The Organ
Henry Willis and Sons Ltd (1895, 1932, 2014)
All Saints has a fine Willis organ, most recently refurbished by Henry Willis and Sons in 2014. The heart of the instrument is considered a late example of a ‘Father’ Henry Willis, one of the best-known Victorian organ builders.
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The original organ was placed in the gallery above the Vestry, which is now the Parish Office (you can still see where the organist would have sat above the Vestry door to the Chancel; it was ordered on 12th September 1893 and installed by the end of the year, in time for the rededication of the first stage of the Victorian church that we have today. Unfortunately, as so often happens, the organ was starved of funds so only 14 of the planned 32 stops had been installed by the end of 1893. A further 7 were installed over the next few years, but the organ as planned was never completed.
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With Sir Ninan Comper’s re-arrangement of the church, which started in 1932 and included building the elaborate gallery and organ case that you see today, Willis rebuilt and re-arranged the organ to its current position. As previously, the money ran out – the third manual was left ‘prepared for’ and only installed in 1957, some ranks of pipes were not completed until the 1980s, and others were not completed at all. There was even a bottom octave of Diapason pipes found lying on top of the swell box when it was most recently removed!
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In 1985, Percy Daniel overhauled the organ, installing the Great Mixture and finally connecting the 32’ Bass, but limited funds meant that the organ still couldn’t be completed as planned.
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It was not until Willis removed the organ in 2012 for a thorough overhaul, nearly 120 years after it was first installed, that all the ‘prepared for’ and incomplete ranks of pipes were finally completed. As part of this work the console was made mobile and placed on the floor of the Nave (it has small wheels underneath), the great pipework was moved from its original position inside the case and placed behind the chair case where the console had been, and the inside of the case was comprehensively re-organised to improve the egress of sound and make maintenance much easier.
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The console now connects to the organ via a single data cable, and just needs a 13amp plug socket to work. The refurbished organ was first played for services on Sunday 23rd February 2014.
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The organ is tuned to A=437Hz, as it was in 1985, which is slightly below standard pitch and means we can’t use it with the piano (which is tuned to A=440Hz).
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The Stops
Great
16 Bourdon (A)
8 Open Diapason No.1
8 Open Diapason No.2
8 Dulciana
8 Claribel Flute
4 Principal
4 Harmonic Flute
2 Fifteenth
II Mixture
8 Tromba (from Choir)
Swell to Great
Swell to Great Octave
Swell to Great Sub Octave
Choir to Great
Choir to Great Octave
Choir to Great Sub Octave
Swell
8 Open Diapason
8 Lieblich Gedackt
8 Salicional
8 Vox Angelica
4 Gemshorn
4 Flûte Triangulaire
III Mixture
16 Waldhorn
8 Trumpet
8 Oboe
4 Clarion
Tremolo
Swell Octave
Swell Sub Octave
Swell Unison Off
Choir
8 Viola da Gamba
8 Gedackt
8 Dulciana
4 Nason Flute
2 2/3 Nazard
2 Flautino
1 3/5 Terz
8 Clarinet
8 Tromba (B)
Tremolo
Choir Octave
Choir Sub Octave
Choir Unison Off
Swell to Choir
Swell to Choir Octave
Swell to Choir Sub Octave
Pedal
32 Resultant Bass (A)
16 Open Bass (C)
16 Bourdon (A)
8 Octave (C)
8 Flute (A)
4 Super Octave
32 Contra Bombarde
Acoustique (B)
16 Trombone (B)
Swell to Pedal
Swell Super to Pedal
Choir to Pedal
Choir Super to Pedal
Great to Pedal
Great and Pedal combs.
Bass Toe Pistons Exch.
How does it work?
With 3 manuals, a set of pedals, over 2,000 pipes, a very complicated-looking network of trunking for the air snaking around the floor of the gallery, several miles of cables connecting it all up and a computer to make it all work it all sounds very complicated… but the basic principle isn’t!
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Each keyboard is called a manual – we have 3 manuals plus a set of pedal stops:
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Great – the louder stops to lead congregational singing
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Swell – the pipes are in a box with shutters on the front, the shutters are controlled by a pedal under the manuals which opens and closes the shutters allowing the organist the vary the amount of sound coming out of the box
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Choir – similar to the great but with smaller stops to accompany the choir
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Pedals – the big and boomy bass pipes, played with the feet
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Each manual has its own set of pipes which is divided into ranks, and each rank of pipes has a pipe for each note on the keyboard. Each rank of pipes has a different sound varying from quiet string sounds to a big loud trumpet, and all sorts in between; some are metal, some are wooden, some have stops in the top, some are open; the smallest pipe we have is about 2 inches tall and the biggest is about 8 feet!
In the Crypt is an electric blower, which is basically a big mechanical set of lungs to blow air into the organ. The air gets blown from the Crypt up the tube behind the staircase to the gallery, then through the network of trunking around the organ to the various ranks of pipes.
Once the air is running to the organ, the organist can pull out one of the stops at the console to control which rank of pipes he wants to make a sound – pulling out the stop opens up the holes under that rank of pipes and primes them for use.
The organist then presses one of the keys on the keyboard, which operates a magnet underneath the pipe to open the flap (called a pallet), the air then flows through the gap and out of the pipe to make a sound. It’s the same basic principle as blowing a whistle, it’s just that the organ has 2000 whistles, can play several at the same time, and has mechanical lungs to blow the air (hence the nickname box of whistles!).
The organist can pull out multiple stops at the same time to use several ranks of pipes, and even transfer ranks of pipes between keyboards to mix different sounds. If you look carefully at the stops on the organ console you’ll also see a little number underneath each one, which tells the organist how low/high that rank of pipes is – the bigger the number, the lower the rank of pipes.
You’ll also see various little round buttons with numbers on underneath the keyboards – the organist can use the organ’s computer to set these so that pressing a button pulls out combinations of multiple stops at once.