I won't lie, the capabilities with this instrument are staggering, the amount of ways to play around with the organ are near infinite. I can definitely see many organists having their "kid in a candy store" moments on this organ, playing with and testing the limits of this instrument. However, my concern is with all the toys and gadgets and gizmos is that whether or not the maintenance becomes an issue over time. In my opinion, one of the largest reasons why the pipe organ has stood the test of time is that the fundamental way the organ works hasn't changed since its inception, and there's a certain beauty in simplicity.
Rooted in IT but with a passion to play pipe organs myself, I "only" got a two-weeks glimpse into hands-on organ building at a smaller workshop in Augsburg, Germany, when I had the chance to take the time between two subsequent jobs. I participated in everything the organ builder did -- including the restoration of a romantic organ with pneumatic action -- and can say that "simplicity" might be a VERY relative term... 🙂 There's so much detail involved in the inner workings of even smaller instruments -- and, to be honest, these additional "toys and gadgets and gizmos" aren't much of a concern regarding maintenance. In contrast, many of these features heavily rely on an electronically actuated groundwork, so effectively everything boils down to a piece of software to debug. Everything else is just the way it was some centuries ago, except for the fact that microcontrollers are now doing the job that good ol' solenoids and tiny valve bellows did when they replaced the wooden abstracts used in tracker organs.
@@epincion Glad I could help you out! 🙂 One other thing -- which I didn't mention in my comment, but this struck me in the aftermath: Many (most?) organists never take their time to "smell a bit of workshop air" at an organ builder of their choice. I'd say they don't know what they're missing...as an example, it's a remarkable experience to construct, build and voice pipes on your own, even if it's just a single one! At least, there are organists out there who are capable of tuning reed pipes, guess that's better than nothing. 😄
@richardharrold9736 No idea which practical experience or evidence this statement relies on; howeveer, according to logic, reliability is subject to careful material selection and manufacturing as well as proper testing -- so you can be either lucky or have bad luck on both architectures.
@richardharrold9736 Well, so we've made different experiences then. Over the past about 10~15 years, I did encounter all kinds of architectures you mentioned above; almost every tubular-pneumatic and electro-pneumatic organ had failing parts (although being restored or at least serviced just recently) while tracker, electric action and computerized ones were in an excellent condition. This may or may be not subject to the amount of money being put into service agreements/contracts, of course. Regarding "legitimate artistic use": If -- and only _if_ -- this term just includes reportoire from the 20th century or older, you're perfectly right.
Wow - this is fascinating! I’ve never seen an organ with such flexibility. Congratulations to Reiger for being so innovative and forward-thinking. It makes my own organ look like a little toy in comparison!
@richardharrold9736 That's a bet you're probably going to loose. You _do_ know that they signed a service contract, do you? :-) This means that defective parts (if any) are guaranteed to be replaced and the instrument becoming unplayable, thus, is far out of reach. One additional thought from my own pipe organ performances: There were more than a handful of occasions where I _wished_ I had microtonal keyboards and pipe tunings (besaid Blues music and sountrack FX) as well as variable wind pressure on specific chests and full enclosure on all divisions to make the pieces I were playing sound "less harsh" in terms of note intervals and dynamics. So, even if these features will be used sparingly or even rarely, I bet there's a bunch of musicians waiting already to experiment with it and finally build upon 'em.
The complexity of the operation of tracker organs has always been mind blowing to me & how they were building them 3, 4, 5, maybe even as much as 600 years ago when you couldn't so much as go to a hardware store to buy simple screws, nuts, bolts or anything we take for granted today makes the concept even more boggling! That being said, this organ takes things to an even more incredible level. Having a fixed tracker action console & a movable electronic one that even attempts to replicate tracker action is so far "over-the-top" I can't even fathom it....
This is one of the craziest things I've ever seen. There are some extremely interesting features here, especially the proportionate stop action and that "glissando" stop.
