Buzard Pipe Organ Builders, Champaign, Illinois; Saint Joseph Catholic Cathedral, Jefferson City, Missouri
From the builder
It was in 2019 that I met Father Jeremy Secrist, a priest of the Diocese of Jefferson City, Missouri, and the organ consultant for Saint Joseph Cathedral. The cathedral was built in the late 1960s and was showing its age and the peculiarities of its era. The bishop and diocesan building committee were planning a complete transformation of the building’s function and “softening” of the architecture. Both its exterior and interior were subsequently completely renovated. Artistic designs were made by architect William Heyer of Columbus, Ohio, the work carried out by the local firm, Architects Alliance. The new organ is the final component of this comprehensive renovation.
At our first meeting with Father Secrist we discussed the existing organ’s tonal limitations. The thin tone typical of its time stymied the musicians’ efforts to fill the room with majestic sound to undergird congregational singing; its small specification limited the types of choral anthems that could be performed. The new organ had to really be a “Cathedral Organ,” with a noble tone and a variety of color to enliven choral accompaniments.
We measured and photographed the space, and I began to create a visual design that would be as dignified as the new renovations promised, while also relating to the many triangular shapes in the room’s physical structure. We knew that the organ would need to be efficiently planned and that the front would need to be cantilevered into the cathedral at an unknown dimension; we were told to make this as minimal as possible.
In February of 2020 I presented my line drawing of the visual design to the Diocesan Cathedral Renovation Committee, which included Bishop W. Shawn McKnight, Father Secrist, William Heyer, various clergymen, and prospective donors to the project. I met Mr. Heyer before the meeting and showed him my drawing, not knowing who he was or what his involvement would be. He was so enthusiastic about it, he wound up championing it in front of the entire committee that morning—I hardly had to say anything! We signed the contract for the organ in October of that year.
The Cathedral Choir sits in front of the organ, so we opted to place two ranks in the lower level of the case to give them sounds they could clearly hear, allowing the remainder of the organ above it to be used to color the accompaniments, lead congregational singing, and render solo organ literature. As the cathedral’s renovations took shape, we were asked to relocate the organ’s blower out of an adjacent room into the organ case itself, as well as reduce the originally planned triangular cantilever of the organ’s façade into a flat shape. A handicap ramp in front of the organ case seemed to be a “sticking point” between us and the architects, until we suggested this ramp be located behind the organ case in a walkway that already existed. This gained us a very necessary 36 inches. The rear walkway, being longer, gives wheelchairs a gentler slope to transition between the floor of the cathedral and the predella. Everyone was happy.
Our chief engineer and production director, Shane Rhoades, was somehow able to accommodate these wishes. The result is the most efficient and clever winding system I have ever seen, in which one wooden wind trunk passes through a schwimmer regulator to avoid using a flexible hose.
Although the new cathedral organ is modest in size, it provides a wealth of tone colors as do all our organs, classically scaled and voiced with a slight romantic cast to the voicing. A portion of the Great is under expression, as in several of our recent organs. The enclosed stops are labeled in red to make it easier for an organist to see at a glance which stops are behind the expression shutters. The basis of the Great division is a 16′ Double Dulciana; the basis of the Swell is a 16′ Lieblich Gedeckt. These play at 8′ and 4′ pitches on what we call the expressive “Choral Organ” behind the singers. To maximize registrational flexibility in the incredibly tight space, this organ utilizes a bit more unification of some non-chorus stops than is our normal practice.
My sincere thanks go to every member of the Buzard Pipe Organ Builders team who spent a tremendous amount of time on-site in a very complicated installation, especially chief engineer Shane Rhoades, our foreman Chris Goodnight, president and tonal director Fred Bahr, associate tonal director Felix Franken, and all their crews. Deep thanks to Father Jeremy Secrist for understanding our challenges, and to Bishop Shawn McKnight for his patience. Organist Ken Cowan will dedicate this organ in a public concert on Friday, June 20, at 6:00 p.m.
—John-Paul Buzard
From the consultant
Akin to the design and construction of pipe organs during the preceding century, the construction of ecclesiastical edifices was not immune to a wide variety of approaches and philosophies either. Some have been inspiringly refreshing, whereas others have challenged the categories of practical form and function. In 1956 the Diocese of Jefferson City was established in the center of Missouri, and the unquestionably gothic structure of Saint Peter Church immediately adjacent to the state capitol was named the diocese’s cathedral church. Although it admirably held that title for thirteen years, there had been plans in the minds of some for a new cathedral to be built.
Following the fourth and final session of the Second Vatican Council, the Cardinal Archbishop of St. Louis had some time to travel around parts of Europe before returning to Missouri. At some location in Austria, Cardinal Joseph Ritter’s eyes beheld a circular church in Modernist architectural form that could seat many more faithful, but without those pesky structural elements called “columns”—and thus was the genesis of the current Cathedral of Saint Joseph, completed in 1968.
