Asking to play an organ

[Vince560]

Hey everyone,

I wasn't able to find many answers for this question, but I was wondering what I would have to do to actually get access to an actual pipe organ at the church I attend. It's a large church in Charlotte, NC (Calvary Church) and it has a massive organ. I have an old Gulbransen organ with an AGO pedalboard, and I've been practicing it every day and I'm starting to get the hang of it. I still want to practice a lot more before I play the one at the church, but I wanted to know if there is anything I should say in particular when asking. Should I offer to play hymns at some point once I get good enough? Help the church out in any way? It's a little intimidating for me because it's such a large instrument, and I don't know how open they are to letting some random organist come and play it.

Thanks

[davidecasteel]

I would think the first step would be to meet with the Organist and discuss the issue. Just be open and respectful and prepared to demonstrate you are capable of playing it without causing damage. I would not be surprised if, once permission is granted, the Organist might observe the first session or two.

David

[regeron]

-- Ask nicely. Start with the person you feel most comfortable with: Secretary, Organist, Minister, someone on a Committe or Board.
-- Stick to your original thought and keep the request simple. "I would like to play the organ, for my own pleasure, at a time when it is convenient to those involved and not a bother to other activities in the building."
-- In my church and in some other local churches where the organist is a paid job, and you haven't played a pipe organ (much) before, don't offer to play hymns for a service, at least not on the first request. If I drove a limousine for a living, and you drove an average car but wanted to have some time behind the steering wheel of my limousine, don't offer to drive my clients around as a way of saying "Thank you." It's a nice gesture, but there's too much at stake and "it ain't gonna happen!' :)
-- I'm in a situation where I take friends from out of town to visit local organs. I ask both the secretary and organist if a certain time and/or day will work for them. They will let me know if there is anyone else that I or they need to check with.
--If the organ seems intimidating (I was in your shoes once), see if the organist can be present, not to give you a lesson on how to work it, but to be with you and show you some of what it can do. That way, part of your time is 'guided' by someone who knows what the organ can do, and part of your time is spent exploring on your own.
-- There is an element of building trust, which takes time, and can take on various forms in different situations.
-- Some people and organizations are VERY protective of their instruments, some are not, and most are somewhere in between. Be prepared that it might be easier or harder than you thought to get time on the organ.
-- Once you do get permission, ask if there are any guidelines about playing. eg. No street shoes on the pedalboard. No drinks or other liquids near the console. (I heard that in York Minster, England, if you want to use THE Tuba, you need written permission from the Dean - the stop is THAT loud.) You might also receive verbal warning that certain stops will cipher or keys will stick and it's best to avoid them, or that part of the organ is not working at all.

There, that's the start of a list. There's lots of wisdom on this forum and I'm sure I've missed something good which someone else will be kind enough to point out.

Good luck. It's a real treat to play an instrument that takes you beyond your everyday experience! As I mentioned, once you build up people's trust in you, there may be other organs near you that you can explore, too.

[james]

It would be nice to play on a large pipe organ, but you sure need someone in authority to give you permission. I don't think I would go to the regular organist since you might get discouraged right quickly such as I did. My situation was that the regular organist wasn't all that good, but jealous of her position in the church. I was told by my music teacher that knew more about the organ, but only was a sub that the regular one was so jealous as well as she didn't want anyone else to play when she was there. She certainly was everything but encouraging to me.

In a few years after getting away from that church I attended elsewhere, and when I made it known that I could play the organist/music director there was very glad to let me play as well as gave me permission to practice on the organ.

So it all depends on each situation. Remember there are more organs than that big one in the church where you attend, and you might not always be attending there.

James

[myorgan]

Vince,

And if all the advice given here fails, try a 357. Then you won't have to worry about playing the organ at all!:devil:

Seriously, everyone has given excellent advice here. However, be understanding that (using Regeron's analogy) you're asking to drive a Rolls Royce instead of your own go-kart. When I was a teenager, it took me a year (through the Worship Committee) to get permission to play the church's Allen TC-4S, which had been given to the church about 15-20 years earlier. Not a year or two later, I was the church's paid pianist during live-broadcast services, and substitute organist. I suspect that won't happen with Calvary Baptist's organ (becoming their organist in a year or two), but the church's organist will undoubtedly be able to refer you elsewhere if the church's large organ is unavailable to you. A church of that size is usually quite busy, and time in the sanctuary is tightly scheduled.

