Chapter XIV How We Stand To-Day
Looking backward over the field we have traversed we find that the modern organ is an entirely different instrument from that of the Nineteenth Century.
Tracker action, bellows weights, the multitude of weak, drab-toned stops, have disappeared, and in their place we have stops of more musical character, greater volume, under perfect and wide control; new families of string and orchestral tones; great flexibility, through transference of stops; an instrument of smaller bulk than the old one, but yet of infinitely greater resources.
In his “Handbook of the Organ” (page 24), J. Matthews says: “There can be no finality in organ building. Whilst the violin fascinates by its perfection, the organ does so no less by its almost infinite possibilities, and modern science is fast transforming it into a highly sensitive instrument. The orchestral effects and overwhelming crescendos possible from such organs as those described in this work, ‘double touch,’ new methods of tone production, such as the Diaphone, the ease with which all the resources of a powerful instrument can now be placed instantaneously at the performer’s command are developments of which Bach and Handel never dreamed.”
And the modern tendency of the best builders is to make the organ still more orchestral in character, by the addition of carillons and other percussion stops.
The late W. T. Best, one of the finest executants who ever lived, stated to a friend of the writer who asked him why he never played the Overture to Tannhauser, that he considered its adequate rendition upon the organ impossible, “after having had the subject under review for a long time.” Nowadays many organists find it possible to play the Overture to Tannhauser; the writer pleads guilty himself. Dr. Peace played it at the opening of Mr. White’s organ at Balruddery and stated that he found the fine string tones it contained of peculiar value for Wagnerian orchestral effects. Dr. Gabriel Bédart says that music ought to be specially written for these new instruments.
While we associate the organ chiefly with its use in Church services, a new field is opening up for it in Concert Halls, Theatres, Auditoriums, College and School Buildings, Ballrooms of Hotels, Public Parks and Seaside Resorts, not as a mere adjunct to an orchestra but to take the place of the orchestra itself. The Sunday afternoon recitals in the College of the City of New York are attended by upwards of 2,500 people, many hundreds being unable to gain admittance; and the daily recitals at Ocean Grove during July and August, 1909, reaped a harvest of upwards of $4,000 in admission fees. Organs have been installed in some of the palatial hotels in New York and other cities, and one is planned for an ocean pier, where the pipes will actually stand under sea level, the sound being reflected where wanted and an equable temperature maintained by thermostats.
Organists have found it necessary to make special study of these new instruments, and the University of the State of New York has thought the matter of sufficient importance to justify it in chartering the “Hope-Jones Unit Orchestra School” as an educational institution.
Our review would be incomplete without some mention of