the First Baptist Church, Jackson, Mississippi, in 1992 (a compilation of its original 1939 E. M. Skinner instrument, a 1929 five-manual Casavant organ removed by Keates-Geissler in 1986 from the Royal York Hotel, Toronto, and some additional structures by the company). The firm has undertaken a substantial number of renovation, rebuilding, and reinstallation projects over the years, about 1,500 altogether, about 75 of these in the United States.
All wooden pipes are made in the factory, but metal pipes are made by Giesecke or Laukhuff in Germany to the company's scaling specifications; preliminary voicing is done in the factory before final voicing on-site. The windchests of electro-pneumatic instruments feature Pitman-chest action that includes some unique features to overcome the effects of extremes in temperature and humidity; the company is the only such manufacturer in Ontario and one of a few in Canada. Expandable electronic switching systems are designed and made in the factory from readily available components to facilitate replacement. Solid-state switching and multiple-memory combination actions are also manufactured. Console shells are handcrafted from solid wood in the factory; tracker touch is an available option. Keyboards are custom made to the company's specifications by Laukhuff, Germany, and blowers are acquired mainly from the same company. The company had four full-time employees in 1998; other part-time workers are hired as needed.
Guilbault-Thérien, Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec (1946)
This company originated with the Providence Organ Company, established in Saint-Hyacinthe in 1946. The partners, André Guilbault, whose father Maurice Guilbault had worked for Casavant, and Guy Thérien, a voicer from Casavant, joined forces in 1968 when the elder Guilbault retired. The present company name was adopted in 1979. When André Guilbault retired in 1992, Alain Guilbault (no relation) acquired an interest in the company.
At the outset the company manufactured electro-pneumatic instruments, but built its first mechanical-action instrument (Opus #1 in a new series), a two-manual, 7-stop organ, in 1970, immediately followed by several small one- and two-manual instruments. From 1974 onward the typical instruments were medium-size, two-manual organs. Larger instruments of three or four manuals began to appear with greater frequency after 1983, the largest being a four-manual, 45-stop organ installed in Grace Church, White Plains, New York, in 1989, the only installation in the United States to that time. While the tonal layout of the organs is mainly inspired by European sources, mainly French, the swell divisions of the larger instruments are sufficiently versatile to handle symphonic literature.
The output of new organs was about 55 to 1998, mainly in Québec and Ontario. The company's work has also involved the restoration and reconstruction of a similar number of Québec organs, mainly by Casavant, but including some of historical significance that are over a hundred years old by such early builders as Napoléon Déry and Louis Mitchell.
Several compact discs featuring performances by Québec organists on instruments manufactured by the company, or on reconstructed historical Casavant instruments, have been released in the past decade.8
The company was established by Chris Houthuyzen in Woodstock, Ontario, a town with a continuing tradition of organbuilding. The founder served his apprenticeship and received further training in The Netherlands before coming to Canada. Small to medium-sized instruments, employing electro-pneumatic action, are the company's specialty, with a contemporary emphasis on the guiding principles of Dutch organbuilding. A total of 119 installations have been completed over the years; the largest was a four-manual, 58-rank instrument. Wooden pipes are made in the shop, but most metal pipes come from suppliers in the United States; their scaling is dictated by the acoustics and intended use of the organ. Chests, reservoirs, ducting, consoles, and casework are manufactured on the premises. Much of the company's work involves rebuilding and maintaining organs, as well as the installation and servicing of church bells, including cast and electronic carillons on behalf of the Verdin Company, Cincinnati, Ohio. The company had three employees in 1998.
Gabriel Kney was born in Speyer, Germany; his father was a master cabinetmaker and amateur bassoonist, and his mother was a singer. He served his apprenticeship in organbuilding with Paul Sattel in Speyer (1945-1951), where he assisted in the restoration of historic, sometimes war-damaged, instruments, along with new organ construction. Since the era was a time of transition from the "Romantic" style of organbuilding to the concepts of Orgelbewegung, this trend provided him with the opportunity to learn about and participate in the building of organs of both concepts. Concurrently he was a student of organ literature, liturgical music, harmony, and improvisation at The Institute of Church Music in the same city.
He emigrated to Canada in 1951 and joined the Keates Organ Company in Lucan, Ontario, as an organbuilder and voicer. In 1955 he was co-founder, with John Bright, of the Kney and Bright Organ Company in London, Ontario, with the intention of specializing in tracker instruments. The timing was premature, for only a few musicians and teaching institutions found such instruments of interest; with the exception of two teaching organs of tracker design supplied to a college in the United States, most of the early organs were requested to have electric key action. In 1962 Gabriel Kney established his own company in London, Ontario, where, with enlarged facilities and a staff of six to eight, he specialized in mechanical-action instruments. Organs from the period between 1962 and 1966 were designed in the historic manner of Werkprinzip, with organ pipes enclosed in a free-standing casework and separated into tonal sections. The tonal design of smaller instruments followed 18th-century North European practices, with some tuned in unequal temperaments of the period.
Altogether, his shops produced 128 organs since 1955; the largest in Canada being the four-manual, 71-stop, tracker-action instrument with two consoles in Roy Thomson Hall, Toronto. Since the early 1970s almost three-quarters of the installations were in locations in the United States, several of these in large universities. Occasionally maintenance and historic instrument restoration projects were undertaken.
Wooden pipes were made in the shop, with the exception of very large pipes made to specifications by suppliers in the United States, England, or Germany. Metal pipes also were made to order by independent pipemakers in Germany or Holland. Some console components, such as keyboards, were obtained from suppliers in the United States, England, or Germany. Electric switching devices came from the United States in earlier years, later from England. Blowers were imported from Laukhuff in Germany, Meidinger in Switzerland, or White in the United States. All casework and chest construction was done in the shop.
In 1996 Gabriel Kney retired from active organbuilding and closed his company. Since then he has acted as a consultant to churches seeking advice on organ purchase, restoration, and tonal redesign, and sometimes to other organbuilders.
Karl Wilhelm was born in Lichtenthal, Rumania, and grew up in Weikersheim, Germany. At the age of 16 he entered apprenticeship with A. Laukhuff, Weikersheim (1952-1956), followed by working experience with W. E. Renkewitz, Nehren/Tübingen (1956-1957), and Metzler & Söhne, Dietikon, Switzerland (1957-1960). After moving to Canada, in 1960 he joined Casavant Frères, where he established the department and trained several employees for the production of modern mechanical organs; while there he was responsible for the design and manufacture of 26 organs. In 1966 he established his own firm, first in Saint-Hyacinthe, then moved to new facilities in Mont Saint-Hilaire, near Montréal, Québec, in 1974. For a while he was assisted by Hellmuth Wolff, now an independent builder (see below).
Karl Wilhelm specializes in building mechanical organs of all sizes, 147 to date, of which 69 are located in the United States and two in Seoul, Korea. Of the total output, 43 are one-manual instruments, 93 are two-manual instruments of medium size, and 11 are three-manual instruments--the largest is a 50-stop instrument in St. Andrew's Presbyterian Church, Toronto, installed in 1983. Two have detached consoles, and four have combination actions with electric stop-action; all instruments have mechanical key action. The design and layout of instruments adhere to the principles of the classical tradition of German and French organbuilding. Three-manual instruments feature a large swell division, suitable for the performance of Anglican Church music and the Romantic repertoire.
All wooden pipes are made on the premises, along with almost one-half of the metal pipes that are handmade of a tin-lead alloy; other metal pipes are imported from Germany. Scaling and voicing are done in the classical open-toe manner for natural speech and mellow blend. Windchests and bellows, consoles and action, and cases are manufactured in a 9,000 sq. ft. workshop. Organs may have cases of contemporary design, or perhaps are more ornate with moldings and hand-carved pipe shades that are compatible with the architecture of the location. Blowers are acquired from Laukhuff, Germany; miscellaneous parts come from other suppliers. The firm does not engage in rebuilding or renovation but services and tunes its own instruments throughout North America. In 1998 the firm had five employees, all trained by Karl Wilhelm.
Hellmuth Wolff was born in Zurich, Switzerland. While a teenager he apprenticed with Metzler & Söhne, Dietikon, Switzerland (1953-1957); in his spare time he built his first organ, a four-stop positiv instrument. He received additional training with G. A. C. de Graff, Amsterdam (1958-1960) and with Rieger Orgelbau, Schwarzach, Austria (1960-1962). In the United States (1962-1963) he worked with Otto Hofmann, in Austin, Texas, and Charles Fisk, in Gloucester, Massachusetts. After moving to Canada he worked with Casavant Frères (1963-1965) in its newly established tracker-action department, and then with Karl Wilhelm (1966-1968), with whom he had worked at Casavant. In the interval 1965-1966 he returned briefly to Europe to work as a designer and voicer with Manufacture d'orgues Genève, in Geneva. Besides playing the piano and singing in choirs wherever he went, he completed his musical training by taking organ lessons with Win Dalm in Amsterdam and later with Bernard Lagacé in Montréal.
In 1968 he opened his own business in Laval, Québec, with one employee; his present associate, James Louder, started his apprenticeship with Hellmuth Wolff in 1974, after training in classical guitar and English. The first large project undertaken in that year was the construction of a three-manual, 26-stop instrument at the Church of St. John the Evangelist, New York City; this was one of the city's first modern tracker-action organs and it incorporated features not yet seen in North America. In 1977 the company moved to a new shop; the firm became incorporated in 1981, and James Louder became a partner in 1988.
Hellmuth Wolff has been part of the Organ Reform in North America since the movement came to this continent in the early 1960s. He specializes in mechanical-action instruments, large and small, whose design is inspired by French or German classical traditions, although other styles are represented that are designed to accommodate a wide range of organ literature. A total of 42 organs have been manufactured; about one-half of these were installed in locations in the United States. While a few small residence or practice instruments have been built, the majority are two-manual organs, in addition to eight three-manual organs, and one four-manual, 50-stop/70-rank instrument installed in Christ Church Cathedral, Indianapolis, Indiana, in 1989.9 Other related activities include rebuilding, restoration, and maintenance work, chiefly in the Montréal area.
Wooden pipes are made on the premises, while metal pipes are acquired from several pipemakers in Canada, U.S.A., and Europe; some reeds are made there, also. Windchests, consoles, and cases are also manufactured on site. Blowers are acquired from Meidinger and Laukhuff in Germany. Several installations feature both mechanical stop-action and capture systems; the first was built in 1977 for the Eighth Church of Christ, Scientist, in New York City; it was probably the first such system in North America. Both sequencers and traditional multilevel capture systems are used. There were eight employees in 1998.
Hellmuth Wolff, along with his associate, James Louder, have contributed to symposiums and written publications on organs and organbuilding.10 Fourteen compact discs, featuring performances by Canadian and American artists on Wolff instruments, have been released, and three others are in preparation.11
Gerhard Brunzema was born in Emden, Germany, and grew up in Menden on the Ruhr river, a northern part of the country where there was an abundance of historic organs. After World War II he apprenticed with Paul Ott in Göttingen and worked with him as a journeyman organbuilder (1948-1952). He received extensive technical training, including acoustics, at the Brunswick State Institute for Physics and Technology (1953-1954), and received a Master's degree in organbuilding in 1955. In 1953 he joined the prominent European organbuilder Jürgen Ahrend in the construction and restoration of organs, some in Holland and Germany of great historical significance; this association continued for 18 years. After emigrating to Canada he joined Casavant Frères in 1972 and served as artistic director until 1979; during that time he was responsible for the design of several notable organs in Canada, the United States, Japan, and Australia, along with the restoration of a number of historic Casavant instruments in Ontario and Québec. His experience at Casavant gave him the opportunity to work with very large organs, an experience that was lacking in Germany.
In 1979 he established his own business in Fergus, Ontario. Throughout his career he specialized mainly in small, one-manual, four-stop, continuo organs (25 in all); most of his nine two-manual instruments--the largest was 25 stops--were made between 1985 and 1987. In 1990 he was joined by his son, Friedrich, who had completed his apprenticeship in Europe. Until the time of his death in 1992, Gerhard Brunzema's total output amounted to 41 instruments; of these, 20 were installed in Canadian locations (mainly in eastern provinces), 17 in the United States, one in the Philippines, one in South Korea, and two in European countries. The tonal design of his instruments was strongly influenced by Schnitger organs that he had studied and restored while in Europe. He believed that basic organ design cannot be learned through restoration work, because such instruments were conceived by others; nevertheless, in restorations the intentions of the original builders should be respected. As for new instruments, his philosophy was that "An organbuilder should choose a style and stay with it, so that he not only continues to develop his own skills, but also continues to help improve the skills of the people working for him. . . . Become a master of one thing, get over the initial difficulties very quickly, and then polish your knowledge, the details of which will finally add up to a very good result."12
Adrian Koppejan was born in Veenendaal, Holland, and apprenticed with his father, who was an organbuilder there. He worked with Friedrich Weigle in Echterdingen by Stuttgart, Germany (1963-1966), with Pels & Van Leeuwen in Alkmaar, Holland (1968-1972) as shop foreman of the mechanical organ department, and with his father's company, Koppejan Pipe Organs, in Ederveen, Holland (1968-1972). He moved to Canada in 1974 and established his own company five years later.
Adrian Koppejan strives for a clear, warm, but not loud sound in his instruments, a preference inspired by classical organs of North Germany. This sound palette is reflected in the instruments in which he specializes: small and medium-size tracker instruments; he has built five electromechanical organs, as well. His output to date consists of 19 organs; these have been installed in churches and private residences in British Columbia, Alberta, and Washington state. His largest organ is a three-manual, 31-stop, electromechanical instrument, with a MIDI system, installed in the Good Shepherd Church, White Rock, B.C., in 1995. An instrument of similar size was constructed in 1998. Rebuilding, restoration, maintenance, and tuning are also part of regular activities.
Wooden pipes are mostly acquired from Laukhuff, Germany; metal pipes come from Stinkens in Holland and Laukhuff in Germany. Keyboards are made in Germany by Laukhuff or Heuss. Winding mechanisms, consoles, solid oak cabinets, and casework are manufactured in the shop. Blowers are supplied by Laukhuff, and electrical control systems come from Peterson in the U.S.A. There were two part-time employees in 1998 as Adrian Koppejan reduced the scope of his operations in anticipation of retirement.
