This year to date

Saturday August 2nd at Ss Peter & John, Rugby

A Successful Young Organists recital was held on the 3M ‘Bevington allsorts’ pipe organ.  The Programme is as shown below.  There were five performers with an age range from 10 to 22.

1) Suite Gothique, Op. 25 Léon Boëllmann (1862 – 1897)
Choral – Menuet - Prière à Notre-Dame - Toccata

2) Prelude and Fugue in F – probably by Krebbs/Bach? (BWV 556)
  ‘Star Wars’ main theme – John Williams

         The Wallace and Gromit Theme Tune – Julian Nott

3) Rondo AllaTurca  W.A. Mozart from Piano Sonata No.11 K331
Le Coucou (Rondeau), Louis-Claude Daquin (1694 – 1772) Op. 1 No.16

4) Cantina Band by John Williams, arranged Dan Coates

         Any Dream will Do Andrew Lloyd Webber.

5) Prelude and Fugue in G major, probably by Krebbs/J S Bach? (BWV 557)

        ‘The Holy Boy’ John Ireland

         Trumpet Tune in D Major by Alex Hooton First Performance

There was a good audience with over 40 people, and each performance was completed with good applause.
(A recording of all the performances is available here . The first item was taken from an earlier performance on 27th July following a service on a different instrument in Bilton).

Approximate Timings are shown below:
1 L B Toccata from St Mark's, 00.00 - 03.39

2 Bach - J Nott - J Williams, 03.41 - 10.14

3 Mozart - Daquin 10.23 - 17.07

4 Lloyd Webber - John Williams, 17.10 - 21.46

5 Bach - John Ireland - A Hooton 21.48 - 30.55

The afternoon finished with a RCO ‘Play the Organ Year’ event which was well supported with about 8 children and some adults seeing the inside of the Organ in the pipe chamber and ‘Having a go’ on the Organ supervised by Will Uglow DOM at St Andrew’s Rugby.

Saturday July 19th at Holy Trinity Attleborough, Nuneaton

Philip Norman, founder of Organists Online, gave a fascinating visual and audio presentation entitled '1,000 years of British Organ Building' . We were joined by several members of the former Leicestershire Organists Association, and afterwards enjoyed refrehments, chat and discussion.  Philip kindly provided the following summary of his talk:

1,000 Years of British Organ Building

Early Years

It’s reckoned that Irish monks brought the art of organ building to the mainland, but no real information exists until we find out that St Aethelwold of Abingdon and St Dunstan in the west of England had organs built. The most interesting is St Alphage who, in 951 or thereabouts, had an instrument built in Winchester cathedral with four hundred pipes, and twenty-six pairs of bellows manned by seventy strong men (all at once or on a rota?). This would have been like a giant mixture with no individual stops, was probably used to mark important liturgical moments (a bit like bells) and, allegedly, could be heard outside the city. It couldn’t have played anything subtle and the “keys” were sliders or levers hit with the fist.

Tudor Organs

Whatever happened over the next half a millennium is poorly recorded but we know that the first mention of stops in England was for an organ in Westerham, Kent in 1511/12

By now, there were different pitch standards for organs as compared to those used by choirs. For instance, in 1519 Antony Duddyngton produced an organ for All Hallows, Barking-by-the-Tower for which the lowest note, two octaves below middle C (that is, CC) had a (speaking) pipe length of 5’, which would make tenor C, one octave below middle C, about 2.5’. About a century later, choral sources were recording that a 2.5’ pipe produced a tenor F. During this period of pitch confusion, it was not uncommon to find organ accompaniments for anthems written out a 4th lower to accommodate the difference.

The instruments themselves were single manual, with a selection of flue pipes which (in our pitch conventions) would have been at 8’, 4’, 2’, and 1’ pitches. There were no reeds and (apart from an occasional Twelfth) no mutations. And certainly no pedals.

