Shouldn't that be "Be Positif" not "Be positive?"

I have found every single Taylor and Boody that I’ve come across to be an absolute gem. They are truly instruments made to the highest quality, and while they are historically informed, I don’t think they go too far down the orgelbewegung rabbit hole.

Fisks also are very high quality. They do French (and French meets American eclectic) organs very well. Again, very high quality craftsmanship, and their consoles are very beautiful and highly functional.

I can’t recommend Parsons highly enough. The organs that come out of their shop really sing. There are no bland filler ranks; everything is voiced to perfection, laid out logically for service, and built to last. Listen to these recordings here. One instrument was an overgrown, impacted Moller, the other is full of 60s Schlicker stuff. Where other builders would’ve trashed those, Parsons was selective, kept most of the ranks, and rescaled/revoiced wisely, to the point that I wouldn’t have guessed the provenance of the pipework had I not been told. What they are doing is amazing work, and with a much shorter waitlist, lower price tag, and higher standards than many others.

http://parsonsorgans.com/music/

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=A6257ymH-C8

I grew up on the Casavant from the 1950s at Our Lady of the Atonement in San Antonio and grew to love it. I have only played one other Casavant of the 2000s and heard a few on youtube which did not measure up in warmth of tone.

I have played 2 Letourneau organs from Canada, and loved the character and power of both of them. They were also successful instruments at their respective institutions: an organ studio and a seminary chapel.

I have played 3 Lively-Fulcher instruments and loved them. The first was a highly French set up at St Patrick's in DC. I played my senior recital on the massive instrument in the Franciscan Monastery of the Holy Land, also in DC. Both these instruments were helped by an amazing acoustic, but they contained special character and warmth, clear flutes, and great reeds.

I have only played one Fisk (Indiana University), and it was successfully eclectic.
Fisk has also done great work with historical instruments, and their creations at Rischoce and Oberlin seem outstandingm though I have not heard them in person.

I have not had the opportunity to play Andover, but it reputationally they seem to be very good, and any builder with a respect for historic pipework and methods gets high marks in my book.

I have heard 2 Schoensteins in person; both were lovely, warm, and romantic. One was in the barrel-vaulted Chapel of the Incarnate Word in San Antonio. These were fantastic choral accompaniment and service playing instruments, but were underscaled to the room, in my opinion.

I played 2 Guilding and Wood instruments, which were both warm eclectic style instruments without any particular character.

I studied on a german-eclectic 2 manual tracker Schudi organ, and regularly played it's Silbermann inspired cousin in the Crypt of the National Basilica. The one at the Basilica is a fantastic period instrument; of course, the room is again it's best feature.

The most gorgeous principal choruses I have ever heard on modern instruments are those of Rosales organ builders, and instruments voiced by Manuel Rosales. Having worked for a summer as a technician at C. Bobsin Organs in San Antonio, this builder also got tremendous respect in the industry, which speaks volumes to me. I know Fisk and Rosales share a lot of work between shops, so they should maybe be considered in tandem.

I have not had the chance to play many of the Flentrop, Taylor&Boody. or Fritts organs in the german tradition, but many look absolutely wonderful for their purpose.



Were I in a position to be considering an organ for a church, I would be looking at Fisk, Rosales, Andover, Lively Fulcher, and Letourneau because of their reputation and proven ability to build successful instruments with individuality, and because I would want a romantic-style instrument for service playing.

I substituted at St Theresa's in Trumbull, CT a few weeks ago where I played a Peregallo with3 manuals and 38 ranks. It was well voiced for the church which has very live acoustics. One of the nicest instruments I've played. Pipes in back of the altar and console to the right. I like choir lofts best but this arrangement works very well in this church.

I agree that the back is generally better than in front. Though, if the choir is located in front, it makes sense to have the organ there too. One example could be the cathedral in Superior, WI which has the choir in a side trancept up front with the organ. I haven't been there, so I don't know how well the sound projects out to the rest of the church, I just know about it.

In situations like the above, I think it would be best to have an smaller organ in the front to accompany the choir with a grand organ in the gallery.