Fernand Létourneau was born in Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec, where he worked for while as a carpenter before entering employment with Casavant Frères in 1965; there he apprenticed with his uncle, Jean-Paul Létourneau, who was head reed voicer. He remained with the company for 14 years, where he was head voicer from 1975 to 1978, when he decided to set up his own independent company. First, with the help of a Canada Council grant, he embarked on an organ tour of Europe to study the voicing of old masters. Upon his return to Canada in 1978 he began building organs in Sainte-Rosalie, Québec, and became incorporated in 1979. His first organ, a two-manual, 6-stop instrument, was started in the basement of the family house and then displayed in the shop of a cabinetmaker; it was later acquired by the Conservatoire de Musique du Québec, Hull, where dozens of students have learned to play the organ on this small instrument. In 1984 he moved back to Saint-Hyacinthe, where three other organbuilders were already established. The factory's first building was formerly a municipal water-filter plant; the partially underground space provided a room 35 feet in height, ideal for erecting organs. A second industrial building was acquired recently to supplement the original premises.
A total of 55 organs of various sizes have been built to 1998; 13 others are in progress. The great majority have mechanical action, utilizing classical principles used in European instruments, and with the flexibility provided by ranks inspired by Dom Bédos, Schnitger, and Cavaillé-Coll. The largest will be a four-manual, 101-stop, mechanical-action instrument intended for the Francis Winspear Centre, Edmonton, Alberta. International distribution has been common from the outset, beginning with three early instruments that were installed in Australian locations in the early 1980s (the builder had become known on account of his activities as a voicer of Casavant instruments in that country). Others have been placed in New Zealand, Austria, England (Pembroke College, Oxford, 1995; an instrument is under construction for the Tower of London for completion in late 1999), the United States (over one-third of the total production), and Canada (chiefly eastern provinces, a few in the west). The company now has permanent representatives in the United States, England, and New Zealand. Fernand Létourneau prefers to build instruments of eclectic tonal design that are suitable for the performance of a wide range of organ literature. Historic restorations have also been undertaken.
All organ components, with the exception of electronics, are made in the factory, including wooden and metal pipes to 32-foot length, keyboards, consoles, and casework. Blowers are acquired from Laukhuff, Germany. Middle-size organs are equipped with electronic sequencers, card readers, and similar devices. The company is constantly engaged in rebuilding and restoring instruments of different vintages to original condition, about 50 to date, several of which have been designated as historical or heritage instruments. In 1998 there were 45 full-time staff in the Létourneau "family," of which a number are related to one another as father-son/daughter, uncle, brother, cousin, and husband-wife.
Fair Organist--"I am sorry you had to give off blowing for us, Giles."
Giles--"Yes, Miss; the organ don't sound what it did, do it? Jim, the new blower, be a very good chap, but 'e ain't got no music in 'im. Now, we did used to give 'em summat worth 'earin', didn't we, Miss?"
(Winnipeg Town Topics, 28 August 1909.)
The history of organs in Manitoba, Canada, is a neglected aspect of the musical, cultural, and church history of the province. A 45-year period around the turn of the century was the "Golden Age" of the organ in Manitoba. More than one-third of all the known pipe organ installations in the province up to the present occurred in this period, many of them in newly constructed churches. Both the instruments and the recitals played on them were matters of intense public interest. The installation of a new church orgn was not only a matter of pride and celebration on the part of the congregation, but it was also a significant event in the musical life of the community. This article presents a brief chronicle of the organ--the instruments, the builders, and the players--during this period of slightly more than four decades.
Within fifty years after the displaced tenant farmers from the north of Scotland had arrived in Manitoba's Red River district between 1812 and 1814, many of the major religious denominations, now well established, had built their first churches. The first Roman Catholic churches were constructed in 1819 and 1822, followed by a series of cathedrals completed in 1833, 1862, and 1908. The Anglicans, whose religion was brought to the country by missionaries and employees of the Hudson's Bay Company, built their first Church Mission House in 1822, followed by several other churches along the rivers, including St. Andrew's on the west bank of the Red River in 1849 and St. James on the north bank of the Assiniboine River in 1853. Holy Trinity, Fort Garry's first Anglican church, was opened in 1868. The Presbyterians erected Kildonan Presbyterian Church on the northern outskirts of the settlement in 1851; the first Knox Church was established at a more central location in 1868, succeeded by larger buildings on other urban sites in 1884 and 1917. Other Presbyterian congregations constructed places of worship in various sections of the city: St. Andrew's in 1882, Augustine in 1887 and 1904, and Westminster in 1912. The Methodists founded their first mission at Red River in 1868; their first Grace Church was dedicated in 1871, enlarged in 1877, followed by a new building in 1883; the Wesley congregation established their first church buildings in 1883 and 1898. The Congregationalists arrived in 1879 and erected their first church building in Winnipeg in the early 1880s, followed by a second in 1890.1
The place of music in religious worship varied according to the denomination. Music was not readily accepted throughout the country by the Presbyterians, for they did not allow organs or hymns; the only singing was metrical psalms, later supported by a bass viol or flute. This situation continued until 1872, when their General Assembly decided to permit the use of organs.2 In Manitoba some members of the Kildonan Presbyterian Church congregation objected to the introduction of a choir and to the idea of having an organ. In a debate on these issues, one parishioner announced that if an organ were put in the church he would bring around Old Bob, his horse, "and take the 'kist o' whustles' out of the house of the Lord and dump it by the roadside." When the organ eventually was put in, another dissenting member transferred to St. Andrew's mission church, unaware that a small melodeon was used in services there, too. Nevertheless, soon after his daughter was appointed to play the instrument in Kildonan Church he returned there. This repentant parishioner was John "Scotchman" Sutherland, later an elected member of the first Legislative Assembly of Manitoba.3
In Winnipeg, where other religious denominations considered the organ an appropriate aspect of Christian praise, things went more smoothly. Grace Methodist acquired a small reed organ in 1873, and two years later a prominent mill owner presented the Baptist Chapel with a similar instrument.4 Other city churches, as well as those in outlying areas, also purchased reed organs, and they served these congregations for many years.
The reed organ today exists only as a reminder of a bygone era, but it played an important part in the musical life of the community around the turn of the century. In addition to supporting congregational singing in the churches, reed organs were the focus of religious devotions and entertainment in family parlours throughout North America.
It is likely that the first reed organ in Manitoba was not imported but was built here. According to the recollections of an early pioneer, the first organ in St. Boniface Cathedral (the 1833 building destroyed by fire in 1860) was a melodeon made by Dr. Duncan, a medical officer with the regular army. He was "devoted to music and a very ingenious man."5 This may have been the same organ acquired by the Grey Nuns sometime after their arrival at the St. Boniface mission in 1844; later they gave the instrument to the parishioners of the Cathedral. One of the nuns, Sister Lagrave, played Dr. Duncan's organ in the Cathedral, but it was lost in the fire that destroyed the fourth Cathedral in 1968.6
An early imported reed organ, built around 1800 by Trayser & Cie, Stuttgart, Germany, was brought from England through York Factory in the mid-1800s, intended for use in a northern diocese of the Anglican church. During the journey the York boat overturned on the Nelson River, but the organ was recovered and brought south to St. Andrew's, where it was left with a local Sunday school teacher who was also the church choir leader. The organ was designed to be carried by four men using poles looped through metal rings, two on either side of the case; this allowed the organ to be moved to and from nearby St. Thomas Church. This instrument, now nearly 200 years old, is in the museum at St. Andrew's-on-the-Red Anglican Church, near Lockport.
Although nineteenth-century reed organs went under different names, all of them used wind-blown metal reeds to produce the sound. The smaller varieties, called melodeons or cottage organs, were compact, table-sized, semi-portable instruments. The larger versions were called harmoniums, cabinet organs, parlour organs, or pump organs, and their wind supply was produced by dual foot treadles that powered the bellows. Their fancy cases, decorated with ornate mouldings and carvings, made them desirable pieces of furniture in Victorian parlours in both city homes and farm dwellings. Larger church models had as many as 20 drawstops and sometimes pedal keyboards; these required an assistant to pump the bellows handle at one side of the case. Often they were mistaken by the public for pipe organs, since some of them had imitation pipes mounted on top of the case.7
Most of the reed organs in Manitoba churches and homes were built in southern Ontario by a few of the larger companies founded in the 1870s and supplied through their agents or retail outlets in Winnipeg. Before rail connections were established with Eastern Canada, organs were transported across the northern United States to St. Paul, Minnesota, and then north to Winnipeg by river boat. One of the largest manufacturers was the Bell Organ and Piano Company (or the Bell Piano and Organ Company, depending on its priorities); one of their large two-manual, 16-stop reed organs, with "mouse-proof" pedals, was installed in St. Alban's Anglican Church, Oak Lake, around 1890, and it is still in use. Other prominent Ontario makers included the Dominion Organ and Piano Company, the W. Doherty Piano and Organ Company, and the Thomas Organ Company. A large two-manual, 20-stop, Doherty instrument, built around 1904, originally in St. Alban's Anglican Church, Snowflake, is still in regular use in St. Andrew's-on-the-Red Anglican Church.
The T. Eaton Company, Winnipeg's largest retail store, sold several models of cabinet reed organs, made by the Goderich Organ Company, through its mail order catalogues around 1900. The basic "Queen" model, with 5 octaves, 10 stops, and 3 sets of reeds, was $29.50; the top-priced "Empress piano-cased" model, with 6 octaves, 12 stops, and 5 sets of reeds, was $75.00 (the lowest priced piano was $150.00). In 1902 J.J.H. McLean's music store invited the public to informal recitals on an automatic self-playing organ, "The Bellolian."
There was competition from American sources, however. In the mid-1870s Winnipeg newspapers carried advertisements by a dealer in St. Paul, Minnesota, offering pianos and organs to Manitoba residents, free of duty. The Manitoba Music Store in Winnipeg offered instruments by both American and Canadian makers, as well as tuning, repairs, and instruction. Several reed organs from the Estey Company, Brattleboro, Vermont, were supplied to Manitoba churches through a Winnipeg agent in the 1880s; a one-manual, 19-stop instrument, with ornamental pipes, now electrified, is still in use in St. Andrew's-on-the-Red Anglican Church.
A pioneer in Deloraine recalled a large imposing instrument installed in the Presbyterian Church there in 1897. The organ had two manuals and pedals, with ornamental pipes, and was powered by the strong arms of older boys or young men who pumped a heavy handle to inflate the two bellows. She remembered that pumpers earned the reputation of "good pumper" or otherwise. Too much enthusiasm on the part of the pumper made it difficult for the organist to adjust the volume, whereas a "good pumper" had more appreciation for the mood of the music and waited for the signals. One time, during an organ recital, a belt connecting the two bellows broke. The pumper was frantically working the handle, hoping to add more power to the remaining bellows, while the organist was giving signals for more volume, more volume! When the ordeal was over, the pumper was exhausted and drenched with perspiration. That pumper still remembered that occasion vividly at the age of 85.8
A later development of the reed organ was the vocalion, patented in 1872 and first exhibited in 1885, which had a smoother, organ-like tone. It was the instrument of choice for a few churches, but its relatively high cost made it uncompetitive with that of small pipe organs. One organist-critic called vocalions "atrocities." In 1890 McIntosh's Music House in Winnipeg advertised "The Vocalion Organ for Churches, etc; Parlour and Church Organs of every description."
Another variation was a hybrid instrument employing both reeds and pipes to approximate true pipe organ sounds in a less costly instrument. The Compensating Pipe Organ Company, which was in business in Toronto in the early 1900s, offered these instruments to Manitoba purchasers through a Winnipeg dealer, the Grundy Music Company. The company's agent installed a two-manual, 14-stop instrument, with full pedal keyboard, in St. John's Cathedral in 1902, replacing a less powerful model by the same maker:
The St. John's Cathedral is to be congratulated on the installation of its new organ, not only on account of the quality of the instrument, but also on its having been built for the Cathedral in time for the ordination of the new dean.
It is to be conceded that it is a very good thing indeed for churches, large or small, Sunday Schools, concert halls, etc., that it is now brought within their means to obtain a high grade organ, producing genuine pipe organ music, one that takes up less than half the space of any other instrument producing a similar musical result, (thus saving expensive alterations), and one that, as has before been said, can produce such beautiful effects with reeds and pipes, played together, (they can be tuned to each other at any temperament) and one which can be bought for half the price that has hitherto prevailed for instruments of similar volume. Similar musical results have never been produced before.9
Nevertheless, the musical qualities of the organ were not highly regarded by one professional organist: "Compensating organs, of which the less said the better, and which the hearer should be very generously compensated for listening to."10
Although many thousands of reed organs were sold during the peak period of their popularity between 1870 and 1910, their decline in popularity accompanied other innovations in musical entertainment, such as the player piano, the gramophone, and the radio, all of which transferred music appreciation in the home from a participatory activity into a passive one. Few reed organ manufacturers remained in business after 1930, and apart from those few instruments still being played in several rural Manitoba churches, the remaining survivors are collector's items in private homes and museums.
The history of pipe organs in Manitoba is largely a chronicle of events in Winnipeg. An expanding urban population, increasing wealth, the growth of the various religious denominations, and the flowering of musical culture all resulted in the construction of a large number of churches within a relatively short span of time. In the French-Canadian community of St. Boniface, three Roman Catholic Cathedrals had been erected in succession (1822, 1833, 1862) before other denominations began to construct their houses of worship in Winnipeg, on the opposite side of the Red River. The first major boom in church building construction began in the 1880s and extended to about 1915. Many of Winnipeg's largest and finest churches were built in these early years. Since many of the business, political, and community leaders, predominantly Anglo-Saxon in origin, were prominent members of the larger city congregations, they undoubtedly exercised considerable influence on decisions regarding the construction of church buildings, as well as on the installation of organs.
The pattern of organ installations in Winnipeg reflected, but did not exactly parallel, the major periods of construction of church buildings. The greatest number of organ installations in the city occurred between 1900 and 1930. In rural centres most of the early churches did not acquire pipe organs immediately, but used reed organs until they could afford pipe organs at a later date. The frequency of known organ installations during the period under consideration is evident in this summary:
City Rural Total
1875-79 2 2
1880-89 9 1 10
1890-99 6 1 7
1900-09 15 8 23
1910-19 20 3 23
Winnipeg newspapers published reports of the arrival of new organs, along with descriptions of their appearance and mechanical construction, often with complete stoplists. One such account, written by a city organist, assumed a broad educational function by including a lengthy discourse on the place of the organ in church worship, recent mechanical improvements in organ design, and the characteristics of the sound.11
In the 1880s Winnipeg had two or perhaps three organ builders, and it is likely that they were related to one another. The two partners H. W. Bolton and A. B. Handscomb were listed as organ builders in the city in 1883. It was this H. W. Bolton, formerly in Montréal, who submitted an unsuccessful tender in 1884 for the installation of a new organ in All Saints' Anglican Church. There was also Fred W. Bolton, another builder who worked in the city in 1885 and 1886, and Wm. Henry Bolton who was listed as an organ builder only in 1887. In the same year a one-manual, five-stop, pipe organ was installed in the Presbyterian Church, Birtle, Manitoba, by "Messrs. Bolton and Baldwin of Winnipeg." Which of the Boltons was involved in this venture is uncertain. As for the colleague Baldwin, he might have been one of a number of mechanics, fitters, or carpenters working in the city at that time who may have assisted Bolton on a part-time basis. A Bolton pipe organ installed in the Baptist Church, Winnipeg, in 1883 received a brief compliment in the press:
The chief characteristic of the organ is its sweetness of tone. The range of effects is necessarily limited on account of the smallness of the organ, but the delightful mellowness of tone is a great relief from the screaming effects of large and more pretentious instruments.12
Another Bolton organ was installed in Christ Church Anglican, Winnipeg, around 1886, but if any other Bolton organs were installed in Manitoba churches none of them survive, and there is no remaining evidence of the builders' activities in the area. The following sections provide brief accounts of some of the major organ installations in Manitoba in the early years.