Although ample terrazzo and marble was used throughout the structure, so too were intentional efforts to restrain any sort of acoustical resonance in a building that seats 950. A 31-rank instrument from the Wicks Organ Company (Opus 4801) was completed in 1968, occupying an organ chamber to the right of the sanctuary. Although the control system was updated in 2001, the instrument perpetually struggled to speak into the room, as the entirety of the instrument was located on the cathedral floor—and the placement of a choir immediately in front of the instrument only further limited its capacities.
In 2019 I was charged by our new bishop to draw together a proposal for a new instrument for the cathedral, coinciding with the overall renovation of the entire building. Having personally experienced what it was like to sing in a choir situated immediately in front of the previous instrument, an alternative location for the organ was first and foremost in my mind. The original plans for the cathedral had envisioned organ chambers behind the altar and sanctuary, although these had never been constructed.
Having invited a number of organ builders in North America for their best assessment and ideas, the creative design energies of Buzard Pipe Organ Builders proposed the best solution to this rather challenging architectural arrangement. Making use of the mostly triangular organ chamber original to the building’s construction, Buzard Pipe Organ Builders has created an instrument of 36 ranks (and four digital voices) wherein most of the instrument is now elevated and slightly cantilevered above the steel retention ring of the crown-shaped building. This elevated position allows for the capacity of this modest instrument to speak commandingly into the body of the church; three divisions under expression provide for tremendous flexibility of control, all the while providing a façade befitting a cathedral replete with subtle references to Saint Joseph, the State of Missouri, and the abundance of blessings that this instrument will be for future generations.
—Fr. Jeremy A. Secrist
Bishop’s Delegate for the Care and Preservation of Pipe Organs
Pastor, Saint Joseph Church, Salisbury, Saint Mary of the Angels, Wien, Saint Boniface, Brunswick
Sub Dean, Central Missouri AGO Chapter
Photo credits: John-Paul Buzard, except as noted
GREAT
Manual II, in and behind façade
16′ Double Dulciana (Ch)
8′ Open Diapason (façade) 61 pipes
8′ Flûte á Bibèron 61 pipes
8′ Flûte Cœlestis II 80 pipes, 1–42=1 pipe; 43–61=2 pipes
8′ Dulciana (Ch)
4′ Principal 61 pipes
4′ Spire Flute 61 pipes
2-2/3′ Twelfth 61 pipes
2′ Fifteenth 61 pipes
1-1/3′ Fourniture IV 244 pipes
16′ English Horn 61 pipes
8′ Trumpet 61 pipes
8′ Clarinet 61 pipes
Tremulant
Cymbalstern
8′ Tromba (Ped 16′)
4′ Tromba Clarion (ext)
SWELL
Manual III, enclosed, in the upper portion of the organ case
16′ Lieblich Gedeckt (Ch)
8′ Stopped Diapason 61 pipes
8′ Salicional 61 pipes
8′ Voix Celeste (low G) 54 pipes
4′ Principal 61 pipes
4′ Harmonic Flute 61 pipes
2-2/3′ Nazard 61 pipes
2′ Octavin 61 pipes
1-3/5′ Tierce 61 pipes
2-2/3′ Grave Mixture II 122 pipes
1′ Plein Jeu III 183 pipes
16′ Bassoon 85 pipes
8′ Trompette 61 pipes
8′ Oboe 61 pipes
4′ Clarion (from 16′)
Tremulant
8′ Tromba (Ped 16′)
4′ Tromba Clarion (ext)
CHORAL
Manual I, enclosed, in lower portion of the case
16′ Double Dulciana 85 pipes
16′ Lieblich Gedeckt 85 pipes
8′ Dulciana (ext)
8′ Wood Gedeckt (ext)
4′ Dulcet (ext 8′)
4′ Flute d’ Amour (ext 8′)
Tremulant
8′ Tromba (Ped 16′)
4′ Tromba Clarion (ext)
PEDAL
Façade, various locations, partially expressive
32′ Subbass (Walker)
32′ Lieblich Gedeckt (Walker)
16′ Open Diapason (Walker)
16′ Bourdon (1–12 Walker, 13-32 fr. 8′)
16′ Lieblich Gedeckt (Ch)
16′ Dulciana (Ch)
8′ Principal (façade) 44 pipes
8′ Bourdon 44 pipes
8′ Spire Flute 32 pipes
4′ Choral Bass (from 8′)
4′ Open Flute (from 8′)
32′ Contra Bassoon (Walker)
16′ Trombone (enclosed in Gt) 85 pipes
16′ Bassoon (Sw)
8′ Oboe (Sw)
8′ Tromba (ext 16′)
8′ Minor Trumpet (Sw)
4′ Clarion (Sw)
30 stops, 36 ranks, 2,281 pipes
