Capable of producing sounds beyond the range of human hearing, the pipe organ presents the ultimate challenge for sound recording. The first known attempt was the Columbia Records recordings of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir from late August and early September 1910, which included two organ solos played by John J. McClellan.
Probably the very first pipe organ recording was a test made on 30 August 1910, with McClellan playing Wagner’s Tannhäuser overture. Two enormous acoustic recording horns, five feet long and two feet wide, were suspended on a rope strung across the Tabernacle. Although the engineer deemed the recordings successful, apparently they were never approved for release.
This according to “The first recordings of organ music ever made” by John W. Landon (Theatre organ: Journal of the American Theatre Organ Society LIII/4 [July–August 2011] pp. 22–28). Above, the Mormon Tabernacle organ as it appeared at the time of the recording (two 15-foot wings were added in 1915).
The heyday of the mortuary pipe organ was the 1920s and 1930s; only a few have been built since World War II. A uniquely American product, the instrument’s characteristics departed significantly from those of the conventional church organ, despite its quasi-liturgical setting and function.
U.S. organ builders, long known for their innovations, met the stringent tonal, space, and cost requirements of funeral homes, cemetery chapels, and mausoleums so successfully that their instruments displaced the reed organ and piano. Over 600 mortuary organs were sold during this period, contributing significantly to the industry’s survival during the Great Depression.
In 1996 Mira Omerzel-Terlep reported that a bone fragment excavated at the Divje Babe I cave site in Slovenia is considered to be the oldest man-made flute, dating from 45,000 years ago (“Koščene piščali: Pričetek slovenske, evropske in svetovne inštrumentalne glasbene zgodovine” [Bone whistles: Origins of the Slovenian, European, and world history of instrumental music], Etnolog: Glasnik Slovenskega Etnografskega Muzeja/Bulletin of the Slovene Ethnographic Museum VI, pp. 235–294). Further studies sought to demonstrate that the fragment had originally belonged to an instrument capable of producing a diatonic scale.
Other researchers were skeptical, though, and in 1998 Paola Villa et al. tried to put the speculation to rest, showing that the holes in the bone were the results of gnawing by animals (“A Middle Paleolithic origin of music? Using cave-bear bone accumulations to assess the Divje Babe I bone ‘flute’”, Antiquity LXXII/275 [March], pp. 65–79).
The argument has not abated. In 2002 a pair of essays staking out the opposing camps was issued in Archäologie früher Klangerzeugung und Tonordnung/The archaeology of sound origin and organization; Musikarchäologie in der Ägäis und Anatolien/Music archaeology in the Aegean and Anatolia (Rahden: Leidorf); April Nowell states that the results of taphonomic testing offered no viable proof that the bone fragment was an instrument (“Is a cave bear bone from Divje Babe, Slovenia, a Neanderthal flute?” pp. 69–81) while Robert Fink presents research supports the theory that it was (“The Neanderthal flute and origin of the scale: Fang or flint? A response” pp. 83–87).
More recently, an exhaustive study by Cajus G. Diedrich of Paleo-Logic, Independent Institute of Geosciences, ends with the conclusion that “The ‘cave bear cub femora with holes’ are, in all cases, neither instruments nor human made at all” (Royal Society Open Science, 2 : 140022; the paper can be read in full here).
Still, the controversy is alive and thriving on the Internet.
Below, Ljuben Dimkaroski performs on a reconstruction of the alleged original bone flute.
The long-lost pipe organ that belonged to the steamship Britannic, the sister ship of the Titanic, was identified in the collection of the Museum für Musikautomaten in Seewen, Switzerland, when restorers in 2007 discovered the inscription Britanik engraved on each beam under the instrument’s windchests.
After the outbreak of World War I in 1914 the British Admiralty requisitioned all large passenger ships as troop transports or hospital ships, so the Britannic was never outfitted for transocean luxury traffic. Around 1920 the organ, built around 1913 by M. Welte & Söhne, was installed in the villa of the camera manufacturer and designer August Nagel (1882–1943) in Stuttgart; around 1935 he returned it to the manufacturer for unknown reasons. In 1937 it was moved to the reception room of the Radium electric light company in Wipperfürth, where it remained in use until the 1960s.