Stuart Organs

In 1606 it’s recorded that a second manual was added to the organ in King’s College Cambridge, then in Trinity College and, in 1613, Thomas Dallam installed an instrument in Worcester Cathedral with two manuals. The lowest key was CC but the speaking length of the longest pipe was 10’, so the pitch convention mentioned above still applied. The stop list was, Tudor like, mainly unisons and octaves with one twelfth, and still no pedals, reeds, or mixtures. However, for the first time, dialogues between manuals became a possibility.

Commonwealth Organs

The time of Cromwell was, in the short term, a disaster for organs as many were destroyed and their tin/lead pipes turned into pewter beer mugs. However, organ builders like Dallam and Harris fled to France and came face to face with instruments replete with mixtures, mutations, reeds and, in some parts of the country, manuals with a compass below CC. This was to bear rich fruit for English organ building when the Restoration of the Monarchy created more favourable conditions in England.

Restoration Organs

Quick to get back into action in England when the time was right, Ralph Dallam produced and instrument for St George’s, Windsor in 1660. It is a sign of things to come. The lowest key is GG (a fourth below CC) and, apart from the convention Tudor/Stuart Diapasons, Principal and Fifteenth, has a divided Sesquialtera/Cornet, and a divided Trumpet. It only has one manual, but this is compensated for by the introduction of “Shifting Movements” which reduce the number of stops in operation when used.

During the period of English organ builders adopting longer compass manuals but also at a more “modern” pitch (CC = CC) pipes from old organs were used in new but with reassigned pitch names. (Cs became Gs and so on).

When Bernard Smith (Bernhardt Schmidt) relocated to England from Germany, he brought with him a whole new set of ideas. These are visible in his 1684 instrument for the Temple Church, London. This is English in its compass but full of strange names like “Prestand” and “Hohlflute” but, more importantly, it had three manuals. The third, the “Eccho” had its pipes permanently enclosed in a box for (you’ve got it) echo effects.

This plan, essentially, became the basis for English Organs for the next 130 years: two full length manuals from GG (Great and Choir or Chayre) and a set of stops in a box with the lowest key being, variously, Middle C, G or (later F). That’s why so many voluntaries from the time feature echo effects.

Abraham Jordan in St Magnus, London Bridge in 1712 added an awkward foot operated lever that, when depressed, raised a sliding flap to the enclosing box of the Echo manual which allowed more noise to get out – the sound could be “swelled”.

But, generally speaking, English organs were now stuck where they were: no pedals (except for a rare set of pull-downs) and an absence of game-changing new concepts. As the 18th C changed to the 19th C, muddled concepts of what pedals could do filtered over the channel, Schreider actually built an octave of pedal pipes for Westminster Abbey in 1778, and the voluntaries of William Russell (1810/12) actually included some independent pedal parts. But there was a growing interest in and discovery of the music of Bach and …

The Hill/Gaunlett Revolution

William Hill (organ builder) and John Henry Gauntlett (musician) knew a thing or two about German organs so, in 1841; they were behind the new instrument in S George’s Chapel, Liverpool. It had four manuals starting from CC (very German, and sweeping away the old English GG compass), the Swell was of equal importance as the Great and, miracles of miracles, there were over two octaves of pedals with stops at 16’ (x3), 8’, 4’ pitch and a five rank mixture. This organ could play anything that Bach had written.

Town Hall Organs

Just as the English organ achieved some sort of continental maturity, it slowly bowed to the demands or playing orchestral transcriptions so popular in town halls. For these, organists demanded a rich selection of solo stops and placed less emphasis on a developed chorus structure. Apart from new sounds, developments in stop management (combination pedals and thumb pistons), balanced easy-use swell boxes, and mechanical bellows allowing high wind pressures, led to a period of what some people considered to be decline as the true nature of what an organ was became lost in a striving for novel effects.

