 |
|
 |
|
|
|
The work commenced in the Durham factory, Hawthorne Terrace. As with all pipe organs and even to the present day the whole "job " is built and erected in the works before being transported to the church. Metal pipes are made from sheets which are a mixture of lead and tin and the sheets are actually cast at the works. Inferior metal pipes can be identified because of the l lack of spots showing the organ builder has skimped on the inclusion of tin. Without the rigidity of the tin in the pipe metal the pipes will start to collapse and become distorted at the base or boot. Wooden pipes are fabricated using the fine seasoned wood, actions with high quality leather motors and lead pneumatic piping cut to length. The intricate work of building the console and covering keys with ivory, turning the stopheads out of ivory. Nowadays we realise the problem to wildlife using ivory causes but there really is nothing as comfortable to play as an ivory covered keyboard, sadly however, even if the trade was regulated and the ivory was obtained when the elephant had finished with it. The greed of some men would open up a whole illegal and aborant trade. Modern organs use bone covered keys and stopheads are cast from a plastic called Ivorthene. When a pipe is fabricated in either metal, wood or reed the whole rank goes to the voicing shop. There the voicer (a highly skilled trade) sets the pipe on speech. He uses a sound board with a small key board, in fact a miniature organ, to hear his work. It is also where the sounds of different ranks of pipes are made to blend. There is a world of difference between a collection of stops and an organ. All stops blend on the Bedford Harrison, a hallmark of good organ building. After the pipes are voiced and all the action is manufactured the organ is erected in the works and thoroughly tested with another voicing session to make the special Harrison sound. On completion of satisfactory testing and voicing the whole organ was packed up and crated for shipping to Bedford Church It was in November 1920 that the Harrison team came to Leigh to start to erect the organ in the Church. The architect, unlike many architects, had considered the organ and left ample space in the north east portion of the church for the new three manual instrument. Space indeed for the longest pedal pipe of not quite 32 ft. The console is elevated so the organist can see the choir or indeed conductor. A friend of mine once told me that the Bedford Harrison was to have been a four manual but the Vicar would not give up his vestry. There is no proof of this and it is merely hearsay. The biggest problem was getting the air from the blowing plant to the main bellows and there is much correspondence between Harrisons, Manchester diocese and the Architect. The blowing plant is located underground in a room off the old choir vestry, down the steps at the north east end of the church and again it is the finest, a Watkins and Watkinson electric three phase blowing plant. Also included is a humidifier to keep the soft leather work of the action supple and in good condition. The organs wind system has been particularly well designed and is an example of how there was no skimping either in money or effort. During the 1997 work on the choir and pedal divisions it was discovered that each manual division had two reservoirs feeding wind to each side (C and C#) of the pipework. The erection of the organ must not have gone without incident. Here is a letter from Geoffrey Greenough to Arthur Harrison
(Church life in the nineteen twenties nothing changes much.) Finally after the organ was erected in Bedford Church records show Arthur Harrison came to Leigh to carry out the final Voicing. This would be a precise operation voicing and regulating the whole organ to fit the building. Mr. Harrison would have stood in the nave of the church and listened to every pipe individually. One can imagine Mr. Harrison issuing orders to the charge hand and apprentice to open and close the boot the pipes to regulate the volume and performing exacting operation on the mouths of the flue work to ensure the correct harmonic content, more importantly the right sound for Bedford Church. The reeds or trumpets were a passion of Arthur Harrison and smooth reeds were already in vogue at many Cathedrals in the UK . The Bedford organ is a fine example of this particular work. After the organ had taken time to settle down the opening recital was given by Edward Bairstow Organist of York Minster on the 27th April 1921. Edward Bairstow wrote to Arthur Harrison asking for a fee of fifteen guineas as he would have to stay over night and cancel some pupils. Later that year a well know recitalist M Marcel Dupré played. Marcel Dupré was at the time organist at the prestigious Cathedral of Notré Dame Paris. Probably one of the best organists of his time and like all French organists superb at improvisation
I often wonder what Marcel Dupré thought of the Harrison. Did he like it? It is so different from a French organ. I believe he did. From the book, George Thalben-Ball by Jonathan Rennert, Dupré and Thalben-Ball were great friends and colleagues. Marcel Dupré commented to Thalben-Ball how much he loved the English Diapason as they were larger and less harmonically developed that the French Montres. If this is the case he would certainly have loved the Bedford Diapasons especially the large Open Diapason. Latest Information Throughout the organs history there has been a record of rain getting in. The structure between the organ chamber roof (which incidentally is flat) and the north bay allows the ingress of rain. In December 1994 the whole of the great division started to seize up and parts of the swell. It was water from the roof. The pedal division took the biggest battering and the Geigen 16’ failed completely and the 32’ open wood became unreliable and ciphering. Luckily the great and swell divisions dried out without harm, a credit to the superior materials Harrison used but the Geigen and the whole pedal division was the subject of an insurance claim. Lawrence Elvins book The Harrison Story tells us that whilst Arthur Harrison had a successful organ building business he was not a rich man. He used all the finest materials and the quality of the organ and sound was the first priority. The Choir division had a burst motor on treble G so the PCC decided to have the whole division re leathered along with the pedal department. The contract for the work was awarded to David Wells, Organ Builders, Liverpool. They started work in September 1997. It caused the cancellation of the recital series but the final quality of the restoration is outstanding.
|
