An Elegy for an Old Organ
I HEAR that the electronic organ in St. Mary's church has been taken away.
In its later years, this idiosyncratic box of wires and diodes was a nightmare
to coax into action: indeed, it occasionally coaxed itself into action quite
spontaneously, and often during the prayers, with sudden loud crackles, or
penetrating buzzings like that of a trapped bumble-bee, or even by tuning into
the odd passing taxi-driver, or local radio station, no less!
Nevertheless, during my tenure as organist there several years ago, I spent many enjoyable hours practising and performing on that organ, for two main reasons.
First, the electronic organ had two keyboards. This meant that the vast majority of the classical organ repertoire was playable on it. As many of you are aware, the principle difference between an organ and a piano is the presence of more than one keyboard in the former and, as a result, all the greatest organcomposers (Bach, Franck, Tournemire, Vierne, Widor, Alain, Durufle, Messiaen) exploited this facility. With only one keyboard (as on the two nonelectronic organs still present in St. MaryÕs) one's repertoire is severely limited.
And the presence of a second keyboard gave the liturgical-organist another major advantage: with it the player was able to "solo out" a melody, so enabling the congregation to hear, very clearly, the melody of a hymn or psalm-chant being played over before they sang it. This was particularly useful when the clergy would choose less-thanfamiliar hymns and chants, God forbid!
Secondly, the electronic organ also possessed an astonishing tonal palette: the number, and variety, of "stops" on both keyboard and the pedal department gave the organist wonderful opportunities for varying the sound of the organ, both in terms of colour and in volume, and this could greatly enhance hymn-singing and psalm-chanting, matching the sound of the music to the meaning of the texts. For the interpretation of organ music, the electronic organ was amazingly gifted at producing all the apposite colours necessary for even the most esoteric of pieces by Messiaen, much to the annoyance of much of the congregation, alas!
Together, these properties of the electronic organ enabled me to compose all of my commissioned works for solo organ on this instrument from 1993 to 1999; works that went on to be premiered and recorded at Festivals around Britain, France and Switzerland.
But the St. Mary's electronic organ did have its down-side. Heaven help the organist who was down to play on Sunday morning after a cleaner, or flower-arranger, or exuberant young person rushing around, or vicar's dog, had accidentally knocked, and moved, the organ console during the Saturday. Then, no amount of flicking the on-andoff switch would coax those tired old electrons into action! Instead, there would be an angry volley of gunfire from the loud-speakers (appropriately draped in black) sprawled across the jube, followed by complete silence. Only after many patient and seductive hours of therapeutic nursing from our village electronic expert, Sidney Hewitt (who lives very close to the church, though he was occasionally beginning to regret this fact), with his screws, and nudges, and winks, and soothing oils, and manipulative fingers, was he able to persuade the old girl to rouse herself and sing her heart out once more for us.
But, alas, she is no more. Her "schwannengesang" has finally been sung, and now her speakers are rusting, mould gathers round her foundations, and rain seeps into her bourdons. But, perhaps she will still hear us, maybe, as we pass her by, in a taxi!