On the other hand, depending on your skills, don't be surprised if you are asked in a year or two to play a piece for a prelude sometime, or for one of the smaller services they hold. Miracles can happen! It did in my case.

Michael

P.S. Also, be aware that the electricity necessary to power that organ for one hour only, can be as much as you use in your own home for a week to a month.

[michaelhoddy]

That Moller organ at Calvary in Charlotte is quite the instrument- I hope you get the chance to play it!

If you go to the church already, and you approach the music director or organist and just introduce yourself, let them know that you're a congregant with a strong interest in the organ, that you play it, and ask politely, there's an excellent chance they'd let you play it. It would be helpful if you have some hymns or other "church-type" music well rehearsed and ready to go if you do get to play it- that definitely would help build your credibility and make it a more mutually enjoyable experience.

[Terpodion]

"P.S. Also, be aware that the electricity necessary to power that organ for one hour only, can be as much as you use in your own home for a week to a month. "
I beg to differ. If you look at the power consumption in amps on the specification plates of the blower and rectifier (the amount expressed is for startup and falls off considerably at idle) you will find that my step daughter with a 2,000 watt blow dryer, a 7 amp well pump and approx 200 watts of lights will exceed the power consumption of the average organ for a week during one of her hour+ sessions in the bathroom to take a shower. Just sayin.

[myorgan]

I beg to differ. If you look at the power consumption in amps on the specification plates of the blower and rectifier (the amount expressed is for startup and falls off considerably at idle) you will find that my step daughter with a 2,000 watt blow dryer, a 7 amp well pump and approx 200 watts of lights will exceed the power consumption of the average organ for a week during one of her hour+ sessions in the bathroom to take a shower. Just sayin.

Terpodion,

Thank you for the correction. I was going by the blower for my pipe organ (Orgoblo from mid-1900s) and assuming the Calvary organ in Charlotte would have at least 2 or more of them. Good to know the blowers are so much more efficient than those of the mid-1900s. It may be worth getting rid of my Orgoblo to find a replacement--depends on how much I'd save in electricity before I make that decision.

Michael

[Vince560]

Thanks for all the suggestions everyone, I'll see what they say, and if I do get to play it, I will post some pictures.

[regeron]

P.S. Also, be aware that the electricity necessary to power that organ for one hour only, can be as much as you use in your own home for a week to a month.

In one church where I worked (in the early 1990s) the question came up about "outsiders" wanting to play our new 2-manual tracker organ, with discussion of not only the wear-and-tear on the organ but also the energy consumption involved. There were a couple retired engineers in the congregation so we asked them to calculate the cost to run the organ and a basic set of ceiling lights in the organ loft for one hour. Their answer? 25 Cents. We opted to waive any fee for use of the organ based on energy consumption.

The organ was installed in 1990 and only required a small blower, so it might not reflect the situation posed in the original request in this thread.

[myorgan]

The organ was installed in 1990 and only required a small blower, so it might not reflect the situation posed in the original request in this thread.

Not to beat a dead horse, but does anyone actually know the power consumption of the Calvary organ in Charlotte? Unless highly duplexed and unified, that's quite a number of pipes to wind. Then again, blowers are much more high-tech and conservative than they used to be.

I do know that to play my ADC-5400, I use approximately 2 Kilowatt hours every 3 hours depending on how loud I play (I'm ODC with the meter). And that's more than I can afford. Then there's the lights. Occasionally, I'll turn on all the lights in the house--just to prove a point when my wife is wasting electricity again.:embarrassed: I also forgot the heater I use to heat the garage. Of course, I'm sure Calvary Charlotte has a much larger budget than I do . . . .:'( Them's the breaks.

Michael

P.S. Why does she feel the need to put a nightlight in the china closet? Are the dishes afraid of the dark? But then I digress. Sorry, Vince.

[myorgan]

Not to beat a dead horse, but does anyone actually know the power consumption of the Calvary organ in Charlotte?

