“For we wrestle …against the rulers of darkness ...against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Ephesians 6:12

From time to time I used to be asked if the organ was too loud, and the question was framed in such a way that reflected the deep humanity and compassion of those who asked it. Instead of saying: The Organ is far too loud! Can you keep the noise down? the question was posed in a much more creative and therapeutic way. This non-confrontational approach made it easier for the Musical Director to theologically reflect on what he or one of his 3 assistant organists had just done. After all, if he wasn’t playing himself, it was he who with vigorous arm waving gestures and shaking of the fist had provoked one of his assistants to perpetrated this crime. (For the non-musical, this is called conducting. In non-musical contexts it would be rightly regarded as threatening behaviour.)

But let the Church Council (PCC) have the last say in the matter. After I left the PCC decided that obviously the organ was not loud enough! This kindly body of people, who had stood by me through thick and thin and approved the setting up of a pension fund for me (God bless them), sanctioned the installation of a significant number of additional stops (ranks of pipes) on the organ. One of these was a trumpet stop, louder than anything else on the organ. There were already 3 trumpet type stops on the Organ but this one trumps them all in volume and power. It has recently become affectionately known as The Last Trump among a handful of Organ aficionados and admirers who have sneaked in to play this magnificent monument to present and future Truth (see the Schweitzer quote below). It can wake the dead if they are in the line of its fire. And this gives us hope and reassurance that there will be no more Trumps after this one. One of the other stops added was a 32ft pedal stop which plays so low that it shakes your rib cage. Maybe this decision of the Church Council was due to the fact that the recently departed Musical Director had so deafened the congregation that more power and volume was needed to compensate for their damaged hearing.

My successor – a first rate organist and musician, complete with sense of humour (without which no man shall see God) – obviously understood what Albert Schweitzer said when he wrote: The struggle (to build) a good pipe organ is to me the same as the struggle for the Truth. No wonder he went on to greater things (Music Director and Organist at Sydney Cathedral). And it doesn’t come as a surprise that he recorded on the VFTT (Valiant For The Truth) label.

Finally, a word of advice. The Bluff Your Way In Music guide begins with these words when it deals with the subject of organists: Never tamper with an organist. The author, Peter Gammond, goes on to explain that this breed of humanity can do with one hand what others cannot do with all their limbs in co-ordinated activity. And history also gives us due warning. In the days of Oliver Cromwell the Puritans were rampaging through churches destroying popish idols; unfortunately organs fell into this category. But one organist was having none of this. When a Roundhead soldier came into his church to destroy his organ, he had the presence of mind to drop a handy millstone from the organ loft on to the soldier’s head. Unfortunately the soldier’s helmet presented no contest against the millstone and he was instantly crushed to death. Quite possibly this organist had been doing a Bible Study on Judges 9:52-54 in his quiet time that morning. As for Oliver Cromwell, he installed the organ that had been removed from Magdalen College Oxford in his palace at Hampton Court. You have been warned! There is no accounting for what organists, or Puritans for that matter, will get up to. (Clergy might like to check the contents of their organ lofts when the organist isn’t around. Approach with caution.)

Pax Vobiscum
Padre Gnu

Some verses for you to further meditate on:
“Praise him with the timbrel and dance: praise him with stringed instruments and organs.” Psalm 150:4 (KJAV)
“Loud Organs his glory forth tell in deep tone” Psalm 152:3 (Gnupochrypha, NGAV …also found in Henry Williams Baker’s writings 1875)