Remember, just like a car, the more electronics, automation, stepper motors etc, the more that can go wrong… and it will, just give it time. Extraordinary instrument, innovation and craftsmanship thought!
Sooner or later, someone at Casavant or Flentrop will see this video, and jaws will drop! lol I have been playing pipe organs for 40 years, and I can't even imagine how I could registrate these features into a piece.
These keys in the drawer on the left are probably the choice of the dividing point on the pedal keyboard. Splitpoint option. You can play with different sets of registers in the pedal.
This has many of the more outlandish features of the new Rieger in the Stephansdom, in Wien. I guess money was no object in either case! Thanks for the fine demo. 😁
Wow, this is an advanced beast! Proportional stops, proportional wind, just marvelous!. Also microtonal and chromatic guys from the past are applauding and cheering! (Luzzaschi, Vicentino, Gesualdo et. al.)
Hey Jonny, long time no see! Well...can't wait to hear some of your stuff being fed into that beast. I _think_ there might be a "MIDI IN" connector somewhere on the console... 😉
Thanks for sharing this insight. Now I understand why I prefer so much mechanically actuated organs over electrically actuated organs. The direct electrical valve opening creates a very hard sound, while the mechanical opening - or here the reproduced mechanical opening - creates a natural warm sound.
Hello Balint, here's my suggestion for a composition this organ actually yearns for: Dominik Susteck: Farblichter. Published at Dohr Verlag. This piece was performed by Winfried Bönig during the Tuesday night's Orgelfeierstunden @Cologne Cathedral. During the concert, a flexible wind controller was mounted and activated to meet the requirements of the piece. Why not give it a try? One of my favourite piece in the contemporary repertoire.
That’s an *insane* organ. It’s probably the most advanced pipe organ in the entire world…. whether that’s a good thing or not, or how much, is probably up for debate (especially in terms of reliability), but it is very cool to see.
@@WMAlbers1 Wouterattheorgan is referring to The Utopa Baroque Organ in the Orgelpark. It is a meticulously-crafted Baroque organ in the manner of Zacharias Hildebrandt (voiced by Munetaka Yokota), with fully-mechanical console. But, it also has a proportional electric action, with a valve under every pipe, and a separate modern console with a Sinua touchscreen software system affording complete control over pipe speech (attack, sustain, decay, plus effects like staccato, delay, fluttertongue, etc) mappable from any pipe to any key in any combination for unlimited mixture compositions, and velocity-sensitive keyboards for constructing complexe layers of articulative effects (i.e. play the key softly and get one sound, a little faster and add a new note, faster yet and add more sound/pitches, or flange/distortion effects, etc). It is also networkable through MIDI and OSC for performance from a laptop or any sort of controller (such as other hyper-instruments, gestural controllers, wired dancers, etc) playable from anywhere in the world. It presents a whole universe of potential for acoustic musical art. Rieger is doing great work devising their own advanced proportional key and stop actions, but they're still a whole generation behind Sinua and the Orgelpark Utopa Baroque Organ. In fact, they should work together, rather than make competing, proprietary hyperorgan systems.
Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho donated 1 million euros of her own money to build it, and also conviced her friend Olivier Latry to join the planning committee. After that the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and State of Finland gave some hefty sum of money. They also sold pipes with names of the donor engraved in them so in total they gathered a little over 4 million euros for this instrument
Thank you Balint for demonstrating the capabilities of this extraordinary instrument. I wasn't previously aware of this organ and note that, on the Musikkittalo website it is described as having "Unlimited creative potential" and "From the project’s inception, what mattered was ensuring that the new organ would lend itself to performing new contemporary music." It appears that they have achieved their aim. I must be too old for this as I wonder when creating "sound effects" becomes music? Certainly there will be some composers and performers who will relish this organ's capabilities. I dare say that the organ tuners have a fun time!
That's the case with any pipe organ i'd say.... All not-small pipe organs have thousands and thousands of parts. I don't think the functions shown require sensitive parts. The solenoids are probably just driven with PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) which allows a solenoid to be on a partial position. Slowing down the blower motor is not difficult either, there are VFD (Variable Frequency Drive) units for that which exist already for decades. The people behind this organ just had the courage to put all these things in there.