The first pipe organ in Manitoba was installed in St. Boniface Cathedral in 1875 by Louis Mitchell, the Montréal builder who accompanied his new instrument across the continent and down the Red River from Moorhead, North Dakota, on the steamboat International. The unloading of the cargo on the St. Boniface side of the river was accomplished with the permission of the customs tax collector at the port of Winnipeg on 14 June 1875; more than fifty men were needed to complete the task.13
A large church organ arrived last Monday on the International for the Cathedral of St. Boniface. It was made in Montréal by Mr. Mitchell, the celebrated organ builder. It is the first church organ imported into the North-West, it is 19 ft high, 12 ft 6 in wide, and 11 ft deep. The case, which is already put up, is in the Grecian style, which is well adapted to the architecture of the Cathedral. The Organ weighs 12,000 pounds and costs over $3,200.
We hear that this new organ will be inaugurated on the 24th inst, upon the occasion of the celebration of St Jean Baptist day, and that there will be in the evening a grand concert at the Cathedral, the proceeds of which will go towards the fund for the completion of the church. All the musicians and artists of the Province will be present on the occasion.14
The organ was the gift of a group of friends of Monseigneur Alexandre Taché in recognition of the thirtieth anniversary of the date of his departure from Québec for the mission at Red River, and of the twenty-fifth anniversary of his appointment as Archbishop of the diocese. At the time of the installation of the organ, about $1,100 had been raised by pupils and associates from the seminary in St. Hyacinthe, Québec. Although the specifications of the organ were not given, the dimensions of the instrument suggest that it may have had about twelve ranks of pipes.
The ultimate destiny of the organ was the first instance of organ recycling. In 1921, when the Cathedral purchased a larger instrument from the First Lutheran Church, Winnipeg, the Mitchell organ was removed and divided into two smaller instruments; one went to a school in St. Boniface, and the other to a mission in Lebret, Saskatchewan, both operated by the Oblate Fathers.15
Holy Trinity Anglican Church acquired its first pipe organ in 1878; it was installed by Samuel Warren & Son, a prominent company in the history of Canadian organ building. Warren, a descendant of one of the passengers on the 1620 voyage of The Mayflower, acquired his technical skills in Boston before emigrating to Montréal in 1836, where he built and repaired organs. The family firm moved to Toronto in 1878 and produced more than 350 pipe organs, along with pianos and other musical instruments, until it was sold to another organ company 1896. The newspaper report of the installation described the instrument in some detail:
The organ is from the establishment of Messrs. S. R. Warren & Son of Montréal and Toronto, and does great credit to that well-known firm. Its price is $3,000, and it is a powerful instrument, containing two rows of keys and full pedale, and twenty-four draw stops. Some of these are of exquisite sweetness, particularly the Claribel Flute, the Viol di gamba, and the Oboe in the swell, and the Dulciana and the Harmonic Flute in the great organ.
The case is of chestnut wood with black walnut facings, and the front pipes are beautifully decorated with fleur de lis, and other ecclesiastical designs, in blue, gold and chocolate color. The top is surmounted with carved pinnacles. The body of the organ is contained in a chamber, built specially for the purpose; the front projecting about two feet into the church on the south side of the reading desk, giving a good view to the congregation of the case and ornamented pipes. Mr. Warren having lately visited the principal organ factories in England, France and Germany, now applies to his instruments all the modern improvements, of which we may specially mention the voicing and tuning of the pipes. The present instrument has been carefully constructed in this respect and its builder has succeeded in giving to its notes a softness and sweetness not always heard even in larger and more expensive organs.16
When Holy Trinity Church moved to a new location in 1884, the Warren organ was relocated and enlarged by the builder. It was claimed that the renovated instrument was the largest west of Toronto. The organ was further enlarged eight years later. In 1912 it was replaced by a large four-manual, 50-stop instrument, manufactured by the Canadian Pipe Organ Company, founded two years previously in St. Hyacinthe, Québec, by some staff of Casavant Frères who had decided to go into business on their own. The new organ was again described as the finest in the Canadian West.
The inauguration of a new organ sometimes was marked not just by the performance of a single recitalist, but by a concert involving the church choir and several soloists. One such concert took place on 20 April 1883, on the occasion of the opening of the new organ at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church. The event was unusual in one respect; the organ builder, Samuel Mitchell of Montréal, was also the featured recitalist. Probably he was related to Louis Mitchell, who had installed the first organ in St. Boniface Cathedral in 1875. The newspaper report covered both the design of the organ and Mitchell's recital:
St. Mary's Church was well filled last night upon the occasion of the inauguration of the new organ by Mr. Samuel Mitchell of Montreal, one of the builders. The organ stands in the gallery just over the main entrance, and presents a very handsome appearance. The case is Moresque in design, and is richly decorated, the arrangement of colors ornamenting the front pipes being most effective.
The chief characteristic of the organ is its powerful tone, the reeds are voiced to a high pressure, and perhaps a little too coarse to suit the sensitive ear, but upon the whole it is well suited to the purpose for which it is intended.
The medley of National airs played by Mr. Mitchell which came after a short intermission, fully demonstrated the capabilities of the instrument. The imitation of the bagpipes greatly amused the audience, and the last expiring croak at the conclusion of "The Campbells are Comin'" elicited the laughter of all. Mr. Mitchell is a very clever manipulator, and the imitation of the fife and drum band was excellent.17
Thirty-five years later, the Mitchell organ was replaced by a new two-manual, 18-stop Casavant instrument. This organ, installed in 1918 at a cost of $3,692, would serve the church for a further forty years before being rebuilt by the same company.
Winnipeg's Victoria Hall, built in 1883 and later renamed the Winnipeg Theatre and Opera House, was the site for many concerts, musical events, and other entertainments in the early years. Some church congregations held services in the Hall before their own buildings were completed. One of the ventures of the Winnipeg Oratorio Society, which performed there, was to provide an organ for this building. The newspaper account of the forthcoming installation in 1884 pointed out that the 11-stop instrument, whose builder was not identified, was intended to be used instead of a string band and would equal an orchestra of about thirty performers.18 The list of stops included many ranks imitative of orchestral instruments: viol di gamba, horn, concert flute, clarionet, flute, piccolo, violin, and bass.
The first pipe organ in Grace Methodist Church was installed by S. R. Warren & Son in 1885, but a few years later it had deteriorated to the point of receiving an ultimate insult: "The organ at Grace church has arrived at that state of perfection when it is difficult to tell it from a circus calliope."19 When a new three-manual, 34-stop organ was installed by R. S. Williams & Son, Oshawa, in 1894, the decrepit instrument was transferred to Westminster Presbyterian Church.
The newspaper account of the new installation consisted entirely of a long discourse on the organ's technical innovations, which were thought to be resistant to Winnipeg's severe climatic changes. Even so, more than half of the report of the opening recital by a Minneapolis organist consisted of a series of observations on the theme that the organ needed "a good shaking down," for an intermittently-sounding pedal note marred the opening selection, and some of the valves were sticking. The instrument tended to go out of tune before the end of the program, perhaps due to a drop in the temperature of the church on the cold December evening. Nevertheless, the voicing was rated as excellent, as were the English-style diapasons and the reeds, some of them imported from France.20
An even more magnificent organ was acquired by the church in 1907: a four-manual, 46-stop instrument built by Casavant Frères, the largest organ in the history of the company to that date. The Casavant brothers, Joseph-Claver and Samuel-Marie, had established their factory in St. Hyacinthe, Québec, in 1879, following several years touring Europe, inspecting organs, and visiting workshops. In the following years their fame spread steadily beyond the towns and cities of Québec. The first Casavant organ in Manitoba was installed in the Parish Church, St. Norbert, just south of Winnipeg, in 1899. During the period under consideration, the company installed eighteen complete instruments in Winnipeg and five in rural towns.
The installation of the new Grace Church organ was celebrated in the evening of New Year's Day 1908 by a concert that included the choir, soloists, and a recital. The newspaper coverage of the event reported that the audience of nearly eight hundred people was delighted with the new "chest of whistles" and with the performance by the organist George Bowles (composer of the operetta, "The Manhaters of Manhattan," a Christmas cantata, and other works, when he was not otherwise occupied as the manager of the Winnipeg's Union Bank), although it was doubted that the ranks of reed pipes would remain in tune due to the severe temperature variations in a church heated by hot air.21
The eventual fate of the Grace Church organ is a unique story in the history of organs in Manitoba. Around 1942 Stuart Kolbinson, then a young man 24 years old, was working with C. Franklin Legge, the Toronto organ manufacturer, servicing a small Winnipeg organ built by a local company, probably Bolton. Legge introduced his assistant to the Grace Church organ, saying,"This will be for sale someday." Legge's prediction proved correct. Although Grace Church was regarded as the mother church of Methodism in the west, the wealthy congregation of the downtown church drifted away into the new city suburbs over the years, and the church building was demolished in 1955 to make way for a parking lot. Kolbinson bought the Casavant instrument for $2,000 and transported it to his prairie farm in the Kindersley district in Saskatchewan, where it was stored for several years. By 1963 Kolbinson had constructed a special building to house the organ, and it was ready to play. As stories of the heritage instrument spread, organists from as far away as Oregon came to try it out. Kolbinson left the farm in 1971 to enter the hotel business in Vancouver, then moved to Victoria, leaving his organ behind at the farm. After selling the farm in 1976, he returned there in 1979 to pack up his organ for the trip to Victoria. Although the organ had remained in an unheated building for several years, it played well except for being a little out of tune. Kolbinson, now retired, built a large extension to his Victoria home, including a bell tower, to accommodate the large instrument. In later years he reflected on his experience:
I have had many difficulties, but it is worth it, and I am sure that after I am gone the organ will still be the pleasure of those who will in the future have care of it. There is no reason why it won't be singing a century from today. . . .
Occasionally I have a visit from someone who knew old Grace Church in its glory days, but as time passes these get fewer as the passing years take their toll. All the clever hands that built [the organ] so well have long since laid down their tools for the last time. All honor to them, who took leather, wood, lead, tin and zinc and fashioned an instrument whose voice shall always sing their praise.22
The earliest known installation of a pipe organ in rural Manitoba was in a small town in western Manitoba; it was made by Bolton, the Winnipeg builder active in the 1880s. This chronicle of events appeared in a report of the state of music in the town at the time:
On his arrival here in 1882 your correspondent found only one miserable little melodeon and two pianos in the whole place. . . . Early in the spring of 1887 the Presbyterians, who had been holding their services in the Town Hall, decided to build a church of their own and succeeded in erecting and opening a very comfortable building by the 19th of June, but not satisfied with this they went a step further and substituted a small but good pipe organ" for the reed organ they had hitherto used. They now claim [incorrectly] to have the only pipe organ in the country west of Winnipeg. It was built by Messrs. Bolton and Baldwin of Winnipeg and is valued at $1000. At present it has only one manual with four stops, viz:--open diapason, stopped diapason, dulciana and principal and a Burdon [sic] set of pedal pipes, it also has a tremolo and swell box. This is just a start, I have no hesitation in saying that in another year or two there will be an addition to it in the way of a "swell organ" which will give them an A 1 instrument for a small church. On the evening of October 29th we opened the organ with a concert and organ recital. . . .
In conclusion I think you will agree with me that this is quite a go-ahead little town. This last year we have built two churches worth $5000, placed a $1000 pipe organ in one of them and subscribed over $200 to a band, all this is a town of less than 3000 inhabitants.23
In 1883 a new site was selected for All Saints' Anglican Church, and within a year services were conducted in the unfinished building. One of the ideals of the founders of this parish was that worship services should place more emphasis on the musical and ritualistic aspects of worship than was customary in Anglican churches in Winnipeg at the time. Accordingly, the nucleus of a substantial organ fund was established by the Ladies' Aid Society in 1884; even the Girls' Guild obtained some money from their activities that they wished to save for the organ. One aspect of the fund- raising activities of the Ladies' Aid Society received strong criticism in this anonymous letter:
Ch. of All Sts. has just been formally opened by the Bishop of Ruperts Land. 2 things in connection with the church and its opening are public property, and neither is creditable to those concerned. . . . [One] matter is the illegal, immoral lottery which the church is sanctioning for the benefit of the organ fund. A bed quilt or something of the sort is to be gambled for, the proceeds of the swindle to go to the church. All Saints Church is improperly named, it should be called All Sinners. To expect true Christianity in a fashionable church seems as absurd as to expect to find decency in a monkey house.24
Three builders submitted tenders for the proposed organ: H. W. Bolton, S.R. Warren & Son, and Casavant Frères. The successful applicant was Warren, who berated Bolton in several letters to church officials, referring to another organ that Warren had been asked to rebuild:
We are aware that there is a builder in Winnipeg but we should think that your congregation would hardly care to take the risk of entrusting the work to a man who has made so many disgraceful failures as the Queen's Hall organ in Montréal and in fact everything he has attempted.25
The decision on the organ was deferred until the debt on the church building was paid off. Finally, the new instrument was installed in 1891 and duly reported in the press:
Mr. Shaw of Messrs. Warren & Son, Toronto, is in the city placing the new organ in All Saints' Church, built by his firm, in position. The instrument has been carefully planned and the stops chosen for balance of power and variety of tone. It has two manuals with five stops on each and provision for two more on the swell and one on the great. Artistically, it will be a great improvement to the church, the front bracketed out into the chancel, projecting about two feet,. and the pipes are tastefully decorated.26
During the war years 1914-17 it was decided that a new pipe organ would provide a fitting war memorial, and a committee was formed:
The result of this committee's work was the placing of an order with Messrs. Casavant Frères of Québec, the well-known manufacturers, for a new pipe organ at a price of $8,344 to be delivered in July 1917 . . . and it is pleasant to relate that the Ladies' Aid Society again came to the front and very generously offered to meet each installment of $500 with interest as the same matured. The organ was duly installed as a memorial to the men of All Saints' who fell in the war and was dedicated on Sunday the 16th September 1917, the Church being crowded. The old organ was at the desire of the Ladies' Aid Society presented to the Congregation of St. Alban's Church in the City of Winnipeg.27
This article will be continued.