Revival

Initiated by Albert Schweitzer in 1920’ Germany, the Organ Reform Movement sort to return organ building to the ideals of the 18th C, with low wind pressures, structured choruses and design based on function. This largely passed by Britian until Ralph Downes designed the organ for the Festival Hall, London in 1954. Although considered at the time to be awful by some (Vaughan Williams for instance) and others a mish-mash of German and French ideas, it certainly cattle-prodded English organ builders. Apart from overtly Teutonic instruments, such as the Grant, Degens and Bradbeer organ in New College, Oxford (1969), rebuilds of Victorian and Edward organ sometime included a Postive manual of tinkling mutations supported by little more than a gentle Gedact. But things settled down and more modern instruments (such as Peter Collins’ Paddington Green organ acknowledge both their English and German heritage.

The Future

Ah, who knows!

Saturday June 14th - Play the Organ year Event at Rugby School.

The Coventry and Warwickshire Organists Association and Rugby School collaborated to host a highly engaging “Play the Organ” event on Saturday 14th June. This special day was designed to offer attendees the unique opportunity to explore, understand, and play the historic organs of Rugby School.

The event was jointly organised by Ian Wicks, Head of Keyboard at Rugby School, alongside Peter Lock and Gillian Potts from CWOA. They were ably supported on the day by volunteers and staff from both Rugby School and the CWOA.

A total of 13 participants attended, comprising eight adults and five children. Attendees came with a wide range of musical experience, from complete beginners to those preparing for Grade 8 piano, including three children currently learning the organ.

The event began with an introductory session in the Rugby School Chapel, led by Ian Wicks. Ian presented the recently refurbished and enhanced chapel organ, which now includes a brand-new Bombarde division comprising  Bass Tuba 16’, Tuba Mirabilis 8’, Tuba Clarion 4’ on new chests on heavy-pressure. Ian provided a clear and fascinating overview of the organ console and its connection to the pipes, supported by live demonstrations showcasing a variety of tonal colours. He concluded the session with a powerful rendition of Geoffrey Bush’s Trumpet March, composed for the 1981 royal wedding of Prince Charles and Diana Spencer, which highlighted the commanding sound of the new Tuba Mirabilis.

Participants then split into two groups.  Attendees had been encouraged in advance to bring music they could play comfortably, and everyone who wished to perform had approximately 15 minutes of playing time. The event was designed to be inclusive and supportive, allowing all participants to experience the organs first-hand.

One group stayed in the chapel with Ian Wicks, while the other visited the nearby Temple Speech Room, where they met the magnificent 33-rank, three-manual Bryceson historic organ (mainly straight Tracker but Gt with Barker Lever), led by CWOA President Adrian Moore. After participants had a chance to play the instrument, Adrian gave a brief demonstration, including an excerpt from the Gothic Suite by Léon Boëllmann.

Alongside the practical sessions, Peter Lock curated a fascinating display of organ pipes and parts, while a selection of music from the CWOA sheet music library was also on show. These displays generated lots of of interest from participants and volunteers alike.

The afternoon concluded with thanks from the CWOA Secretary Peter Harris to everyone involved and an explanation of how the CWOA can support those wishing to pursue their interest in the organ further. Certificates were presented to all attendees in recognition of their involvement.

CWOA would like to extend sincere thanks to Richard Tanner, Director of Music at Rugby School, for his generous hospitality and for granting access to the school’s exceptional buildings and instruments. We are looking forward to returning before too long.

The Annual General Meeting of the Association took place at the church of St Marie, Rugby,  on Saturday 15th March 2025. There were 13 members who attended, with apologies from 13 more. The minutes of this meeting can be found here, and the Treasurer's Accounts here. After the AGM we were provided with an excellent buffet lunch organised by our Treasurer, Ian Leonard.

After lunch our President Adrian Moore gave a superb organ recital. The programme is here.  Unfortunately the organ (not the organist!) malfunctioned for a bar or so during the second item - the Bach BWV 622 -, so it has been omitted from Peter Lock's recording of the complete recital, which may be listened to here.