The Recent Revolution in Organ Building: Being an Account of Modern Developments — John Stuart Mill — John Shaqi
The Recent Revolution in Organ Building: Being an Account of Modern Developments
John Stuart Mill · en
At the commencement of the period of which we are treating, the stops
belonging to the Swell organ could be drawn on that keyboard only;
similarly the stops on the Great, Choir and Pedal organs could be drawn
only on their respective keyboards. It is now becoming more and more
common to arrange for the transference of stops from one keyboard to
another.
If this plan be resorted to as an effort to make an insufficient number
of stops suffice for a large building, it is bound to end in
disappointment and cannot be too strongly condemned. On the other
hand, if an organ-builder first provides a number stops that furnish
sufficient variety of tonal quality and volume that is ample for the
building in which the instrument is situated, and then arranges for the
transference of a number of the stops to other manuals than their own,
he will be adding to the tonal resources of the instrument in a way
that is worthy of commendation. Many organs now constructed have their
tonal effects more than doubled through adoption of this principle.
It is difficult to say who first conceived the idea of transference of
stops, but authentic instances occurring in the sixteenth century can
be pointed out. During the last fifty years many builders have done
work in this direction, but without question the leadership in the
movement must be attributed to Hope-Jones. While others may have
suggested the same thing, he has worked the system out practically in a
hundred instances, and has forced upon the attention of the organ world
the artistic advantages of the plan.
His scheme of treating the organ as a single unit and rendering it
possible to draw any of the stops on any of the keyboards at any
(reasonable) pitch, was unfolded before the members of the Royal
College of Organists in London at a lecture he delivered on May 5, 1891.
When adopting this system in part, he would speak of "unifying" this,
that or the other stop, and this somewhat inapt phrase has now been
adopted by other builders and threatens to become general.
Extraordinary claims of expressiveness, flexibility and artistic
balance are made by those who preside at "unit (Hope-Jones) organs,"
but this style of instrument is revolutionary and has many opponents.
Few, however, can now be found who do not advocate utilization of the
principle to a greater or less degree in every organ. For instance,
who has not longed at times that the Swell Bourdon could be played by
the pedals? Or that the Choir Clarinet were also in the Swell?
Compton, of Nottingham, England, employs this plan of stop extension
and transference, or unifying of stops, in all the organs he builds.