COMPLETE AT LAST

 

COMPLETE AT LAST

 Today - 1 April 2022 - I can tell you my dear friends that I am complete.  At last

 No, although as I write this I see it is the 1st April, it is not a joke; it has really happened

 110 years ago, Mr William’s clever design for your friend Hillie was partially completed.  Some more work followed one year later, then more in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, but it still left me without the really bold trumpety sounds, and the really deep firm sounds Mr William had always intended.  After all, I sit in very large space in a very large building, which I was designed to fill with glorious sound, but until now that was not possible

 Mr Gary started his work 2 years ago, and as well as cleaning everything, sorting out wind leaks, lifting my blowers and reservoirs and restoring my lovely keyboards, he added a lot of my missing pipes

 However, one set of 30 pedal pipes was still missing - until today.  In 1945, horn pipes were donated in memory of one of my former friends, Mr George (Tonkiss) who had recently died.  These pipes were also made in the 1910s by Mr William, but for another organ - I’m still not sure where that was, or how they were found, but they were installed into one of my missing stops and were very useful and much appreciated for the last 65 years

 These horn pipes were not now needed as my cousin organ in London very generously donated a chest and pipes to fill the gap at the front of my swell box, so rather than consign them to a large filing cabinet somewhere, Mr Gary suggested they should be used as a new pedal stop, to work alongside my new trombone pipes

 So that’s what has happened.  These pipes are now high up in my transept home, above almost every other pipe in the organ, clean and shiny and oh so trumpety

 I’ve now got 2400 pipes and though I say it myself, I sound just amazing.  And, yes, those new pipes can be heard trumpeting away, adding some new brightness to the sounds from my nether regions

 Complete at last




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