Christoph E. Hänggi studied musicology, arts and history in Basel and Zürich (Ph.D.), later obtaining his Executive Master in Corporate Management. He is a member of the Swiss Musicology Society and was from 1990 to 1992 Head of Music for a classical radio station in Switzerland. From 1993 to 2003 he worked for the Bertelsmann Music Group (BMG), where he became Director International of a BMG Classics label in Munich. In June 2003 he was appointed Director of the Museum der Musikautomaten in Seewen SO, which is under the aegis of the Swiss Federal Office for Culture.
David Rumsey studied organ in Australia, Denmark, France and Austria. He rose to a senior lectureship in the Australian university system from 1969–1998, also pursuing an international teaching, concert and consulting career as an organist. He worked in various cross-disciplinary fields, especially linking broadcasting, drama and music, arranging a number of major presentations and seminars. In 1998, after mounting a 14-hour spectacle on the life of Bach with actors in period dress and musicians playing historic instruments, he left Australia and settled around 2002 in Basel, Switzerland, where he continues to work as an organist and consultant.
Background
The Welte Company was a German firm, first established in 1832 at Vöhrenbach (in the Black Forest) by automata manufacturer Michael Welte (1807–1880). About 1865 he moved to Freiburg im Breisgau and registered there as M. Welte & Söhne. During the remainder of the 19th century, the firm expanded considerably and became particularly noted for its orchestrions. In 1904 Edwin Welte (1876–1958, grandson of the founder) invented the Vorsetzer, and from that By 1909 a recording organ had been built for Welte’s studios in Freiburg. The Philharmonie was displayed in November 1911 at the Turin Exhibition in Italy. Welte successfully went on to market player organs, cinema organs, cinema player organs and, later, when that market contracted during the 1930s, church organs. They issued punched paper roll recordings dated between 1912 and 1930 of performances by the great organists of the day, and sold them with considerable commercial success. From 1865–1917 they also ran a branch in New York (M. Welte & Sons) under Emil Welte (1841–1923, eldest son of the founder), but it was closed during World War I as an “alien enterprise.” Edwin Welte’s sister, Frieda, married Karl Bockisch (1874–1952), who was active in the firm from 1893 onwards. He later assumed a leading role and became a partner.
Player organs became status symbols of the rich. They were the epitome of home entertainment in their day and, along with orchestrions, were manufactured in both Europe and the USA by a number of specialist firms. Welte instruments were installed in homes, palaces, schools, department stores and one was apparently even in a luxurious “house of pleasure” (the Atlantic Garden orchestrion). Apart from Europe and the USA, Welte’s market is known to have extended to Turkey, Russia, China and Sumatra. The Sumatran instrument was broken up and lost in 1985.
Around 1926 Welte began to be threatened by a rapidly growing radio and recording industry. Business declined so much that in 1932 the firm only narrowly escaped bankruptcy. At this time they were also engaged in a collaboration with the Telefunken Company involving the development of electronic organs, using analog sampling, glass plates and photo-cells. It was a prophetic development for that time. The collaboration had to be terminated because Edwin Welte’s first wife, Betty Dreyfuss, was Jewish. Had Welte been successful, they might well have eliminated the Hammond organ from the pages of history.
World War II finally precipitated the total demise of the firm. Apart from being blacklisted by the Nazis, the Freiburg premises—all but a few scraps of stock, instruments and historical documents—were annihilated by Allied bombing in November 1944. The ruined Welte factory was something of a landmark next to the Freiburg railway station until the mid-1950s. No trace of it remains today—a housing estate replaced it.
Time lines
1902–3
Olympic and Titanic were first planned. Orchestrions and other mechanical musical instruments had long been available.
1908
December 16: Olympic’s keel was laid.
1909
Welte’s first Philharmonie recording organ was built in their Freiburg studios.
March 31: Titanic’s keel was laid.
1910
October 20: Olympic was launched.
1911
May 31: Titanic was launched; Olympic was delivered to the White Star Line.
November: the Philharmonie was publicly demonstrated at the Turin exhibition and the company’s order book opened.
November 30: Britannic’s keel was laid.
1912
April 1: Titanic’s trials first were scheduled.
April 15: Titanic’s sinking.
Work ceased on Britannic pending the Titanic inquiry, after which some changes to design were made, mainly safety items.
Welte first made their Philharmonie available in a range of specific models.
1913
Welte consolidated their organ designs, including modifications to their 1909 Freiburg recording organ, possibly on advice from Edwin Lemare (Kurt Binninger, 1987). Variant models became available in the same year, including the largest, as represented by the Seewen instrument, whose specification well matches the Freiburg recording organ of 1909. Manufacture began in earnest. This gave ample time to build Britannic’s organ. Since work on the ship was delayed, even more time became available.
1914
February 26: Britannic was launched and her fitting-out begun.
July 28: beginning of World War I.
August: the ship became subject to requisitioning by the Admiralty; work was again “slowed.”
1915
May: mooring trials were undertaken; Britannic was on standby for military service.
November 13: Britannic was officially requisitioned as a hospital ship and fitted out accordingly.
December 11: Britannic sailed to England and entered service on the 23rd.
1916
November 21: Britannic hit a German mine and sank off the Greek island of Kea (Tzia) in the Aegean Sea.
The Seewen Britannic organ
Until recently it was unclear exactly when the organ now preserved at the Museum für Musikautomaten was originally built. The museum contains a major collection dedicated to mechanical musical instruments and musical automata, and is located at Seewen, Switzerland (http://www.landesmuseen.ch/e/seewen/index.php). 1912–1920 were the considered limits since such instruments had only just come out of their development stages in 1912, and the Seewen instrument was definitely known to have existed by 1920. Internal evidence such as specification, roll formats, pipe construction, comparison with similar instruments and known availability led us to moot a dating of about 1913 as most likely.
It is a variant of Welte’s “Grundmodell V–VI,” having a two-manual and pedal console with stop tabs and a roll-mechanism for automatic playing. From 1920 it is well documented. However, signposts to its pre-1920 history turned up in the course of restoration work during March 2007. In cleaning some normally unseen wooden beams around the original windchests, the word “Britanik” was found inscribed in four places. By late May 2007, more inscriptions were found, bringing the total to six.
The console is not, or not completely, original. An earlier console would naturally have been modified or even replaced in 1920 or 1937 when the organ was slightly enlarged. The present console, however, gives the impression of having re-utilized at least some of the earlier components.
Organs aboard ships
During the mid-19th century, beginning with calliopes, keyboard musical instruments increasingly came to be featured on the river boats, yachts and ocean liners of Europe and North America. Jules Verne’s 1869–70 novel Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea contains a reference to Captain Nemo playing a pipe organ installed on his ship Nautilus. From fiction to fact took a little time. Harmoniums and grand pianos were featured in such vessels as the Cunard line’s Campania and Lucania (both 1893). Campania even had false pipes arranged, as was sometimes the custom with harmoniums, to make it look like a pipe organ. The race for luxurious on-board musical entertainment was gradually intensified. It became a serious pursuit in the greatest luxury liners of the early 20th century. In their catalogue of c1913–14, Welte identified and illustrated a number of piano and organ installations, including player pianos such as the Welte-Mignon, aboard yachts and ships. Their New York branch installed at least one orchestrion, “operated by electric motor,” aboard the Pocahontas, an American river boat.
But the largest of ships’ organs was destined to be the Britannic’s organ. Others, mainly on vessels of the White Star Line or Lloyds, but including some private yachts such as Howard Gould’s steam yacht, “Niagara,” which also featured a Philharmonie, are well chronicled in these catalogues. The Aeolian company was also involved in ships’ organs. Documents exist showing that the Britannic was originally intended to have a player organ from Aeolian.
Of the White Star Line’s three great “Olympic” class ships—Olympic, Titanic and Britannic—there is neither evidence nor suggestion that Olympic ever had an organ. With the later ships, however, there are different stories to be told.
Titanic
On-board entertainment was an important item in the inventory of luxuries aboard these ocean liners. Titanic had no less than four uprights and one grand piano. In the light of this, oft-repeated suggestions that “an organ” was planned, built, or even installed aboard Titanic, cannot be ignored. There are said to be survivors’ reports of an organ that “played” (Internet Site 1—see below). The detail is vague and the report is seriously questioned. If it has any credibility at all, then we might extract from it that “played” might suggest an orchestrion aboard. It does not discredit other reports, although a second instrument aboard is highly unlikely and has never been suggested. If an organ was installed, then it now lies with the wreck and all claims of a surviving instrument “built too late” are completely errant.
There is an interesting consistency in perpetuation of a belief that the Titanic’s organ was not completed in time for the voyage. A number of collections in North America and Europe possess orchestrions claimed to be “built too late to share the ship’s fate.” Certainly, if there is any element of truth in this, then it was probably an orchestrion. These were available for decades before Titanic was conceived. The Deutsches Musikautomatenmuseum at Bruchsal in Germany has one. It is sometimes claimed that an undated letter from Ilse Bockisch (widow of Karl, his second wife, married in 1932) associates it with Titanic. The letter leaves many unanswered questions.
Suggestions have been made (Internet Site 1) that a Philharmonie was originally intended for Titanic. Welte’s Philharmonie was not offered for sale until some eight months after Titanic’s launching. A specific model was further out of the question until immediately prior to Titanic’s sea trials. The idea that Welte catalogue illustrations (see later) were of a Philharmonie organ aboard Titanic is thus ruled out by the time lines. The earliest known illustration is from 1913–14, well after Titanic’s sinking. If there is any credibility at all here, then the only possibility was an installation after the maiden voyage.
Most evidence points against an organ or orchestrion ever belonging to Titanic. Expert researchers, such as Günter Bäbler and Mark Chirnside, have looked into this matter exhaustively. Both are emphatically of that opinion.
Britannic
By contrast, evidence for an organ intended for Britannic is overwhelming. There is an interesting existing reference to an Aeolian organ with two chests for music rolls in the Britannic’s specification book. There is no evidence that these plans ever proceeded. Illustrations in Welte’s catalogues are renderings that are so accurate that they appear to be or have been made from photographs. The firm variously identifies them as “Welte-Philharmonie aboard a large English steam ship” and “Welte-Philharmonie aboard S. S. Britannic.” Surviving architects’ sketches, now preserved in the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum, show exactly the same organ case in the stairwell area of Britannic. The ship’s plans allocate this space as “ORGAN.” Seewen’s organ has “Britanik” inscribed in at least six places.
The dimensions of the original Seewen organ have been carefully checked against the ship’s plans. It fits exactly into the space allocated.
Time and space considerations
What was possible? Plans survive for all three ships showing their main stairwell areas. These are virtually identical, except that on Britannic a rectangular space identified with the word “ORGAN” was added, jutting out into the stair area. Any of these three ships could easily have had this modification, but only plans for Britannic include it. A Philharmonie Grundmodell V–VI could have fitted into this space on any of them.
Orchestrions generally take little more ground space than an upright piano. They typically had about 260 pipes, whereas a Philharmonie V–VI could have over 2,000 pipes. Orchestrions and salon organs the size of Bruchsal’s (and the other Titanic claimants seem to be of commensurate size) could have been placed almost anywhere aboard these ships. These would not have required identification in architects’ plans; detailed accommodation plans show nothing of this kind.
Even assuming for a moment that the reports of a Welte Titanic organ were true, which organ was too late? Certainly not one of their mass-produced instruments. Orchestrions, having been in production for years, should either have been in stock or available on very short notice. This meant that delivery of such a salon organ should have been easily achievable. It could not be entirely ruled out that delays in development of the Philharmonie might be the issue here. For what it is worth, Ilse Bockisch’s letter describes a failed attempt to deliver “an organ” to Titanic at Southampton. Her letter leaves open too many questions to be trusted as a basis for firm conclusions in this context.
We must conclude that Jules Verne’s idea was best going to be realized with Britannic.
Discussion points
A Welte catalogue of around 1914 has an illustration captioned “Welte-Philharmonie-Orgel an Bord eines grossen engl.[ischen] Dampfers” (“Welte-Philharmonie aboard a large English steamer”). The vessel is not identified by name. The illustration is very lifelike, although some background detail differs from the known architecture of the ship. Another Welte catalogue from about this time reproduces this but now unequivocally identifies it as “WELTE-PHILHARMONIE-ORGEL auf S. S. Britannic der White Star Line” (“Welte-Philharmonie on the White Star Line’s steam ship Britannic”). (See page 26.) The architect’s sketch in the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum and the Welte illustrations show identical organ casework. These all clearly identify ship, organ, size and placement. They show the casework fully in place. Both captions expressly state that the organ was “aboard.” This suggests its presence behind the case. Since a responsible and proud firm repeated this in at least two catalogues, it can leave no doubt that the organ was a Philharmonie and that it probably was installed. No final proof either way is yet to hand.
Time lines easily allow this. By February 1914 there was ample time to build and transport the organ. By the end of July there was also time to install and remove it. The illustrations appear to have been the property of Welte themselves, so all evidence points to the instrument being at least in preparation for, or process of, installation by summer 1914.
The two-story space near the stairs offered ideal dimensions for an organ the original size of Seewen’s. Britannic’s Philharmonie could easily have been finished in Freiburg by late 1913 and moved to Belfast, arriving sometime between March and July 1914. We do not know whether the main staircase was installed before then. The portrayed roll player hints at a console and possibly the wind apparatus being located underneath, with windchests and pipes on top. The apparent width of the roll in the illustration lines up well with the dimensions of Welte’s Philharmonie V–VI rolls: the paper was 390mm wide and there were flanges on either side.
Welte may well have used a hybrid pneumatic-electric action. The company is reported (Binninger 1987) to have used electric actions in “larger organs” and “where consoles were detached.” Welte had developed electro-pneumatic actions as early as 1885, one of the first firms ever to master this technology. Arguments in favor of a fully pneumatic original action also exist. The two main manuals of the almost contemporary three-manual organ at Tunbridge Wells (see Appendix) are pneumatic. Although it is unclear until 1937, the Seewen organ does appear to have always had a hybrid action. Experts such as Peter Hagmann fully acknowledge this possibility and, having searched, can find nothing to disprove it.
Another photograph, from 1916, shows Britannic fitted out for wartime service. Explanations accompanying this photograph refer to a very basic state of furnishing—just white-painted metallic walls. Woodwork from the stairwell later appeared as collectors’ items. Stored items from the ship were publicly auctioned in Belfast in 1919, and many are still preserved in private ownership. This indicates that the internal outfitting of the ship was probably advancing at the time that possible requisitioning became an issue during August 1914.
