Last summer I finished out part of an old outbuilding as a music studio, since my children have inherited my musical interests and the house is too small for more instruments.</p>
I recently obtained a Conn Serenade, free, on Craigslist, and proceeded to pay an organ tech for a day to move it, tune it, clean contacts, replace a tube or two, and so on.</p>
I'm happy with it. For a 1962 instrument the sound is pleasing, in many ways better than early digitals. The biggest shortcoming, for me, is the 25 note pedal compass. I use the top seven notes more than I realized.</p>
[quote user="steve"]I'm happy with it. For a 1962 instrument the sound is pleasing, in many ways better than early digitals. The biggest shortcoming, for me, is the 25 note pedal compass. I use the top seven notes more than I realized.[/quote]</P>
While you are talking about your children, these days, I would be talking about my grandchildren. [:$]</P>
Of all the ancient organs I grew up with, andwere part of my life way back then; Conn was the only one that I enjoyed back then, and still retain fond memories to this day. [:)] If you were looking for the pure uncompromised sound ofa diapason, then along with all the other organ manufacturers, that wassomething Conn couldn't provide. It wasa unique musical instrument that sounded beautiful in it's own right, without comparison to anything else out there.</P>
Typical of organs of the pre-digital era,early Conn pedal divisionstended to be somewhat less than wonderful, most often being confined to a few semi-uselessmuddy ill-defined16' and 8' options. [:(] I don't how your particular instrument was strung together,but some of the later Serenade models atleast offerred an "accompaniment-to-pedal" coupler.</P>
Ironically,from a historical perspective, providing your kids withawondrous 25 note pedal division sounds like overindulgent decadence compared to some of the ancient, but great organs of Europe. [:$] And I won't even get into Mediterranean the stuff! [:|]</P>
My Conn has an 8' pedal stop and a coupler. Neither work reliably, since Conn incorporated a then-new polymer contact technology that, 45 years later, closes a circuit only some of the time. The organ tech I work with has offered to replace the contact rails but says it's an all day job for the pedal division due to the number of things that have to be moved out of the way.</p>
I have access to half a dozen nicer instruments, but transportation is the problem where kids are involved. In time, though, they'll be able to move up. There are two Dobson trackers nearby, both wonderful instruments, and a couple of larger three manual instruments we can get to if we need them.
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