Ironically, I just found the website:

The blowing plant for the organ — 6,000 pounds of machinery — is housed two floors below the choir and includes nine large electric blowers, efficiently requiring only 29 horsepower. Incidentally, bellows still exist in the modern organ but merely as a reservoir to ensure steady wind pressure.

Source: http://www.calvarychurch.com/site/18_150_44.cfm

Michael

[crapwonk]

I do know that to play my ADC-5400, I use approximately 2 Kilowatt hours every 3 hours depending on how loud I play (I'm ODC with the meter). And that's more than I can afford. Then there's the lights...

According to Google, the average cost of a KW-hour in the US is approximately 12 cents, so you are spending maybe a quarter for three hours of organ practice. That seems way below the cost threshold I can get excited about.

We have several rooms with 6 or more recessed lights. The price of LED recessed bulbs has dropped so much that at the local Home Depot, a 60W equivalent LED recessed bulb is now less than $3 each (cheaper than an equivalent incandescent), cutting power draw from around 360 W to 60 W for our family room where the overheads are on a LOT of the time. However, realistically even that is not a huge cost compared to our heating and cooling costs.

[regeron]

Ironically, I just found the website:Source: http://www.calvarychurch.com/site/18_150_44.cfm

Michael

Thank you, Michael.

The truth is so often helpful. I need to remember that some of these organ (with large wind requirements) are in a different league. I also didn't realize that the organ in question was so famous. It looks like a real beauty. I'd want to play it, too.

I once heard the tale of the large Casavant organ at St Paul's Anglican Church, Bloor Street, in downtown Toronto, with over 100 stops, divided on either side of the chancel and with the equivalent of a 2-manual organ in the rear gallery. There were 3 large blowers. Instructions were to turn them on one at a time, with some number of seconds of waiting before turning the next one. Even then, people joked that when you turned it on, the lights in the nearby subway dimmed and the trains slowed down. LOL

Their energy costs were no doubt higher than 25cents an hour. Still, it would be interesting to have someone who knows motors do a quick calculation to see how much energy they do take.

[jbird604]

My guess is that the #1 cost of practicing on a church organ is the cost of heating or cooling the sanctuary, if the church doesn't normally leave the heat/air on all the time. Of course, a large well-financed church OUGHT to keep the sanctuary at a fairly even temperature throughout the week, for the benefit of the organ (and piano if present) and to make the room hospitable for folks who might need to use it for prayer or meditation, funerals, weddings, and other events that can happen any day of the week.

It is, IMHO, penny wise and pound foolish to turn the heat/air completely off though the week. It MIGHT cut the power bill (or might not, considering the load it places on the system just to normalize the temp on Sunday morning), but it will definitely increase the maintenance cost of the instruments, and in the long run will tend to damage the furnishings, like the pews, which may suffer glue damage from the extreme swings in temperature.

I frequently advise churches to set the AC to about 80* or 82* F. in the summer when the building is not in use, which ought to keep the cooling system from having to work too hard all week. Then in the winter, when unoccupied, the thermostat can be lowered to 55* to 58* F. Keeping the temp in the sanctuary between 55* and 82* greatly lessens the stress on the instruments, much better than letting it drop down into the 20's in the winter and rise to over 100* in the summer!

The other significant cost is likely the lighting required to practice the organ, unless there is a way to just light up the console itself without turning on the house lights. As churches convert to LED lighting, this cost ought to go down dramatically.

As has been pointed out, a huge pipe organ will have a huge air plant. The one mentioned above with 29 horsepower of blower motors might well cost a few dollars to run for an hour. A motor requires just under 1 kw to produce one horsepower, so a 29 horsepower air plant might use 24 kw/h. At 12 cents per kwh, that is $2.88 per hour. Add to that the current draw of the rectifiers and other electrical parts of the organ, along with the probably rather large surge of current required just to start all those motors, and you might well be looking at $10 or more to power up the organ for an hour's playing. Of course this is a very large organ, not the typical church organ with a single blower.

And a digital organ may draw less than 1 kw/h for the console and all the amps, so it is very cheap indeed to operate, if you don't have to consider heating, cooling, and lighting of the sanctuary.