Although the Welte catalogues show the roll-playing mechanism, no keyboard is apparent. This might lead to a belief that this instrument was a large orchestrion. However, Welte calls it a Philharmonie. This specifically meant that it had a keyboard. The ship’s plans unequivocally identify its space as “organ.” It is instructive to compare the design with the Welte-Philharmonie at the Salomons Centre, Tunbridge Wells, England. This has pipes above and console below, flanked by pillars. The console is on the inside, screened off from the auditor. It is exactly the arrangement with Welte’s organ for Britannic, only decorative details differ and the specifications are very similar.
Installation aboard Britannic 1914
The overall period during which the organ could logically have been installed was February 26 to late summer 1914. This is far more time than an installation would have required. Britannic’s final requisitioning theoretically allowed until November 1915 for de-installation, although Welte staff could hardly have remained or returned then. We do not yet know if anybody from Welte was in Belfast, so we simply cannot say if installation was proceeding or completed before late July 1914. Welte’s illustrations and captions prima facie support the notion that it was.
If Karl Bockisch was in Ireland for the installation, then he may have had to return quickly to Germany with the imminent outbreak of war. Edwin Welte was pursuing an extremely busy traveling schedule, especially across the Atlantic, although he was known to be “in England” (which could include Northern Ireland) at about this time. In 2005 some missing documentation that might clarify the firm’s travel arrangements came into the possession of Gerhard Dangel of the Augustiner Museum, Freiburg, but it has so far proven inconclusive. There is evidence that the Welte family traveled on the German steamer, the Kronprinzessin Cecilie, in September 1912 (this ship also had a Welte-Mignon piano aboard), but no records have yet been found clarifying the movements of Welte employees. Since they were quite itinerant, we must assume these records are now missing. Further clarification as to whether Bockisch or his team were ever in Ireland seems now dependent on finding something of this kind or from dives to the wreck planned for 2008.
Welte staff would rapidly have found themselves behind enemy lines by July 28, 1914. The inscriptions “Britanik” and “Salomoons” in the Salomons Centre organ at Tunbridge Wells make it clear that Welte identified their clients and organs in this way, a practice already established for their pianos and pneumatic roll player devices.
1917–19
There is a lack of surviving documentation that might indicate the fate of the organ between 1914 and 1919. Since Britannic sank in 1916, the organ could not be returned to her. After the war, in the natural course of events, ownership and other details had to be sorted out. White Star Line—no doubt in some disarray with the loss of two of its three most prestigious ships—had no further use for it. So the instrument (with or without casework) would have been available for sale, presumably around 1919, allowing for decisions, communications and paperwork (and possibly transportation back from Belfast).
There were negotiations between shipping company, state and insurance brokers that lasted until 1919 when final damages were paid and an auction of remaining items took place. The organ, being a part of this, would not have been available for sale until all was finalized. It probably elucidates the timing of its sale in 1920. As far as we can currently ascertain the organ was not mentioned in the inventory of items for auction in Belfast mid-1919. A Steinway piano thought to have been lost with the ship, was found after government compensation for the ship’s loss had been agreed in 1917. It was then offered for sale “as Admiralty property,” after which all traces of it disappear. An organ would have been even more obvious. We can only assume that the organ was not part of the compensation negotiations and therefore was either still or once again in Welte’s possession in Freiburg in 1919.
From 1920 onwards
Around 1920, an organ was sold by Welte to Dr. August Nagel (1882–1943) for his residence. Nagel began a highly successful camera manufacturing business in 1908 that later became the “Contessa” brand. He was a great music lover and lived in a magnificent villa in Stuttgart. In 1926 his business went to the Zeiss-Ikon concern. In 1928, he founded another camera manufacturing company that flourished in spite of hard times. This was taken over by Kodak in 1932. No photographs have yet been located of the instrument in Nagel’s possession. Indeed, the apparent absence of even one photograph of this organ is curious for a camera manufacturer: one reason could be that the organ simply was not visible and had no casework to photograph (see later). It seems that the new owner had two small supplementary windchests built to accommodate some additional stops.
Nagel returned the organ to Welte in 1935 for reasons that are now unclear. In 1937, after work on it in their Freiburg workshop, Welte sold it on to Dr. Eugen Kersting (1888–1958), owner of “Radium GmbH,” an electrical manufacturer. Werner Bosch (1916–92), German organ builder, worked on it as a young employee of Welte’s at the time. It was installed in the Radium Company’s Concert and Meeting Hall in Wipperfürth, Germany. Changes were made at Kersting’s request—mainly two reed ranks added and some interesting but small concessions made to organ reform movement principles. Once again modifications to suit a client were a normal part of Welte’s operation. The original Wienerflöte was replaced by a Harmonieflöte (also by Welte), and somewhat miraculously all pipes of both stops have survived. The Wienerflöte can now be returned to its proper (and original “Britannic”) configuration. There was again no sign of earlier original casework: a simple but elegant wooden grille appeared in Wipperfürth.
Towards the end of World War II, in 1945, water damage occurred as a result of bombing. The instrument survived this quite well and was offered for sale through Werner Bosch during the 1960s. No buyers were forthcoming. In 1961 it was used to make an important LP recording, issued in English-speaking circles as Reger plays Reger. The organ was selected as the best available for this purpose, having a specification capable of closely reproducing organists’ registrations on the original Freiburg recording organ.
By 1969, after the meeting room had been turned into a storeroom and the organ had become an encumbrance, it was to be sold for scrap. Heinrich Weiss-Stauffacher (*1920), who owned a collection of automatic musical instruments that later formed the basis of the Seewen collection, was informed. He acquired the organ at the last minute and, in somewhat dramatic circumstances, packed and moved it carefully to its present home. There, after renovation, its re-inauguration was celebrated on May 30, 1970.
During its removal to Switzerland, Bosch’s experience was critical in ensuring its preservation and proper functioning. He and Basel organ builder Bernhard Fleig helped Weiss with the re-installation and subsequently also its maintenance. Apart from normal wear and tear, the organ has remained in good original condition, with few losses or changes.
The restoration
Years of investigation into these instruments (and submissions from experts and organ builders) began in 1998 with the Seewen organ’s removal and storage while the museum prepared for extensions. These created much needed additional space, partly to properly accommodate and display the organ.
The restoration contract was awarded to Orgelbau Kuhn, Männedorf, in 2006. In early 2007, in the course of restoration, the “Britanik” inscriptions began to show up around the original windchests. The beams were carefully checked to see if they might have belonged to another organ. However, all experts—two highly experienced organ builders, the museum director, its conservator and the organ consultant—independently concluded that the beams and the organ were part of the same original instrument.
Very few relevant Harland and Wolff (shipbuilders of Belfast, Ireland) and essentially no Welte records have survived. However, all evidence overwhelmingly points to the Britannic and Seewen organs being one and the same instrument, little changed in its 90 years of existence. The Britannic’s pipework, windchests, console and possibly the action are all either fully original or have been only slightly modified, overwhelmingly by Welte themselves. The organ’s 1920 and 1937 forms are fully valid Welte configurations, developed out of their Grundmodell V–VI. In the few cases of missing or damaged pipework, replacement has been arranged with surviving original Welte pipework or pipes carefully reconstructed to the firm’s manufacturing methods and standards.
The Seewen/Britannic organ is today probably the most typical, intact and best preserved of its size and kind. So far as is currently known, there is only one other Philharmonie of comparable size, Freiburg manufacture and with tonal resources capable of doing justice to the full-sized rolls (Tunbridge Wells, see Appendix below). The collection of rolls at Seewen—nearly 1,300 of them—is well in excess of any other existing collection currently known.
The fate of the organ’s original casework
Welte’s case designs are not noted for standardization, although stylistically they are mostly consistent with their epoch. Cases and organs are sometimes sold separately. No surviving organs or photos show other Welte instruments with casework in the style of Britannic’s.
Welte also specialized in installations in basements, attics and “adjacent rooms,” the organs speaking through holes in walls or floors. This may well have been the reality with Nagel’s residence and might explain a lot in this connection—e.g., the suitability of an organ on offer without a case and the absence of case photographs. Since the Philharmonie was totally enclosed in a swell-box, façade pipes, where they existed, were always “dummies.”
Was the casework removed with the refit to a hospital ship? The photo of the bare-walled area can but indirectly suggest that it was not there. Simon Mills’s Britannic Foundation, now owners of the wreck, believe that whatever was installed—probably not much—was simply covered up and left in place. Reports of Jacques Cousteau’s divers who went down there in 1976 could point to the organ case still being present. They identified “an organ” and reported “metal organ pipes.” The value of these reports has been questioned—indeed the rendering published by Welte in their catalogues hints at wooden pipes or just simple slats of wood, “pipe look-alikes.” If the Cousteau report turns out to be true, then that could hint that the organ was at least partially installed when hostilities began.
An exhibition in Kiel, Germany in mid-2007 reconstructed the Titanic’s stairwell. Given that the three ships’ designs were essentially identical here, it was clear that the organ could be installed or removed with its façade in place. Being a totally enclosed instrument, the façade was purely decorative. The Britannic Foundation has undertaken more recent dives to the Britannic wreck and is currently planning another for about mid-2008 when currents are favorable. The area where the organ was to be placed will then be very closely investigated.
Effectively, Britannic’s casework has now completely disappeared. It is either, as per the Cousteau hint, barnacle-encrusted some fathoms under the Aegean Sea, or it was destroyed, saved in an unknown location, or broken up for use in other organ façades.
The motor and blower
Speculation of wind-raising using Britannic’s steam power sometimes arises (Internet Site 3). The availability of electric power, and potential evidence of a possibly original blower and electric action argue very strongly against steam. In fact, steam was rarely used as motive power for organ blowing. Even then it was associated more within the period of 1812–85 than the early 20th century.
An old motor and blower has survived with the organ. No dates are evident. The motor is rated at 220 volts DC and was made by Meidinger of Basel. The firm was established in the late 19th century and located not far from Welte in Freiburg. Their records only date back to about the 1960s. From its serial number, we only know that it was certainly made before then. Both motor and blower are being restored as part of the historically conscious approach to the project. It is interesting to observe that it is rated at 220 volts DC and the ship’s electric supply came from four 400 kW steam generators, each providing 100 volts DC. Expert opinion informs us that the voltage difference from running two generators in parallel—sensible electrical engineering with two in parallel and two in series—to provide 200 volts is not critical to the operation of this motor. The organ’s wind supply is designed as a regulated system and virtually never needs the full amount of wind (over-) supplied by the blower. Two experts also independently estimated that the motor itself is “probably early 20th century.” Thus, it is just possible that this motor and/or blower could have come down from the original Britannic installation.
From about 1885, a growing preference for power reticulation using alternating current was beginning to overtake that of direct current. By 1913–1914, AC might normally have been the prime choice for such a motor, but the fact that the ship’s supply was DC must have determined a DC motor. This further supports the possibility that the surviving blowing installation at Seewen could have been that of Britannic.?
Appendix
Seewen and similar known surviving Welte-Philharmonie
player organs
Full 150-note functioning Welte player mechanisms appear to survive in no more than ten organs worldwide. Details are scarce, so only tentative information can be offered as set out below. In the September 2006 issue of Mechanical Music, Durward R. Center published an article entitled “Welte Orchestrions / The Age of Opulence.” In it he reports that only two “fully pneumatic” organs (of an equivalent type to Seewen) still exist. Some of Welte’s organs originally had hybrid pneumatic-electric actions, so the field might be extended slightly in this direction without conflict to the general notion of a “Welte-Philharmonie.” (The term “pneumatic organ” is sometimes used to indicate that a player mechanism was attached; cf. “pneumatic” when used to differentiate action types, e.g., electric, electro-pneumatic, mechanical.) Welte’s Grundmodell V–VI had a basic specification of about 23/II+P (23 stops, two keyboards and pedals). The Freiburg recording organ after 1912–13 was about 28/II+P. A degree of discreet borrowing and extension was normal practice in all of these instruments (and less “discreet” in smaller organs and orchestrions). As far as we are aware, however, of Welte’s full-sized (with 150-note tracker bars) roll-playing organs left in the world today, only about eight seem to be of original Freiburg manufacture.
Seewen
The Seewen basic specification after 1937 is 37/II+P. (With retention of both Harmonieflöte and Wienerflöte, the 2007 specification became 38/II+P). This includes extended and borrowed ranks normal to Welte practice. Stop nomenclature is German; the stop-tabs are uniform and fit comfortably across the top of the keys, although some of the new stops added have been placed out of sequence to the right of the earlier stop-tabs. This suggests that the basic console dates from earlier and was only modified in 1937. A collection of about 1,300 rolls is associated with this organ. Organists include Harry Goss-Custard (150 rolls), Edwin Lemare (87), J. J. Nater (84), Paul Mania (76), Kurt Grosse (58), Alfred Hollins (47), Joseph Bonnet (44), William Wolstenholme (39), Walter Fischer (37), Eugène Gigout (35), Thaddäus Hofmiller (31), Herbert Walton (30), William Faulkes (29), Samuel A. Baldwin (26), Clarence Eddy (20), Karl Matthaei (17), Franz Joseph Breitenbach (16), Alfred Sittard (15), Paul Hindermann (13), Marco Enrico Bossi (12), Max Reger (11), Marie-Joseph Erb (11), Günter Ramin (8), Karl Straube (7), and Marcel Dupré (7), among others.
Tunbridge Wells
Residence of David Salomons, Salomons Centre, Tunbridge Wells, England. This organ also dates from c1913–14 and is virtually a twin to that at Seewen. The basic specification is 27/II+P, pneumatic player, pneumatic action. It has, however, a third manual, an Echo division of five stops (remotely placed with electric action), bringing it to 32/III+P. Extended and borrowed ranks normal to Welte practice also exist here. A most valuable survivor, its basic specification includes the full Philharmonie Grundmodell V–VI stops, with resources that sometimes differ slightly from Seewen’s. Apart from the Echo-division, the percussion accessories in particular show some variance, e.g.,“tubular bells” in place of Seewen’s “Harfe” and “Glocke” registers. The console was required, as per the contract, to be modeled on English systems—pistons rather than fixed combinations, manual compasses reaching to 61 notes instead of 58, stop-knobs rather than rocker-tabs, and the stop nomenclature is entirely English. There is no crescendo pedal. Even so, the general size and layout is remarkably similar to Seewen’s. It plays rolls of two sizes, accepting also the Welte #10 orchestrion rolls, the largest orchestrion rolls Welte ever made, and is apparently the only player for them still functioning. A collection of about 150 full-sized Philharmonie rolls is associated with this organ. See website: <http://www.maesto.com/US/welteinstruments.html>.
