Despite not yet being a public venue, STOPS held their first public concert on Sunday 12th December 1993. It was a highly informal, well attended event, and set the tone for future concerts. The recording was done on cassette by Ron Fraser. There is some difference in levels between channels, and at one point, some analogue distortion is present. But despite all the faults and flaws, this recording shows, in general, how the organ sounded when first installed, and comprised only 7 ranks plus pedal Fagotto. The stop list is at www.stops.org/o... (although the pedal Diaphone had not yet been added).
What is interesting is that the ‘signature sound’ of the organ is unmistakably Hilsdon, despite everything being on between 4” and 5” wind pressure (and blown by a BOB TOT3!).
The concert started with Gordon Lucas, one of the co-founders of STOPS, the leader of the theatre organ movement in the East of Scotland in the 1970s, resident organist of the Playhouse Edinburgh from 1970 to 1975, and co-owner of the New Palace Centre. He learned a lot of his theatre organ technique from electronic organist Jon Garr, when he was stationed in Portsmouth. He leads the Hymn ‘Christ is Born Today’, with Tommy Gladston joining in on the second verse playing the Eminent electronic theatre organ, then he announces and plays a (poorly performed) Selection of Disney songs. He had not long had surgery on his right hand for a trapped nerve which had been causing his fingers to curl and he still didn’t have full use of his hand. This was also the first time he had played in public since the broadcasts from the Playhouse had stopped in 1976. His last item (Never Smile at a Crocodile) ends at 11:50s.
Larry McGuire plays a selection of mainly Christmas songs from 11:50 to 21:28. However, from 16:06 to 17:48s the Right channel inexplicable drops about 20dB in gain (we suspect Ron knocked a fader down and didn’t notice). Larry became resident organist of the New Palace Centre and had been the last resident organist of the Playhouse, Edinburgh, from 1975 to 1985, and was the last organist of the Astoria, Corstorphine, Edinburgh, having played there from 1970 to 1973. He was the one of the three co-founders of STOPS and the other co-owner of the New Palace Centre. Having learned piano and classical organ from the age of 10, he learned theatre organ styling both from Gordon Lucas, listening to recordings of various organists, and being given tips and hints from many theatre organists between 1970 and 1980.
From 21:28 to 23:00 we have ‘Auntie Kate’ - Kathleen Kerss from Kirkcaldy, leading some more carol singing, accompanied by Larry McGuire playing the Hilsdon and Gordon Lucas joining in on the Eminent electronic theatre organ for the second one.
There had been short comedic sections so there was now an interval, then in the recording, from 23:00 to 43.15, Tommy Gladston of Tweedmouth, Berwick-upon-Tweed performs. Tommy was a classically trained organist who had also studied under theatre organist Frank Matthews when he was resident at the Odeon Gateshead 3/8 Compton organ. He was organist of St Andrew’s Wallace Green Church in Berwick-upon-Tweed and at the time, had been the accompanist for almost 50 years of the Berwick Male Voice Choir.
From 43.15 vocalist ‘Auntie Kate’ - Kathleen (Katie) Kerss performs and was accompanied by Society stalwart Ron Fraser, in his one and only public performance for the Society, playing the Eminent electronic theatre organ.
From 48:19 to the end Larry performs again, rushing a bit against time as some previous items had grossly over run their time.
Unfortunately, apart from the overall loss of signal strength from the tape, there was a bad ‘buzz’ as well as excessive hiss throughout the original recording, which we have done our best to remove, but it has left some ‘digital artefacts’ in places. We hope that this does not detract too much from your enjoyment of this little piece of history.
The stop list of the Hilsdon organ as it was at this time can be seen here - www.stops.org/o....
The Diapason, Flute, Strings and Vox Humana are from the Palace Picture House Hilsdon, the Trumpet was from a Hisdon church organ, but tonally similar to the Playhouse Bombarde, so probably similar to the Palace’s original Tuba Horn / Bombarde. The Tibia is the Christie rank from the Lonsdale Carlisle. The pedal 16’ Fagotto came from St Giles Cathedral, Edinburgh.
STOPS - the Scottish Theatre Organ Preservation Society is Scotland’s oldest cinema/theatre organ society, and is a registered Scottish charity (SC 018217).
We own and operate the New Palace Theatre Organ Heritage Centre in Greenlaw, Scotland, our websites -www.stops.org for the Society & www.nptohc.co.uk for the Centre.
We welcome donations of all amounts, which can be made to www.paypal.me/stops.
9 сен 2024