@@Engineer9736 I don't think PWM will cut it here. The Druckpunkt he is talking about is physical, opening the valve against the wind pressure - after the first tiny opening it suddenly gets much easyer because the pressure differential decreases rapidly. For the organ to have a progressive mode you need either two magnets (one pulling and one pushing) or stepper motors, at least those are the systems I know to have been used in the past. For the drawstops I'm really curious what Rieger did, because I know for a fact that the two biggest suppliers of organ parts in Germany cancelled the project of drawstop solenoids capable of doing what is shown here after several years of development. Lastly the blower motor: Usually Rieger does actually not alter the RPM, because it would interfere with the bellows managing the wind supply. It's simpler and more genius at the same Time - they use a lever and a moveable weight pressing on the bellows.
I never knew Dr. Frankenstein was also an organ builder. An instrument to fill "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" with an irresistible urge to play the "March from Athalie" on it. Does it also have A.I., or will that be added? Imagine an organ talking back - "you aren't playing that. It will not be allowed". 😅 From Chicago, U.S.A.
My organist husband thinks this instrument is very interesting and cool… but I’m reminded of Scotty’s classic line from “Star Trek III": “The more they overtake the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain.’
The keymode tracker is really nicely done. I never thought about such thing. But it looks and sounds really like it's mechanically connected (while it's not of course). The proportionate stop action... I don't know if that really has a use case. Half-open stops are good for spooky sounds but i don't know if it has a place in normal organ playing.
This is a hugely expensive toy for Helsinki but at the end of the day surely it's the music that counts. Is there organ music using quarter tones, proportional winds? Or it is becoming a special effects generator? I like the feature to adjust the console dimensions to some extent. 20:31 Stop number 7 Chamade B 4', number 8 Chamade D 8', what are B and D?
At least in Finnish they would be B = Basso (bass) and D = Diskantti (treble), so you can have the chamades split in half, only to give brightness to the treble or just to give power to the bassline.
The page-turning function and adjustable console functions would be good to have on organs generally (and maybe that could adjust the bench's height and forward placement also).
They're going to need to build a digital copy of this thing so that visiting organists can spend a week or 2 figuring it all out before getting to the real thing 🤣 . .
Thank you for your video. Looks fantastic. Never seen something like that before. The good way to go in terms of how 21 century organ can look like. On the other hand there might be an issue how to maintain this huge and complicated instrument in good condition. More engineering devices take more time to overhall. More complicated ingineering is less reliable compared to less complicated one. Nevertheless, it looks very interesting and exciting!
The only response that readily comes to mind is that the early vacuum-tube based ENIAC computer of 1946 that was used by the US Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory, had over 17,000 tubes & was said to suffer a tube failure (which supposedly took only 15 minutes to locate) every two days on average. Somehow, it survived & managed to serve its purpose... Hopefully this organ will also.
@richardharrold9736 The point is whether the instrument can be, or is, “greater”, more impressive, more renowned, than the player. And I would say that is certainly true, almost by definition, for what you describe as legendary instruments. One person’s “gimmick” is another’s useful, musical innovations. All the instruments I mentioned had those. Builders have been innovating for 600 years, otherwise we would only have organs with no stops and heavy levers instead of keys.
Thanks for insightful demo. My personal takeaway is yes, that organ has a good sounding principal 8 in the great (which is my #1 wish on every organ), especially with the proportional action. As for the "innovations" (most of them ancient but used more systematically here than elsewhere), I appreciate the open-mindedness of both the builder and the player. However I remember my disappointment at listening Keith Jarrett's "Sphere" recording in Ottobeuren, back in the seventies. Most of the stuff was played with half-drawn stops and the result was a boring failure. The fact that I am both a Keith Jarrett fan and an organ fan only sharpened the disappointment. For most organists, microtones are less useful than the ability to switch temperaments. Some (tracker !) organs have that, using extra pipes per octave and special "couplers" to select the right ones (rather than having sub-semitones that are difficult to play).