Other instruments
• a 25/II+P Welte-Philharmonie, from a collection that belonged to Jens Carlson, is now in the Mechanical Musical Instrument Museum at Elm, Germany (Stiftung Museum mechanischer Musikinstrumente Königslutter am Elm).
• formerly at Linz am Rhein, Germany. Also a smaller Philharmonie organ than Seewen, 21/II+P, recently moved to the USA. This organ was used for an EMI CD recording set issued as 7243 5 74866 2 0. It was built in 1925 for the Villa of Lady Burton of England in Cap de Antibes, southern France. Horst King und Sohn restored it for the Linz Museum in 1984/85. Laukhuff of Weikersheim delivered a purely decorative case for it.
• Siegfrieds Mechanisches Musikkabinett, Rüdesheim, Deutschland. The console has the Freiburg firm’s nameplate attached. Two of Wendel’s publications give “around 1922” as its date of construction. 21/II+P with “Harfe und Glocken.” Currently “partially restored.”
• Deutsches Musikautomatenmuseum at Bruchsal (in the “Welte-Saal.”) As well as the so-called Titanic organ, there is a 20/II+P Welte-Philharmonie dating from 1924 in this collection. See their website: <http://www.landesmuseum.de/website/>.
• The Schloss Meggenhorn instrument near Luzern in Switzerland. 19/II+P (with borrowing and extension) probably built 1915–20. An associated roll collection of 104 items features Max Reger, Karl Matthaei, Eugène Gigout, Marcel Dupré and others. The instrument was restored by Orgelbau Kuhn.
<http://www.orgelbau.ch/site/index.cfm?fuseaction=orgelbau.orgelportrait…;
• Tuxedo Park, New York (also made in the USA), at the Spedden residence. Members of the Spedden family were survivors of the Titanic. The organ is still in its original location. It was recently restored by the Kegg Organ Company. 15/II+P of Freiburg manufacture. Year of manufacture is not known at this stage.
Other, related installations (excluding cinema organs):
• An interesting player organ exists at the former Krupp Residence in Essen, Germany at Villa Hügel (now a museum and concert venue). It began as an American Aeolian organ with 9/II+P. In 1914 an Aeolian player mechanism was added. 1921 and 1928 saw the instrument enlarged to 14 stops by Welte, with one of their player mechanisms substituted for that of Aeolian. It was restored in 2003 by Orgelbau Klais of Bonn. Associated with it is a collection of about 110 usable rolls recorded by Ramin, Straube, Sittard, Mania, Lemare and Reger—a repertoire surveying Bach, Beethoven, Brahms, Chopin, Gluck, Händel, Haydn, Liszt, Mozart, Mendelssohn, Reger, Schubert and Wagner. Five rolls are of popular music. These appear to duplicate many rolls in the Seewen collection, as would be expected, bearing in mind the Welte catalogue marketing system. The Orgelbau Klais website has details: <http://www.orgelbau-klais.com/m.php?tx=52>.
• A Welte player mechanism—also a 150-note tracker bar—was added in 1931 to the Willis organ at Blenheim, England. There appears to be an associated collection of some 80 remaining rolls, said to be by English organists.
• Technik Museum, Speyer, Germany. 36/III+P manufactured in the USA. Dating from 1916, it must have been one of the last instruments, and the largest, built there before Welte’s New York branch in Poughkeepsie was closed down. Renovated in 2001. A collection of over 600 rolls is associated with it. See <http://www.museumspeyer.de/>.
• An organ under restoration (2006) for the Swiss dealer Hanspeter Kyburz by organ-builder Remi Steis of Germany. It is also of U.S. manufacture. It additionally bears a “W. W. Kimball” company reference underneath Welte’s on its nameplate. It is a II+P organ with much extension and borrowing somewhat reminiscent of cinema organ practice.
• A Welte-Philharmonic of nine ranks built pre-1926 in the studio of Barker Bros.’ department store in Los Angeles, then variously in the possession of Anita Baldwin, South Pasadena Masonic Lodge (1930) and Kyle B. Irwin (1999). Apparently of U.S. manufacture with much extension and borrowing. Barker Bros. eventually owned a total of four Weltes.
Acknowledgements
The authors express their gratitude for the many personal telephone, verbal and e-mail communications received. Special mention is made of
Günter Bäbler, Titanic-Verein Schweiz (http://www.titanicverein.ch)
Andrew Baghurst, Adelaide, Australia
Nelson Barden, Boston, USA (http://www.nbarden.com/)
Durward R. Center, Baltimore, USA
Mark Chirnside, Warwickshire, England (www.markchirnside.co.uk)
Gerhard Dangel, Augustiner-Museum Freiburg, Deutschland
Malte Fiebing, Titanic-Verein Deutschland (http://www.titanicverein.de)
Brooke Green, Tasmania
Bernhard Häberle, Gesellschaft für Selbstspielende Musikinstrumente, Germany
Georg Hofmeier and Gesellschaft des Museums für Musikautomaten, Seewen (GMS)
Philipp Klais, Orgelbau Klais, Bonn, Germany
Brett Leighton, Linz, Austria
Ken Marschall (http://www.kenmarschall.com)
Michail Michailakis, Greece
Simon Mills (Britannic Foundation) England (http://www.thebritannicfoundation.org.uk/)
Bernhard Prisi, Seewen, Switzerland
Wolfgang Rehn and Ueli Schärer, Orgelbau Kuhn, Männedorf, Switzerland
Rico A. Reinle, Münchenstein, Switzerland
Elizabeth Rumsey, Basel, Switzerland
Heinrich Weiss and Susanne Weiss, Seewen and Basel, Switzerland
Matthias Wunderlich, Essen, Germany
For its 39th Annual Convention, the OHS returned to central
Connecticut where it had held its 20th Annual Convention in 1975. There were revisits to only eight of the instruments heard in the previous meeting which lasted for only three days compared to the full week for the 1994 convention which offered 47 events (including optional choices) to the more than 435 who registered for all or part of the week. Headquarters was the Holiday Inn in Cromwell.
Events began with a trip to New Haven to hear several
organs, which, although too new to be historical in the antiquarian sense, are landmarks of organ building in the area and are all situated on or near the famous New Haven Green.
The United Church on the Green and its 1967 3-manual
Hillebrand (as rebuilt by Kinzey-Angerstein, 1979-1981 with further mechanical
revisions by Foley-Baker) was the site for a recital by Mark Brombaugh: Toccata in d (BuxWV 140), Buxtehude; Poolsche Dans, Sweelinck; the hymn "New Songs of Celebration Render" sung by all to the tune Rendez à Dieu; and Introduzione, Aria e Passacaglia, Op. 15c, Healey. Brombaugh, the church's Director of Music, provided a vigorous start to the convention with his reliance on energetic agogic accents and appropriate plenum ensembles as well as artistic exploitation of the many colorful solo combinations available in this modified North German tonal design.
A short walk next door to Center Church (where Charles Ives
had been organist from 1894 to 1898) brought us to a short recital presented by
Kimberly Ann Hess on a 3-manual Fisk, Op. 54 (1971 and 1974): Präludium
in D Major (BuxVW 139), Buxtehude; Variations on "Puer Nobis Nascitur," Sweelinck; Chorale Prelude: "Drop, Drop, Slow Tears," Persichetti; the hymn "Drop, Drop, Slow Tears" sung to the tune Prince; and Variations on a Noël, Dupré. Ms. Hess displayed the instrument well, even though its rather thin and intense tone did seem to be a bit too much for the totally unreverberant room.
Dwight Chapel on the Yale campus was the site for a short
recital by the extremely talented Marvin Mills on the 3-manual Beckerath of
1971: Partita on Showalter (1992),
Spong; the hymn "Leaning on the Everlasting Arms" sung to Showalter; Pastorale (1991), Conte; Agnus Dei
(from the Mass for Double Choir,
1992), Martin; and Maple Leaf Rag,
Joplin. All of the pieces spanned the 20th century, with the lyrically
expressive Conte work being especially attractive. Mills exhibited his usual
subtle balance between virtuosity and musicality and seemed to enjoy himself as
did the capacity audience in this lofty and acoustically sympathetic former
library. It was tempting to compare these three instruments heard in close
succession, produced, as they were, within a span of a few years of each other.
To this reviewer's ears, the Dwight Chapel Beckerath, aided no doubt by the
favorable acoustics, seemed to be the most well balanced and musically
satisfying of the three.
While many conventioneers immediately sought out the
air-conditioned comfort of the undercroft of Trinity Episcopal Church to escape
the almost tropical heat and humidity of the afternoon, others opted for a more
leisurely stroll and enjoyed a carillon recital from the famous Harkness Tower
presented by Timothy Hurd: "Allegro non presto" from Organ
Concerto No. 2, Handel; Prelude
on "Chartres," Johnson; Sonata a cimbalo solo, Op. 1, no. 4, van Noordt; "Visions" from Etudes in a New Age
style='font-style:normal'>, Courter; and Melodeon
style='font-style:normal'> (Toccata 1982-87
style='font-style:normal'>), Hurd. It was an uplifting experience for those who
took their time to listen as they wandered around the quadrangle on their way
back across the Green for a service of Evensong at Trinity.
Many people had been looking forward to hearing Trinity's
choir of men and boys as well as the magnificent 78-rank Æolian-Skinner
(Op. 927, 1935), as recently restored by the A. Thompson-Allen Co. They were
not disappointed. The service itself was beautifully done, and the choir, in
spite of the continuing heat, performed extremely well under the direction of
Walden Moore. Organists David Chrzanowski (assistant at Trinity) and Peter
Stoltzfus (formerly assistant there also and now assistant at St. Thomas' in
New York) provided expert accompaniments and revealed the Harrison-designed
organ to be a superlative service instrument and an outstanding vehicle for
solo organ music. The Prelude was Evening Song, Bairstow, followed by the Introit, "O Thou That Hearest
Prayer," Davies. Preces and Responses as well as the Lesser Litany,
Suffrages and Collects were settings by Shepherd. Hymns were: "O Blest
Creator" (Bromley);
"God Fashioned Earth and Called it Good" (Dominus regit me); "And did Those Feet" (Jerusalem); and "For all the Saints" (Engelberg). Psalm 91 was sung to an Anglican chant setting by Parratt. The Magnificat and Nunc
Dimittis were by Howells, and the anthem
was "Lord, Thou Hast Been our Refuge," Bairstow. The service ended with Tu es Petra
style='font-style:normal'>, Mulet. Congratulations and deep gratitude are due
to those who prepared and participated in this event, especially those Trinity
parishioners who offered their hospitality to many a hot and thirsty
conventioneer.
The newly and magnificently restored Battell Chapel on the
Yale campus was the scene for an evening recital by Will Headlee on its
landmark Holtkamp (Op. 1653 of 1951) which had been restored by the A. Thompson
Allen Co. in 1985 without any alterations to the original voicing: Praeludium
in F-Sharp Minor (BuxWV 146), Buxtehude;
"Das Alte Jahr" (BWV
1091), "O Jesu, wie ist dein Gestalt"
style='font-style:normal'>(BWV 1094), "Du Friedefürst, Herr
Jesu Christ" (BWV 1102), "Alle Menschen müssen sterben" (BWV 1117), all from the Neumeister Collection, Bach, which had been premiered in Battell Chapel in 1985; Fantasia in G (BWV 572), Bach; Sonate I, Hindemith; Choralpartita: "Lobe den Herren," Ahrens; the hymn "Praise to the Lord, the Almighty" sung to Lobe den Herren; "Cantilène" from Suite Brève, Langlais; and Dieu Parmi Nous, Messiaen. Like his counterpart, G. Donald Harrison, Walter Holtkamp was a tonal pioneer in seeking out greater ensemble clarity, and this instrument shows him at his most convincing with its clear but colorful and firm foundations, intense mixtures and buzzy reeds. Curiously, some of the most effective stops for subtle carrying power issued from the apse division. This location had been the site of a Hook organ of 1875. Perhaps we can indeed learn from history. Headlee, who provided well chosen verbal comments concerning some of the pieces as well as the instrument itself, received a rousing reception at the conclusion of the recital.
The day began with an illustrated talk by OHS Archivist,
Stephen Pinel, on the background, personality and work of Philadelphia and New
York organ builder, Thomas Hall. Supported by many slides of archival material,
Pinel gave a fascinating and lively account of the early years (up to the mid
1820s) of this influential builder and later partner of Henry Erben and John Labaugh.
A short bus trip to Hartford brought us to Second Church of
Christ, Scientist for a recital by Lorenz Maycher on its Skinner, Op. 793 of
1929: A Solemn Melody, Davies, arr,
Perry; the hymn "Brood o'er us With Thy Sheltering Wing" sung to the
tune Vita; A
style='font-style:normal'> Joyous March and Arioso
style='font-style:normal'>, both by Sowerby; and Sketch in B-Flat
Minor, Op. 41, Dupré. The welcome
change to bright, clear and crisp weather together with the ambience of the
immaculate and impressive edifice helped create a congenial atmosphere for rich,
warm and colorful sounds of the Skinner which was handled in the usual expert
Maycher fashion. The unassuming demeanor of this young artist belies the fire
and musical intensity that he always projects. His playing of the Dupré
Sketch in particular displayed his effortless virtuosity. It is obvious why he
has become a favorite with OHS audiences (beginning with his debut at the New
Orleans convention in 1989). Make a special effort to hear him if you have the
chance. You will be in for a musical treat.
We then took a short walk virtually across the street (much
to the impatient consternation of central Hartford late morning traffic) to the
sumptuous Art Deco Horace Bushnell Memorial Auditorium to hear the magnificent
Austin of 1929 as expertly restored by the original builders in 1988-89. Like
many such civic organs, this instrument's future was uncertain until reason
prevailed, and through the generosity of the Beldings of Old Lyme, CT, Austin
Organs, Inc. undertook its thorough rehabilitation. Since they still had the
original pipe casting information as well as other engineering and tonal
specifications on file, any necessary reconstruction and voicing adjustments
were done in the manner of the 1929 installation. Thus, this was a true
restoration.
Peter Sykes utilized the organ's vast tonal resources
spectacularly as he presented the world premeiere of his transcription of
Holst's The Planets to the delight and
awe of those in attendance. What a perfect match of locale, organ and artist
for such an occasion! The ceiling decoration features planets and
constellations, the organ was in perfect condition, and Sykes astounded all
with his playing from both the technical and musical standpoints. He had begun
this monumental task just this past April and found Holst's original two-piano
score helpful as he reworked the composition into, as Sykes put it in his
program notes, " . . . an organ work that would uniquely and effectively
display the resources of the orchestral organ of the 1920s, today's best reason,
after all, for attempting such a project." His wife, Victoria Wagner (who
also played accompaniments on a small 1-manual Smith organ later in the week)
provided an additional set of hands at the console for the final movement,
"Neptune." The audience acknowledged the performance with
appropriately wild enthusiasm. Through the generosity of an endowment by the
Dexter Corporation of Windsor Locks, such concerts will continue on this
monumental instrument. The program concluded with the singing of "Star Spangled Banner" to an arrangement by Edwin H. Lemare. Convention chairman, Scot Huntington, presented an OHS Historic Organ Plaque to an official of the Auditorium as the concluding event of the morning.
