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by Michael Fazio, President, Austin Organ Company |
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Monday, 22 October 2007 23:08 |
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Austin Organ Company’s Opus 1747 has a very interesting past... If you are an organ-history buff! The instrument was originally built for our (former) studio here on Woodland Street. The organ was originally connected to a brilliant innovation of the Austin firm – the Austin Quadruplex Roll Player! This allowed the organ to play by itself, much like a player-piano. Organists from around the country would come to the factory and record their favorite works, which would then be cut on paper rolls and sold to purchasers of these mechanisms! The little studio also was wired into, what we believe was then WTIC AM Radio, for its Friday evening broadcast – complete with live music from Austin Organ Company! As this novel concept faded into history, the organ was sold to Mrs. Ida Young for installation into her residence in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. In the 1950’s, the organ was donated to Emmanuel Congregational Church in Springfield, and once again moved and re-installed. It was in this church that I discovered the instrument, as a 14 year-old student at Cathedral High School, also in Springfield. Our music teacher was organist there, and invited members of the school chorus to come and sing. It was during this service that I truly "discovered" the organ as a musical instrument. As years went on, the congregation at Emmanuel dwindled away to nothing, and the organ was rescued by the Austin factory, and eventually offered to St. Joseph’s. As we know, there was already the remnant of an old M.P. Möller Organ intended for installation at St. Joseph. Some creative thought was given to melding the best parts of the two organs into one cohesive instrument. The design chosen was to install steel beams in the walls of the chancel on which to place the old Austin windchests. Work was begun, then stopped, when we came on the scene. Our concept was to utilize the old Austin pneumatic mechanisms, (by 2006 mostly rebuilt,) and build new chests that would fit the specifications for this new organ in a more logical way. This would allow for better tuning access and tonal egress. As we developed the tonal and mechanical design, we also eliminated the steelwork, building the organ into proper cases, which would serve to focus the sound, conceal mechanical and non-decorative pipes, and give support without the added expense of structural additions to the building. It is important, as an organ architect, to design an instrument that is either so very stunning, that it stands alone on its own merit, or most often the case, to design an organ that looks and feels like it has always been part of the fabric of the church. While we certainly know that an organ would not have ever been installed in the sanctuary of a Catholic church built in 1923, we feel that we have achieved a sense of graceful elegance in this installation. Care was given to incorporate the stylistic elements of the gallery organ into the new instrument in the sanctuary. Tonally, we looked at the available resources, and chose to discard more of the Austin, some of the Möller, and add a few new stops, and some other substitutions. In the final tonal specification, we ended up with only three of the Austin stops being used, and three from the Möller. We built one entirely new set of pipes, rebuilt two others, and revoiced every rank to create an instrument that holds together tonally, creating another example of an instrument that should sound and perhaps feel like it has always been a part of the worship life of the church. So much new pipework (new voices, and new sounds from old pipes), new chests, new actions, etc., that we chose to assign the organ a new opus number: The 2790th organ built under the Austin name! Austin Organ Company Personnel Working On This Project:
The stops in the organ are as follows:
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