The first decision to be made was the wind pressure.  The old organ was on 6″ – which is much too heavy and meant that the smaller pipes were “screaming” as wind was forced through them.  The standard wind pressure for the new organ would be only 3″, which would help to ensure that the sound would be less strident, and would give an overall more mellow tone. This pressure is more normal for most good quality UK organs.

What could we keep?

The various surveys of the existing organ in 2009 and 2010 revealed that of the 5 ranks of pipes in the old organ, the Trumpet rank, though badly misshapen, could be refurbished as the pipework was of good quality and so should be retained in the new instrument.  The flute rank was also good, but needed cleaning and ‘revoicing’ to improve its tone quality and ‘blend’, so this would also be retained.  The principle rank was much too loud for use on the keyboards and the top octave of pipes was too badly damaged to be refurbished. Some of the pipes could be repaired and revoiced.  Working on reduced wind pressure, these ranks of pipes could be made to blend well as part of a chorus of sound in the new organ, so they were to be retained as the basis of the new organ’s independent pedal division (ie with its own pipes).  The remaining two ranks were too poor to be re-used.

The blower could not be accessed until the organ was partly demolished, but it was assumed that it could be re-used as it was less than 10 years old.  The organ’s casework was well made (of medium oak) and typical of the time, so this would be cleaned and retained.  The front pipes were dummies, do not sound, were relatively undamaged but badly painted with poor paint.  These are being stripped back to bare metal, polished and then repainted, with gilded mouths, and being reinstalled in the front of the refurbished case.

A slowdown

In early 2012 matters ground to a halt as, sadly (for All Souls!), All Souls lost James Felix, its young organist, when he became engaged to be married and emigrated to Singapore.  After a hiatus of several months Keith Ainsworth joined the team in time for Christmas 2012 as our new organist, and the organ project was revived in 2013.  It had already been decided that the church was badly in need of redecorating and that the organ rebuild should not take place until that work was done.  There were various issues that delayed that work (including dealing with asbestos that had been discovered during the church’s 5-yearly survey), but the church (except for the organ gallery) was finally redecorated in time for Christmas 2013.

We are ‘approved’!  

In early 2014, after further planning work between the organ builder, Mike Thompson, Keith Ainsworth and Fr Peter Jones (representing the Archdiocese Organ Advisory team) the basic design and dimensions of the organ were decided, and Keith prepared sets of scale drawings and floor plans, and sketches of the organ as it would be after the rebuild was completed, together with an application statement for the the Archdiocese Arts & Architecture Commission.  These were approved and supported by Father Peter, and the parish applied to the Commission for the necessary faculty to allow us to carry out the work, which was eventually granted in April 2014.  After that, we had to get the Diocesan Treasurer’s permission to commence the project, which arrived in June.  We were ready to go…at last!