After lunch, we continued with a visit to yet another Austin,
Op. 166 of 1906 in St. Mary's R.C. Church in New Britain, whose elaborately
decorated interior has recently been restored with great care. The unusual
Austin (with tubular pneumatic action) was a revelation as it erased any
assumptions of what the tone of a 1906 Austin might be. Reconditioned by
Foley-Baker in 1983, it features remarkably bright and singing diapasons and
such a well integrated chorus (up through 2') that one almost forgets that
there are no mixtures or, indeed, any off-unisons. Timothy Edward Smith
obviously enjoyed the instrument as he played both sensitively and with
dramatic flair in the following program: "Andante rustico" from Sonata Cromatica, Yon; Alpine Fantasy and Storm, Flagler; the hymn "Ye who own the Faith of Jesus" sung to the tune Daily, Daily; An Elizabethan Id
style='font-style:normal'>yll, Noble; and Toccata
style='font-style:normal'>, Fletcher. All these works came from the decade
following that in which the organ was installed, and thus revealed the sounds
and musical tastes of the time. Alan Laufman presented an OHS Historic Organ
Plaque to the curate, Fr. Carter, in recognition of the worth of this
remarkable Austin.
A trip to the scenic and historic town of Litchfield and its
United Methodist Church featured a short program by Gregory Crowell assisted by
Paul Austin (horn) on a rare 2-manual tracker built by F. J. N. Tallman in 1893
for a New York residence and later moved to Litchfield: Canone all' ottava, Boëly; Meditation, Foote; Four Aeolian Versets (1990), Woodman; Andante for Horn and Organ, Saint-Saëns; Scherzetto, Vierne; and the hymn "My Soul Gives Glory to my God" sung to the tune Morning Song. Crowell's beautiful, flexible and expressive playing coupled with the bright and musical sounds of the Tallman and Austin's expert horn playing in the Saint-Saëns piece provided us with a total musical experience. For those who might be looking for a fine ensemble piece, this duet for horn and organ is well worthwhile and will suit many different occasions. Very active trackers in the duet and a momentary cipher at the beginning of the hymn did not detract in any way from the enjoyment of the program and demonstrated once again that such things may well be expected in playing a vintage instrument. An experienced player like Crowell can simply take such occasions in stride.
The final event of the afternoon was a short recital by Lynn
Edwards on an elegant 1-manual, 7-stop Thomas Hall organ of 1823 in Trinity
Episcopal Church, Milton. The tiny wooden combination Classic and Gothic style
building with its modified barrel vault ceiling in pastel blue contrasted with
light rose hues on the walls together with white and gray on the woodwork
provided a visually subtle setting for the elaborately carved mahogany
English-styled case with its gilded front pipes: Solo per Cembalo in E-flat
Major, C.P.E. Bach; Variations on
"Was Gott tut, das ist wohlgetan,"
Pachelbel; Fantasia in C Major
(G. 60), Handel; Prelude and Fugue in B Minor
style='font-style:normal'> (BWV 867), Bach; Voluntary, Op. 1, No. 5, Walond; and the hymn "Lord of all Being, Throned Afar" sung to the tune Mendon. Even though there is an electric blower available, Ms. Edwards chose to have her wind raised by hand pumping for most of the program to demonstrate the subtle difference in effect this produces on tone and phrasing. The standing-room-only audience gave her and the restored Thomas Hall organ a well deserved ovation.
Prior to the main evening recital, there was a short
pre-dinner program on a large reconstructed McManis, originally his Op. 35 of
1957, in St. John's Episcopal Church, Waterbury. The event was not on the
original schedule, but dinner in the Parish Hall was, so the convention
committee thought this would offer an opportunity to hear a major example of
the work of a distinguished veteran American organ builder. John W. Sherer played the following program: Fugue in E-Flat ("St. Anne"), Bach; Prelude on "Iam sol recidit igneus," Simonds; "Allegro" (Symphony No. VI), Widor; and the hymn "Immortal, Invisible" sung to St. Denio. Scherer's very capable playing showed off the colors and intense ensembles of this modern landmark instrument.
The evening event was a recital by Rosalind Mohnsen on the
3-manual Johnson and Son Op. 778 of 1892 in Sacred Heart of Jesus, R.C. Church
in Waterbury: Concert Overture in C Minor, Hollins; Concerto in D Minor (from "L'estro Harmonico") (BWV 596), Vivaldi-Bach; Sonata No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Reger; Méditation à Sainte Clotilde, James; the hymn "I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say" sung to Tregaron; St. Francis of Paola Walking on the Water
style='font-style:normal'>, Liszt; the hymn "O Jesus, in Thy Heart
Divine" sung to Jesu dulcis memoria; and Lauda Sion (from "Suite Latine
style='font-style:normal'>," Op. 86), Widor. The organ's history and
restoration had been the subject of a recent article by Susan Armstrong (see
The Tracker, Vol. 37, No. 4, 1993) and Ms. Mohnson handled it in the grand
manner by displaying its hefty but colorful ensembles and many solo colors
(including a particularly delicious Doppel Flute on the Great). The highly
decorated and wonderfully restored interior of the church with its magnificent
rear gallery Johnson combined to create an uplifting end to the day's round of
recitals and demonstrations. Opening remarks by the Pastor and the Director of
Music revealed that the parish realizes the worth of the instrument and will
continue to cherish it for both its beauty and utility.
The Annual Meeting of the OHS took place as the first event
of the morning with President, Kristin Farmer, attending to necessary business
matters and reports with dispatch. Among the items of general interest were the
announcement that the Hook organ recently removed from Woburn, MA will be
installed in Berlin (Germany) in a couple of years; the convention for 1995
will be headquartered in Ann Arbor, MI, with Dana Hull as chairman
(Philadelphia, the Pacific northwest area, Washington, D.C., and Boston are
sites for upcoming meetings through the end of the century); and the
announcement that the OHS Distinguished Service Award goes to John K. Ogasapian
this year. Since he was busy preparing for his recital later in the morning,
the actual presentation was done in conjunction with that event.
A lecture entitled, "Tonal and Mechanical Development
of Skinner and Æolian-Skinner Organs" followed the meeting and was
introduced by a sampling of the new video tape produced by The Symphonic Organ
Society on "Mr. Skinner's Home Movies." This informative and often
hilarious video was presented with background and comments by Jonathan
Ambrosino and Joe Dzeda after which Dzeda and Nicholas Thompson-Allen of the A.
Thompson-Allen firm, Curators of Organs at Yale and experienced experts in the
restoration of Skinner organs, gave advice on restoration in general and of old
pipework in particular.
The Second Congregational Church in Middle Haddam was the
location for the following short program by John Ogasapian, editor of the OHS's
quarterly, The Tracker: Pastorale in F (BWV 590), Bach; Sonata in G Minor (W 70/6), C.P.E. Bach; and the hymn "All Glory be to God on High" sung to Allein Gott in der Höh. This fine 2-manual Appleton of 1827, which had suffered from both neglect and damage, was discovered by Barbara Owen several years ago. Long thought hopeless, it received a masterful reconstruction and restoration in 1992 by Mann and Trupiano (who had restored a similar Appleton of 1830 for the Metropolitan Museum in New York). Ogasapian's sensitive playing and appropriate programming showed off the subtle colors of this delightful instrument. He was aided as page turner and stop puller by the organ's restorer, Larry Trupiano, who must have been proud of his "baby" and the way it was played. Barbara Owen presented an OHS Historic Organ Plaque to the church and gave some heartfelt remarks on the background and history of the efforts to save this musical jewel. This is a distinguished example of one of the purposes of the OHS--to engender interest in preserving worthy examples of American organ building even though the effort may take a generation to accomplish. Ogasapian and the Appleton (together with Trupiano and Owen) were given an appropriate standing ovation.
A scenic bus ride through the picturesque Connecticut
countryside brought us to the beautiful 1820 Congregational Church in
Killingworth for a recital by Kevin Birch on a 2-manual 1875 E. L. Holbrook as
restored by Richard Hamar in 1971. The organ, in a rear gallery, features a
highly decorated case with exposed Great pipework. The program: Sonata V ("Allegro di molto"), C.P.E. Bach; Cantilena in F, Op. 71, No. 1, Foote; "Prelude" (Symphony No. II), Widor; the hymn "Dear Lord and Father of Mankind" sung to the tune Repton; and Carillon de Westminster, Vierne. The solid and bright Holbrook was served well by Birch's wonderfully sensitive, energetic and intelligent playing. It was refreshing to hear the Vierne Carillon played in a sane tempo which allowed the musical phrases to happen and communicate. This young artist is a player to watch--he should have a fine career.
From Killingworth we returned to New Haven for the first of
two recitals on a 3-manual E. & G.G. Hook Op. 576 of 1871 which had been
transplanted from St. Alphonsus R.C. Church in New York to St. Mary's R.C.
Church in New Haven in 1982 and restored by a group of New England organ
builders under the direction of Larry Trupiano of Brooklyn, N.Y. This reviewer
had heard the organ in its original location many years ago and had marveled at
its tone and musical effect at that time in spite of the instrument's obvious
mechanical difficulties. The church (now razed) was a somewhat higher building
than St. Mary's, but the organ now looks and sounds "at home" in its
new loft. The building sounds as large as it looks and features a recently
restored opulently decorated interior which creates an appropriate setting for
the colorful and robust tone of the Hook. Bruce Stevens played magnificently in
the following program: Sonata No. 3 in G Major, Op. 88, Rheinberger; Concert Variations on "The Star
Spangled Banner," Paine; Canon in A-Flat Major, Op. 56, No. 4, Schumann; Fantaisie in A, Franck; "Andante sostenuto" (Symphonie Gothique), Widor; Toccata and Fugue ("The Wanderer"), Parry; and the hymn "Holy Ghost, Dispel our Sadness" sung to Geneva. Throughout, Stevens exhibited his usual superlative, mature and artistic approach to communicating the music and seemed totally in command of the piquant small and vigorously-voiced large ensembles as well as the many solo colors of this important organ transplant. The recital was certainly a high point of the convention.
Nearby St. Paul's Episcopal Church hosted a late afternoon
recital by John Cummins on a relocated 2-manual 1876 Jardin & Son tracker
which had been renovated by Brunner and Heller in 1982-1985. The facade pipes
had been decorated by Kristin Farmer within a couple of weeks of the beginning
of the convention. Her expert work, featuring a bright cardinal red in the
mouth area of the pipes led one wag (who shall remain nameless for her own
protection) to affectionately dub the organ, "Hot Lips." Cummins gave
good verbal explanations on the music and registrations for his program: Sonata II in C, Mendelssohn; "The Peace may be Exchanged" (from Rubrics), Locklair; the hymn "Praise the Lord, ye Heavens Adore Him" sung to the tune Faben, written by former St. Paul's organist, the renowned J. R. Willcox; and Concert Variations on "Old Hundredth," Paine. Cummins is an excellent player who displayed both virtuoso pedal technique in the Paine and expert hymn playing as he and the gutsy Jardine led the large audience in vigorous singing. Following a catered pizza party in St. Paul's Parish Hall, we took a welcome post-prandial stroll through a portion of the Wooster Square area of New Haven to St. Casimir's R.C. Church for an evening recital by David Dahl on the church's large 2-manual E. & G.G. Hook and Hastings, Op. 750 of 1874 as restored by Richard Hamar in 1970. Unlike the Jardine in St. Paul's, this Hook was originally installed in this building which at that time was the home of Davenport Congregational Church. The program: Praeludium in d, Lubeck; Four Organ Chorales, ("Wo soil ich fliehen hin," "Schmücke dich," "Sei Lob und Ehr dem höchsten Gut," "Christ lag in Todesbanden"), Homilius; Sonata IV in A Minor, Op. 98, Rheinberger; Four Pieces ("Canon in the 5th," Op. 68, No. 1, "Romanza," Op. 13, No. 3, "Novelette," Op. 68, No. 3, "Fugue" Op. 36, No. 3), Parker; the hymn "We will extol You, ever-blessed Lord," sung to the tune Old 124th; Nordic Lament, Dahl; and Fantaisie in G (BWV 572), Bach. Tim Smith presented an OHS Historic Organ plaque to the church during the intermission. Dahl handled the instrument both musically and brilliantly with his solid, sensitive and dramatic playing displaying the tonal features of the organs to great advantage. His Nordic Lament was a particularly colorful and attractive work. Dahl and the finely restored Hook received a well deserved standing ovation.
A morning illustrated lecture by The Reverend Nicholas
Thistlethwaite on "The Tonal Development of 19th Century British
Organs" exposed us to the differences and similarities in character of
organ building trends vis-à-vis the U.S. and Britain presented from the
perspective of the British Institute of Organ Studies, a younger sister
organization of the OHS.
Glenn Kime gave the first recital of the day on a magnificent
late Johnson, Op. 788 of 1893 in the Unitarian Universalist Church in Meriden: Trumpet Tune, Phillips; Canzonetta, Op. 71, No. 4, Foote; "Allegretto" (from Sonata in E-flat Minor, Op. 65), Parker; Amazing Grace, arr. Held; Variations on "America," Ives; and the hymn "Sing out Praises for the Journey" sung to Westminster Abbey. Prior to the program, Dana Hull presented the church with an OHS Historic Organ plaque. The handsome restored Romanesque structure with its pristine Johnson singing out from its corner installation, its beautifully balanced sound elicited by the expert playing of this young artist with his refined and relaxed technique which let the music really speak, formed a wonderful beginning for an equally wonderful day--the almost tropical humidity having given way to another example of crisp New England early summer weather.
The final morning event was a recital by Mark Bighley on
what may be the only remaining 3-manual Ryder, Op. 156 of 1890 in St. Francis
R.C. Church in Naugatuck. His program: "Wir treten zum Beten vor Gott
den Herren," Reger; the hymn
"Once He Came in Blessing" sung to the tune Gottes Sohn ist
kommen with settings by Pepping as organ
interludes between the stanzas; "Christus der ist mein
Leben," Rinck; and Four Short
Pieces, Pinkham. The organ, a tracker,
features an unusual reversed console and an almost "see-through"
facade. Since most of the pipework is situated low in the case, the west window
is visible through the pipe front. Bighley demonstrated the colorful organ well
and registered the Pepping settings to show off the transparent and light
colors as a contrast to the fuller ensembles during the sung verses.
