Leroy Andersons "Festival of Christmas"

[Uncle Al]

Performed by the internationally acclaimed artist, Jelani Eddington
on the Allen T321Q digitally sampled theatre organ.
Turn up your volume and enjoy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WQMrfatuP1o#t=82

Uncle Al

[Gordon]

Thanks Al

I love good organ music.

[Kirbstone]

A lovely clip, Uncle Al. I'm a sucker for everything Leroy Anderson wrote. In that clip all his harmonies stayed ultra- mainstream and were all the more glorious for it.

My only caveat is that despite all those stops and tonal changes &c. the thing inescapably sounds like a Wurlitzer or similar. For my sins, in organ-speak, you can't touch the mighty sound of the big pipe organ with any substitute.

On Christmas morning they're letting me loose on two of these....7 miles apart in two different churches, so there won't be any congregation overlap and they'll each get the same fare with no surprises. This year, fresh off the practice pipeline are two Christmas numbers: 'Chestnuts roasting' &c...Ulra jazzy chord sequence that I'd never think up myself, but lovely just the same. The other is Leroy A.'s original 'Sleigh ride', best delivered at Warp speed...exciting.

Neither of these would be suitable for inclusion in a church-organ programme, however.

Tom

[Uncle Al]

The sound samples in the Allen T321Q are from Wurlitzer,
Morton, Barton and Kimball. All sampled from REAL PIPES
Wurlitzer Theatre Organs, Unit Orchestra is the pinnacle of
T.O.'s and is the most sought after sound, either for a pipe
organ installation or sampled for Virtual Theatre Pipe Organs.

Uncle Al

[crfriend]

For my sins, in organ-speak, you can't touch the mighty sound of the big pipe organ with any substitute.

Al and I have been known to occasionally engage friendly jousts about the relative charms of theatre organs and concert/church organs. He, of course lands firmly in the former camp and I in the latter, although there is much enjoyment across the fence. One could wonder what Johann Sebastian Bach might think of a Mighty Wurlitzer with all its tricks and whistles; of course he might wonder when presented with some of the true monsters in the concert organ space -- realizing that when he first sat down to compose for the instrument it was already completely and fully mature technologically, and some of the examples played in his lifetime still work.

The saddest thing about pipe organs, though, is that they are inescapably "installation pieces" and are wedded to their venue. For instance, one does not record "an organ" -- one records its interaction with its environment; the hall is as much a part of the instrument as the pipes, blowers, valves, and controls. This is why so many of the YouTube clips sound so horrible, and why you can't yank a pipe-organ from one venue and drop it into another and hope to have it sound right without much reconfiguration and fiddling. Imagine how thin and reedy the electrical output-stream from a digital "organ" would sound without the benefit of being played in a hall (or having the reverb artificially added).

The other is Leroy A.'s original 'Slay ride', best delivered at Warp speed...exciting.

"Exciting" is good, but I've found that the best pacing is that of a trotting horse which is also the most evocative. I'd imagine it's also the pace that Mr. Anderson himself would have specified. Playing it at "warp speed" somehow gives me the image of a horse with bells on attached to a vibrating-table -- which would probably really annoy the horse (and likely make a mess).

Anderson amazes me; that he came up with such familiar tunes as Sleigh Ride, The Typewriter, and The Syncopated Clock really points up how talented and versatile he was as a composer.

Neither of these would be suitable for inclusion in a church-organ programme, however.

True enough, but Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D-Minor always is, and you've got the right tool for the job!

[Uncle Al]

You want BIG



Try the Midmer-Losh in Atlantic City, NJ. It has 449 ranks of pipes
containing 33,114 pipes PLUS 81 percussion's, 1,235 stop-tabs controlling
the voices of the organ. Carl is absolutely correct when stating the venue
or "Room" is part of the instrument. The Midmer-Losh is only 25% restored
and still sounds fantastic. To give you an idea of how big "The Room" is,
a helicopter has been flown in the hall/arena where this organ is installed.

This YouTube Clip will give you an idea of how large the hall is, and as the
camera zooms in to the console, you'll see just how diminutive the console,
and artist, are compared to the hall. This next clip gives a more detailed
insight into the restoration and complexity of the instrument.

The Midmer-Losh instrument can sound like a theatre organ or a Cathedral
organ as it is a concert instrument. It has ALL of the sounds in a symphony
orchestra - each sound, other than percussion's, is produced by air blowing
through wood or metal pipes. The Midmer-Losh company took almost 4 years
to build this instrument. No pipe-organ builder today would have the courage
to create such an instrument.

Thanks to the University of Oklahoma creating the American Organ Institute,
there wouldn't be any people fully trained to create, restore or maintain
these instruments.

Tom mentioned the Christmas Festival clip 'sounded like a Wurlitzer',
as if to say Wurlitzer is not worthy to be classified as an organ.
Wurlitzer promoted "The Unit Orchestra" concept. The theatre organ
is many times more versatile than a "church organ". It can sound
like a "church/cathedral organ" but can do much, much more.

The Allen T321Q, used in the Christmas Festival clip, is a fine example
of how a 'unified' organ can produce the various orchestral voices using
digitally sampled sounds from various pipes organs from around the world.



Going back under my rock to
Uncle Al