When the Wipperfürth reception room was turned into a storeroom, the organ was offered for sale but attracted no buyers. Eventually it came to the attention of Heinrich Weiss, the founder of the Museum für Musikautomaten, who quickly acquired it for his collection; the instrument was completed and reinaugurated there On 30 May 1970, but its identity and history remained unknown for decades.
In 1909 John Wanamaker bought the instrument for his new emporium. Thirteen freight cars were required to ship it, and installation took two years. The Grand Organ was first heard in the seven-story atrium on 22 June 1911; later that year it was prominently featured when President William Howard Taft dedicated the store. During the following 20 years it was continuously enlarged under the direction of William Boone Fleming.
Daily recitals by store employees provided a harmonious environment for shopping, and special performances, such as annual Christmas concerts, provided outreach to the community. Today the store is owned by Macy’s, and the traditions continue.
This according to “The Grand Court organ” by Ralph Blakely (The musical times CXXX/ 1761 [November 1989] pp. 703–707). Below, Virgil Fox discusses and performs on the organ.
The 200th anniversary of Chopin’s birth in 2010 inspired the launch of a new Russian-language quaterly dedicated to piano, PianоФорум (PianoForum). Published by Международная Муызкально-Техническая Компания (International Music-Technical Company) and edited by the musicologist, pianist, and pedagogue Vsevolod Zaderackij, the journal covers diverse aspects of contemporary pianism, including instrument building, piano repertoire and interpretation, piano competitions and festivals, and piano pedagogy from the beginning level to professional training. A description of the contents of issue no. 3 (2010) in Russian is here.
With his background as a professional jazz guitarist and his MFA in painting, Ken Butler had a long-standing interest in combining his two passions, but he couldn’t find the right connection. Then one night an axe in his basement caught his eye.
In about an hour and a half he had added a bridge, strings, and a contact microphone to the axe. As he describes it, “Suddenly the world opened up to me in terms of “That’s a cello. That’s a violin.’”
Since that night Butler has built hundreds of hybrid instruments, which he describes as “anxious objects”. While all of them can be played, he considers most of them to be primarily collage sculptures; but some of them sound good enough that he considers them real instruments, and performs on them. His raw materials have included a toy Uzi, a motorcycle manifold, and parts of discarded mannequins (inset).
On 17 November 2010 Na Píobairí Uilleann launched Na Píobairí Uilleann: Source, an Internet resource that includes Irish music web tutors, Irish music collections dating back to 1724, reed-making and pipe-making videos, recitals, and historical data on iconic musicians.
While the site is specifically intended to support students of uilleann piping, pipe-making, and maintenance, it includes material of interest to players of other traditional instruments, traditional singers, and all lovers of Irish traditional music.
Source is a free collection; membership in Na Píobairí Uilleann enables use of organizational tools to create personal bookmarks and galleries. Content will be added regularly, and the site’s design provides for possible future enhancements such as the ability for members to upload and share their own content.
Many thanks to Patrick Hutchinson for bringing this to our attention! Below, Séamus Ennis plays Pat Ward’s jig on the uilleann pipes.
In 2010 the Organ Historical Society Press launched its series OHS monographs in American organ history with Organbuilding along the Erie and Chenango Canalsby Stephen L. Pinel. The book chronicles the careers of the organ builders Alvinza and George N. Andrews of Utica, New York, and their innovative use of the canals to undercut their Boston and New York competition in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Organ is published in Russian with a collective summary in English; it is edited by the musicologist, organist, and pedagogue Evgeniâ Krivickaâ. Introducing instruments from around the world with specifications and photographs, and providing interviews and reports on organ events, the journal addresses a wide range of readers, from organists and organ builders to students and teachers, and everyone interested in organ music.
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