Unfortunately, the subtle registrations in the quiet Pinkham pieces were
punctuated with the sounds of happy children being released from a neighboring
school.
Wednesday afternoon was devoted to a variety of options: a
tour of the Austin organ factory in Hartford; a visit to the Trolley Museum in
East Haven; a trip to the Hitchcock Chair Museum in Riverton with a program on
its diminutive 1-manual organ of unknown manufacture followed by a trip to
Otis, MA for a short recital on the 1-manual Whiting in St. Paul's Episcopal
Church; a trip to the famous seaside resort of Watch Hill, RI; or a few hours
of free time for rest and relaxation back at Cromwell. Since one could not be
in all of these places, this reviewer chose the tour of the Austin factory
which was open for all with printed floor plan maps to help in locating the
various departments, from pipe casting and fabrication, chest making, and small
parts manufacture to console constructions and the design and voicing rooms.
Our hosts were very helpful and courteous in explaining the various operations
and fielding questions posed by the visitors. Of particular interest was the
important display of historical documents that had been set up for our perusal.
In addition, we were able to see bits and pieces of Austin's Op. 500 of 1915, a
large instrument built for the Panama-Pacific Exposition that had been severely
damaged in the recent California earthquake and had been returned to Austin's
for restoration. One can only imagine the immense amount of work involved in
shipping this vast organ across the country for rehabilitation by its original
builders. We shall await the news of its reinstallation.
For those who wished, there was time to visit the former
residence of Mark Twain on nearby Farmington Avenue We then traveled to
Rockville for Ezequiel Menendez's recital on a 2-manual Johnson & Son
tracker, Op. 830 of 1895, formerly in the Masonic Hall in Hartford, and
successfully relocated to the First Lutheran Church in Rockville. His program: "Komm Gott, Schopfer, heiliger Geist" (BWV 667), Bach; Pastorale in G, Whitney; Toccata, Villancico, Ginastera; the hymn "Who Trusts in God, a Strong Abode" sung to Was mein Gott will; and Sonata I, Mendelssohn (which contains the hymn tune just sung). Menendez's sensitive, bold, brilliant and musical playing delighted all those in attendance. This young Argentinian is undoubtedly an artist of major talent, and we should expect to hear of his great international success in the near future The performer seemed totally at home at the Johnson, another example of a successful transplant of an instrument which had been slated for destruction. Relocation and reassembly was accomplished in 1992 under the direction of Thad Outerbridge.
After dinner back in Cromwell, we bused to Hartford again
for a recital by Christa Rakich on an extraordinarily fine 3-manual Kilgen, Op.
4828 of 1932, in St. Justin's R.C. C The Pastor, Fr. Devito, accepted the OHS
Historic Organ plaque from Lois Regestein and made moving and appropriate
remarks prior to the recital. The program: "Liebestod" from Tristan
und Isolde, Wagner; Prelude and
Fugue in D Minor, Clara Schumann; Variations on "Wondrous Love," Barber; "Sweet Story," "All Things Bright and Beautiful," "Wonderful Words of Life," and "Praise our Father," all from Folk Hymn Sketches, Diemer; the hymn "Amazing Grace" sung to New Britain; Sweet Sixteenths (A Concert Rag), Albright; and Prelude & Passacaglia in festo Pentecostes, Woodman. An encore was in order, and that was the Sicilienne of Paradis. The wonderful Art Deco vastness of the marble interior with its alabaster rererdos and elaborate decorations was the perfect milieu for the truly distinguished sounds of the Kilgen which had been designed and overseen by Charles Courboin who also had played the "Liebestod" at the dedication of this instrument in 1932. Ms. Rakich, who is Director of Music at St. Justin's, obviously was much at home on this instrument and displayed its sumptuous, bold and luxuriant colors with expertise. There is always an extra dimension of success to the effective use of the organ when the incumbent musician is at the console. Fr. Devito and the parishioners of St. Justin's deserve our plaudits for seeing that the organ received a sensitive restoration by Michael Foley.
The day began with a short trip to Storrs and the University
of Connecticut's St. Thomas Aquinas R.C. Chapel for program by Richard Hill on
a gutsy Steer & Turner 2-manual tracker, Op. 8, of 1868 which had
originally been built for the Baptist Church in Rondout, NY and moved to Storrs
under the supervision of the Organ Clearing House and installed by A. David
Moore in 1973. The program: the hymn "Now Shall my Head be Lifted
High" sung to the tune Victory; Grand Centennial March, Zeuner; Chorale-Prelude on "Jewels," Bitgood; Rondo-Caprice
style='font-style:normal'>, Op. 35, Buck; Berceuse
style='font-style:normal'>, Shelley; and Sortie in D Major,
style='font-style:normal'> Rogers. Most of the pieces chosen had a connection
with Connecticut, a nice touch in programming. The contemporary and modest
sized chapel features a narrow and long barrel vault ceiling, which is not only
visually attractive, but also helps give the room acoustics. The organ, with
its natural chestnut case, fits in with the architecture well. Its sound is
robust, with a firm and bright tone. Hill demonstrated the colorful single
registers persuasively and gave the larger ensembles an appropriately vigorous
touch. Some out-of-tune ranks and a rather violently aggressive tremolo were
the only jarring factors.
The next stop was in Willimantic for a superlative recital
by Leo Abbott on a later Steer & Turner, Op. 86 of 1874, in St. Joseph's
R.C. Church. The 2-manual tracker is in the rear gallery and filled the
recently restored church interior with its dignified, bright and bold sounds
which led one to think that the organ was much larger than it is. The program: Festival Voluntary, Op. 87, Peeters;
"Incantation," "Pastorale," "Antienne,"
"Hymne," and "Danse" from Mariales pour Orgue, Hakim; the hymn "Hail, Holy Joseph, Hail" sung to Maritus; Menuet-Scherzo, Op. 54, No. 2, Jongen; and "Allegro con moto" from Grand Sonata, Op. 25, Whiting. The instrument, restored by Charles Aitken in 1989, fairly danced at the expert virtuosity and artistic playing by Leo Abbott who demonstrated his talents in improvisation by supplying appropriate interludes between the verses of the hymn. After such a musical treat, we all needed some time to absorb what we had just heard, and we were able to do so, as well as to absorb a wonderful catered luncheon held in St. Joseph's Parish Hall.
After lunch, Ray Cornils presented a short recital on the
last of a series of the three Steere organs of the day, a 2-manual tracker, Op.
340 of 1892 in First Baptist Church, Willimantic. His program: "Mein
junges Leben hat ein End," Sweelinck; Fuga IV, Zeunner; the hymn "All Hail the Power" sung to Diadem; Scherzo, Buck; Pastorale and Aviary, Roberts; and Variations de Concert, Op. 1, Bonnet. It was instructive to hear these three Steeres, one after the other, and thus to compare them. This instrument, the mildest of the three, also featured a bright and well balanced principal chorus, characteristic of Steeres of this era, with an extremely quiet Great Dulciana and Swell Salicional. A recessed front location for the organ and the dead acoustics may have had a bearing on the understated effect. Cornils demonstrated the various subtle and colorful combinations to great effect and proved once again that he is a well disciplined and thoroughgoing musician. The capacity audience showed their appreciation with an appropriate ovation.
The Reuter Organ Company has built a new manufacturing facility and corporate headquarters at 1220 Timberedge Road in Lawrence, Kansas. Reuter, a fixture in downtown Lawrence since 1919, decided to leave its historic location to build a new structure more suited to production efficiency. The World Company purchased the previous location at 612 New Hampshire, including three buildings, one of which was the site of the former Wilder Bros. shirt factory, dating from the 1880s, one of the oldest manufacturing facilities in the city.
A ribbon-cutting ceremony took place on June 4, marking the official opening of the new facility. The day's festivities included tours of the building from 2:30–4:30, presentations and ribbon cutting at 4:30 p.m., and a reception following. Albert Neutel is president of the company; Albert Neutel, Jr., is executive vice president. The ribbon cutting ceremony was organized by the Law-rence Chamber of Commerce and included presentations by the following: Sandy Praeger, state senator; Scot Buxton, Lawrence Chamber of Commerce; Steve Kelly, Kansas Department of Commerce and Housing; and Albert Neutel. Allison Vance Moore of Law-rence was the emcee.
The $4 million project features a 75,000 square-foot building on 7.15 acres. The new facility is more than twice the size of the old one, and all operations now reside on a single level instead of five separate stories in two buildings. Instead of waiting turns for a slow elevator ride, workers can simply walk around the single-level shop to access each department. One of the best improvements to the operation is air conditioning throughout the entire shop.
The move represents a significant milestone in the history of pipe organ building in this country. The last new facility by a large major U.S. organ builder was over 30 years ago.
The planning of the new shop was in the works for over a year, long before an architect and contractor were engaged. Company personnel spent time studying production flow, materials handling, and work stations. The building was de-signed to receive new and raw materials on the north end and send completed organs outbound on the south end. Each instrument works its way from north to south, where it is assembled, tested, dismantled, packed, and loaded through the assembly room and shipping dock.
Visits were made to other organ and pipe shops in the United States and Europe, in order to gain an understanding of what worked best and worst in these manufacturing situations. An "open shop" concept was finally decided upon. Several architects were asked to comment and prepare a conceptual rendering of a shell to house this open shop. After studying these proposals, Architect One of Topeka, Kansas was chosen to develop the plans for the project. A. G. Tollefson of Lecompton, Kansas was chosen as the general contractor.
The new facility boasts many distinctive features. The assembly room measures 72' x 76' with a 48' ceiling. Riding across the ceiling is a five-ton hoist. Materials arrive in a 130' x 45' receiving room. The adjoining lumber storage and mill shop measures 114' x 30'. The zinc and copper pipe metal leave the receiving area to join the 135' x 55' pipe shop. The spotted metal is cast in a special room complete with planer and storage bins. All of these areas are equipped with large overhead doors to allow for movement of materials via forklift.
Reuter's nearly 50 employees now enjoy breaks in the new "cafeteria" area equipped with kitchenette and vending machines. Data drops are installed throughout the building. This facilitates the use of high technology anywhere in the shop as needed. The CNC router is enclosed in its own room, complete with vacuum table, storage, computer platform, telephone and data connection.
Reuter was founded in 1917 in Trenton, Illinois, as the Reuter-Schwartz Organ Company, formed by Earl Schwartz, Henry Jost, and A.C. Reuter. Mr. Reuter had previously worked for Wicks, Pilcher and Casavant since about 1904. A. G. Sabol, Sr., who was with Casavant at the time, joined his uncle, A.C. Reuter, in the new firm. The company started with six employees, besides Reuter and Sabol, including Jake Schaeffer, a noted voicer who had worked with Reuter at Casavant; E. J. "Pat" Netzer, woodworker; William Zweifel, pipe maker; and Frank Jost, console maker. Only one organ was built in 1917, an instrument of eight stops over two manuals and pedal, sold to Trinity Episcopal Church in Mattoon, Illinois. After this instrument was completed and set up in the erecting room, a tornado struck Trenton and blew out one factory wall. The assembled organ was severely damaged. The company carried insurance, and a new organ was built and installed in Trinity Church as opus 2. During the following year, a total of ten instruments were built and installed. In 1919, 14 instruments were built and installed, including opus 14 for the Masonic Temple in Lawrence, Kansas.
In 1919, the company decided to move to Lawrence, Kansas, purchasing the Wilder Bros. shirt factory as its new headquarters, where Reuter remained until this year. The board of directors was listed as E. G. Schwartz, A. C. Reuter, H. T. Jost, G. O. Foster, and W. B. Downing. Foster and Downing were both with the University of Kansas. The Lawrence Chamber of Commerce had pledged funds to help defray the cost of moving. On January 1, 1920, the new office was open for business, and on March 1 the remodeled factory opened for production. The first organ built in the Lawrence plant was opus 27, a 23-rank instrument for Central Congregational Church in Topeka, Kansas. Earl Schwartz left the company in July of 1920, and the name was changed to "The Reuter Organ Company." During the "roaring twenties" business increased rapidly to 51 instruments in 1928. Reuter first began exporting organs in 1954. Opus 1101 was installed in St. Peter's Lutheran Church in Edmonton, Canada. Subsequent organs have been installed as far afield as Taiwan, and, scheduled for 2003, an instrument for Seoul, Korea.
Franklin Mitchell joined the company in 1951 as special representative and consultant, and in 1957 was appointed tonal director. He was elected vice-president in 1964. In 1980 he became president and partner, a position he held until 1983, when he became chairman of the board. He continued in that role until his retirement in 1995. Mitchell died on March 31, 1998.
Albert Neutel joined the company in 1980 as plant manager. He partnered with Mitchell that year to purchase the company. In 1983, when Mitchell became chairman of the board, Neutel become the seventh president of the firm. His son, Albert Neutel, Jr., has been associated with Reuter for twenty years. In 1986, he moved to Memphis, Tennessee to represent the company in the Midwest and Southeast. He returned to Lawrence in 1997 as executive vice president.
Among Reuter's notable installations are Glens Falls Presbyterian Church, Glens Falls, New York (IV/61); First United Methodist Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado (IV/80); West Texas State University, Canyon, Texas (III/63); Augustana Lutheran Church, Denver, Colorado (IV/60); Shadyside Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (IV/105); St. John's Lutheran Church, Allentown, Pennsylvania (IV/82); First Presbyterian Church, Philadelphia (IV/80); and University Presbyterian Church, Seattle, Washington (IV/93).
The company has announced plans to increase sales by 15–20%, and reports at least $7 million worth of orders for the next 18 months. Current and upcoming projects include: Trinity United Methodist Church, Wilmette, Illinois (III/63); First United Methodist Church, Williamstown, West Virginia (II/18); Church of the Ascension, Rockville Centre, New York (II/19); St. John's Episcopal Church, Albuquerque, New Mexico (III/57); First United Methodist Church, Winfield, Kansas (II/29); First Presbyterian Church, Lincoln, Nebraska (III/65); So-Mang Presbyterian Church, Seoul, Korea (II/34); and Salem Missionary Baptist Church, Brooklyn, New York (III/31).
As part of the festivities to introduce the new facility, Reuter's board of directors was on hand: Robert Billings, developer, president, Alvamar, Lawrence, Kansas; Robert Coleberd, economist, president (retired) Pac-West Oil Data, Mission Hills, California; Stephen Hamilton, minister of music, Church of the Holy Trinity (Episcopal), New York City; Joe Kelly, president (retired), board vice-chairman, Douglas County Bank, Lawrence; Charles Merritt, director, Pueblo Choral Society; Thomas Murray, attorney at law, partner, Barber Emerson Springer Zinn and Murray, LC, Lawrence; and Albert Neutel, president, Reuter Organ Company.
For more information about Reuter and the new facility, visit their web site at www.reuterorgan.com.