It would really be nice if there were a way to mount automated tuning mechanisms to the pipes, and perhaps also an expanded number of pipes like you describe, to support a greater variety of tunings that can be switched to on the fly. But to be accurate and useful for any appreciable length of time, it would seem to require a level of stability that lead alloys just can't provide. Mind you, there's no _theoretical_ barrier to making organ pipes out of different stuff - but developing the craft of organ voicing in a different and much more resistant material is a can of worms I can't see anyone in the field wanting to open in the foreseeable future. (Based on my own research into the properties of different alloys, my top picks for such materials are aluminium bronze and/or nickel silver, but with no known examples of pipe being made out of those materials comparable in voice to the traditional method, I might as well be farting into the wind...)
@@Kaiveran there is an experimental organ with automated tuning mechanisms, the amount of overthinking that went into that is just astounding - hermode and voigt did this in Eisleben. And on the one hand there is an ongoing project for making pipes from aluminium, on the other hand that lead/tin alloy has really proven itself, to the point where you use it for the parts relevant for voicing even if the body of the pipe is made from zinc, copper or brass.
@richardharrold9736 If you want to _genuinely_ reproduce earlier music from eras in which the equal temperament didn't exist, you'd have no choice to go "out of tune". Oh wait, there _are_ TONS of named temperaments that each have their pros and cons, but let's just ignore them for the convenience of stubbornness. Tuning a 1624 Scherer instrument to anything else but its original mean-tone temperament would most certainly deprive it of its character, not mentioning of how much of a historic loss this would be to. This would be the parallel to repainting a unique painting in a modern style while destroying the original.
@richardharrold9736 Better? In terms of feeling "less awkward" to our ears of today? -- Well, definitely; and, personally, I would indeed prefer it the equally temperamented way. However, it's just not the answer to the question how historic music _really_ sounded back then. To be fair: If that question is never asked (i.e. nobody is interested in experiencing that original sound), keeping the old relics doesn't make much sense. "Unfortunately", there _are_ people interested in it, so I think we should preserve and respect our ancestors' legacy.
This organ is fascinating, but I ask, was it worth it to build it with pipes? Wouldn't top notch samples, and a really good speaker system work just as well? And so much easier to do. And a question, is the spaghetti stuff on the case just decorative? Thanks.
The spaghetti pipes appear to have mouths, so perhaps they speak (or belch or whatever)? I'd like to know too! ETA: I looked at the specification and found Faggotts but not Spaghetti. ETA2: According to ruclips.net/video/qdbIbETcT2o/видео.html they are "bent air tubes" and the is a mention of 3D printing which I think rules out their ability to produce musical notes.
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel Only the four lowest wooden pipes on the sides of the organ are the 32' princ. The speaking facade pipes are from 16' violonbass.
Great to see a non tracker action organ, or at least one with the option of electric action. It isn’t always the best solution for an organ. The proportionate key action is nothing new and has been around in one form or another for years, in fact the Willis floating lever was probably the forerunner. Of course on most tracker actions you can’t play like in the demo because of the “pluck” so I can’t see its or much value. Those drawstops look very disconcerting!
Do you know whether or not the curved looking pipes that make up the facade are speaking pipes or are they just for decoration? I can see that each has a mouth which made me curious as to whether or not they speak. With such an eclectic organ I would almost automatically assume that they do speak but wanted to see if you knew. 😊Excellent demonstration as usual. I love to see your organ demonstrations! Thank you for posting these!
@@jcolbyt82 Thanks, I had the same question immediately when I saw the organ. But, after I checked, it's actually the violonbass 16'. I was at a demonstration of the organ and the demonstrator got it wrong at first. I got confused, sorry. You can find the info by searching the stop names and Helsinki together.
