St Peter’s, St Louis, Missouri, USA (Main and Chamber Organ)

Whilst voicing the organ, there were a number of instances where we became further disenchanted with the chamber situation, and it raises the question as to whether it is a viable option and if one should allow oneself to do a similar layout again. There is no doubt that achieving the right balance is more difficult. The spatial separation that one experiences with vertically disposed departments is never going to be as marked. The Swell Organ (which has shutters both on the front and on the side close to the opening of the chamber into the body of the church) was not badly affected. The Great was more disadvantaged, sited, as it had to be, below the Swell and behind the Choir Organs, but responded well to a certain amount of re-balancing of the Principal chorus. Most surprisingly, the Choir Organ maintained its feeling of forwardness without being forced, mainly because it was placed right at the front of the organ with relatively open casework, of a design that did not require carving.

Lack of height did cause us problems. The 32ft reed had to be half length, and the 32ft octave has leathered shallots to make it more foundational. There was also not enough height for the bottom six notes of the Pedal Open Diapason 16 and the Swell Open Diapason 8. Both these stops utilised the equivalent notes of the Bourdon 16 and Gedackt 8 with "helpers" of 8 and 4ft pitch, respectively. These are pipes of relatively narrow scale, low cut-up and very gently voiced which supply exactly those harmonics which are missing from the stopped pipes. This is not a new idea, and was practised by (amongst others) Snetzler, but it does seem to be a particularly English practice. In the case of the Pedal Open, the Bourdon pipes that were used had two pallets so that when used for the Open Diapason, the note could be "voiced" a little louder by feeding the pipes with a little more wind.

Another point of interest is perhaps the Great Mounted Cornet of three, rather than the usual five, ranks. The primary objective of this is to save space but it does have anther significant advantage. To be used as a Cornet, 8 and 4ft stops have to be added, and by using various combinations of the Open Diapason, Stopped Diapason, Gamba, Principal and Open Flute, a variety of Cornet tones can be synthesised, adding both interest and versatility to the stop not available with the usual five-rank Cornet.

As always in our instruments, the winding is by traditional bellows with concussions under the soundboards. This gives a life to the winding (without becoming noticeably unsteady) in a way that is never quite achieved with any form of schwimmer. Whereas the schwimmer can be set up to give some life, it is almost always achieved with a fluctuation in pressure below the set value, rather than above and below as is the nature of the traditional bellows. Coupled with this, we use traditional Dom Bédos tremulants. The effect of these is quite unlike any other tremulant around. The tremor is not entirely even and varies in depth and speed depending on the amount of wind being drawn through it. The ear appreciates this small fluctuation and the extra work it takes (which can be significant) in getting them to work well is worth it. We may still be the only builders to use Dom Bédos tremulants that are activated electrically. Is the old master amused or turning in his grave? The key action is suspended and floating, as is logical for the layout of the organ.

When the necessary building alterations were undertaken to accommodate the organ, shortly before it was delivered, a large steel beam was discovered that could not be removed but necessitated alterations to the organ on site, as it was being installed. We would like to acknowledge the invaluable assistance offered by the St Louis organ builder, Martin Ott, in making this task so much easier, by offering us the use of his workshops and facilities to make some of the alterations. A heartening example of the way organ builders are now prepared to assist each other, for which we are grateful.