I'll never forget one of the first masses I attended at St. Sulpice... Daniel Roth improvising up to full organ during the offertory and then coming back down... it was quite 'impressionant' and I marveled at their liturgical organ culture. You'd never get away with that in the states. It was fascinating to hear the dialogues between the front and the back. (And, it should be mentioned, that while the choir organ at SS looks relatively petite compared to the room, it actually has a surprisingly robust sound!)

I have often shaken my head at American organists in dry rooms racing through Widor and Vierne. They could never be played that fast in French churches without turning to mush.

Francis, I once subbed on a 4m Austin that was in a huge, 1,000 seat, perfectly round room that was a parabolic concrete dome. The result was that there was a half-second delay slap back where you would hear exactly what you played but a beat or two behind, almost as loudly as what you heard in front of you from the organ. It was WILD. I tried the Widor for a laugh and could only muster a few measures before it was such a garbled mess I couldn’t even tell what I was supposed to be playing. It was one of those weird rooms where if you stood in the right spots, you could whisper to someone clear on the other side and it sounded like they were whispering straight into your ear. I’ll never forget that gig.

Just my .02
Various builders have strengths in particular areas:
Fritts: Tracker historically based
Quimby: American Classic, especially concerning resoration of Aeolian Skinner.
However I laud Casavant for being able to build anything.

That would be https://pipeorgandatabase.org/organ/3847

I have heard good things about the Noack. Juget-Sinclair is amazing both for quality of construction and sound.

If Organ Media Foundation doesn't satisfy your inner organ nerd, nothing will. It's amazing getting to see organs that range from 1 year to 100 years old. The channel is basically a virtual organ crawl.

Holtkamp has not been mentioned. I Played a 50 rank one for about 15 years some years back. It was a very satisfying one to play. Holtkamp was in the beginning of the baroque revival and does fine work. The only really fault with this instrument was a 16' posauna that sounded like a ship's horn,

By French style these days is meant Franck, Widor, etc., and their organs. When I speak of French style, I mean Titelouze, de Grigni, and Cliquot et al. There is not a word that encompasses both - because they are each exponents of totally different sound worlds.

I rather loathe Holtkamps, if I’m being honest. I despise their consoles, and typically they are as ugly as can be. Their whole design philosophy (at least the earlier ones from the 50-70’s) is just… unfortunate imho. They are, to me, the equivalent of ugly church buildings, and every time I come across one, I just have to sigh and ask myself, “why?”.

The Holtkamps of that era were a product of their time. Although I have only seen/heard one of their newer installations, I was impressed by it. It even had real draw knobs. I'd give them a second look if you were in the market for a new organ.

I think too many of the American "neo-Baroque" organs just sound bad. Whether they produce sounds Bach would have appreciated is a bit questionable, comparing them to German Baroque organs of his day still in existence. They tend to be a bit limited in the music they can adequately do and don't have the versatility of the French organs. In my town there are too many German Baroques and only one or two organs that have any French voicings. That seems to be the norm. I have also questioned just how much of that Lutheran music is adaptable to the Catholic mass.

I think the major design factor to be considered is the acoustic in a church, or lack thereof. No matter what rep one likes best, in Europe one hears so many Silbermanns, Schnitgers, C-Cs, Cliquots, Willis, Hill, Sauer, etc. that are absolutely spellbindingly beautiful in their own special ways. But reconstruct any of those into the typical American church, and they’re not so special anymore.

In any room that’s not as live as European churches were in the 18th century, the German [neo]-Baroque organs don’t sparkle anymore, but feel anemic on the bottom and hateful at top. The French-ish organs become downright aggressive….you can’t put fiery reeds, harmonic mixtures, and edgy foundations like that in a dry room; they need a lot of space and acoustical cushion to coalesce.

To me, the only thing that can be successful in a dry room is something along the lines of what Skinner and Aeolian-Skinner were building from the teens into the early 50s. Listen to the recordings Virgil Fox made at Riverside Church, which was then a totally deadened space. Plenty of color there, and convincing adaptability to all styles – but designed to work without acoustical help. That takes a big bottom end, extremely careful voicing, and a controlled and blending approach to voicing the principal and reed choruses.