There was an organ
in
this church before Wicks' Opus 2735 was installed in
1946, but no records of it have been located. Some older
parishioners
remember as children seeing exposed organ pipes
that partial covered the windows in the rear choir loft
gallery. It's possible that some of the pipes from that
organ
were included in the 1946 installation, as some of the current
pipes
show evidence of use in an older organ (see photo below).
The thirteen-rank
Opus
2735 included a variety of colorful string stops and several
bold
diapasons, as well as contrasting flute and reed
ranks. As was common in relatively small church organs in
the
first half of the 20th century, brightness was achieved through
the
narrow scaling of string and diapason ranks (the narrow scaling
brings
out the upper
harmonics in individual pipes) rather than by adding
higher-pitched
principals and mixtures. These varying timbres blended
overhead
in
this high-ceiling room, filling it with a smooth, warm sound
that fit
the nature of chant-based liturgical music and
popular devotional music and hymns of the pre-Vatican II parish
church.
By the early 1980s
the
organ had suffered, perhaps from water
damage around the bell tower, as new bottom-boards were put on
some of
the chests on the tower side of the organ. A switch was
made to a
solid state
relay system,
thus eliminating use of the
mechanical-electrical linkages in the stop and coupler actions.
In 2009, seven new
ranks of
pipes were made by the Wicks shop to blend with the original
thirteen
unified ranks
to
add brightness, greater clarity of voices and increased
independence of
stops, while
intentionally maintaining the historic character and tonal color
of the
instrument. The new
pipes are on newly added chests placed inside the existing
chambers;
except for the new pedal
principal pipes which are
placed in decorative oak casework on the outside of the
chambers.
The console has been refurbished, including optical key
contacts, a new
multi-level combination
memory system and a MIDI sequencer allowing record/playback and
synthesized sounds playable on the MIDI stops. The
relay
system received further upgrading and most of the reed pipes
were sent to the Wicks shop for refurbishing. Sam
Bowerman, the
Kentucky/Southern Indiana area representative for Wicks and
proprietor
of River City Organ Works in Louisville, led the planning and
installation phases of the project. On-site tonal
finishing was provided by Christopher Soer and Jonathan
Lester. Re-dedication recitals were performed in 2010 on
January 9 by Neal Biggers and June 26 by Karen Schneider Kerner.
In the fall of
2011, an electrical surge during a lightning storm burned out
several of the new electrical components of the organ rendering
it unplayable for weeks as insurance claims were pursued for
tens of thousands of dollars in repairs.
-Neal Biggers,
Director of Music and Liturgical Ministries
New Harmonic Flute
Evidence of stenciling on existing pipes installed in1946,
obviously from an earlier organ.
Sound
and
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