1. Gedanke: Erstaunlich, was heute im Orgelbau möglich ist. 2. Gedanke: Wer braucht sowas? 3. Gedanke: Die Registerzüge wirken sehr billig und instabil. 4. Gedanke: Da müssen so unfassbar viele Sensoren verbaut worden sein. Wenn da irgendwann mal einige ausfallen, will ich nicht der Orgelbauer sein, der die Fehler finden muß! Fazit: Ich wünsche der Orgel alles Gute! Aber ist es notwendig alles umzusetzten was möglich ist?
Zu 1.: In der Tat. 🙂 Gibt es aber schon seit 2018, seit Rieger seine erste Orgel dieser Art in St. Martin in Kassel gebaut hat. Zu 2.: Musiker, die über Ihren Horizont hinauswachsen und sich mit Eingeschliffenem nicht zufrieden geben möchten. Praktische Anwendung: Effekte für Film-Soundtracks etc. Zu 3.: Ja, _wirken_ sie -- dachte ich auch erst. Aber dann: Karbonfaser! Ein äußerst robuster und dabei doch flexibler und extrem leichter Werkstoff, der bei großen Orgeln mittlerweile auch gern für Abstrakte eingesetzt wird, um den Tastendruckaufwand bei mechanischen Spieltrakturen zu senken. Hatte sowas im Magdeburger Dom unter den Fingern -- mit sehr angenehmem Spielgefühl. Zu 4.: Nicht unbedingt Sensoren, sondern eher elektromechanische Steuerungstechnik (Servos usw.). Insbesondere die digital steuer-, speicher- und anzeigbaren Komponenten (Winddruck, Registerschübe) gehen rein über elektronische Signalwege. Für den Orgelbauer dürfte die Fehlersuche da nicht so schwierig sein, denn es gibt unter Garantie einen Schaltplan zur Dokumentation und Fehlersuche. Zum Fazit: Dito! 😊Und meine ganz persönliche Meinung: "Brauchen" tut man nicht alles, was möglich ist. Aber wenn die Möglichkeiten erstmal da sind, fängt man unfreiwillig an zu experimentieren und sie auszureizen. Das ermöglicht Kreativität und führt sicherlich zu dem einen oder anderen überraschenden Ergebnis.
BTW, the microtonal division is NOT unique. In 2018, Rieger built an experimental organ at St. Martin, Kassel, Germany, which already has many of the features included that you demonstrated in your video: Variable wind pressure on individual divisions, microtonal keyboard on the IV manual, etc. -- however, the Kassel organ seems a bit like a blueprint or prototype, where Rieger wanted to try or test some things before going big on large-scale instruments. Rieger also released a promo video on RUclips, in which they demonstrate some of the features: ruclips.net/video/z6VNb2TUfk0/видео.html
@@bkarosi Haha, it's just like I wrote in another comment below: If new things are designed and built, people start to experiment with it and get inspired. 🙂 Looking forward to listen to and watch some interesting concerts from the Musikkittalo in the future!
A triumph of technology over musicality. Somehow pretending that pipes gasping for wind thanks to partially opened valves or sliders are in some way "musical"... it's a joke. And all that money and they couldn't even sort out a bench that doesn't creak. Or maybe that's part of the innovation?
The thing I would like to know is how much of these gimmicks will be usable without a large amount of practice and rehearsal time which is always in short supply in concert halls. I suspect it won’t get much use.
@@erichkusterer6339 Nein. Verschiedene Meinungen sind völlig akzeptabel und regen eine gesunde Diskussion an. Das ist auch gut so. Mir ging es mehr um den Teil Aussage, in dem es darum ging, dass kein Mensch die "Spielereien" brauche, die in diesem Instrument stecken.
@richardharrold9736 Blues music, modern music and movie scores: _"Am I nothing to you?!?"_ Also, I'd be interested in your opinion about Keith Jarret's music. Honestly.
Absolutely not a fan of modern art, I find most of it distasteful and disordered. In other words not beautiful. I say this because the casework looks like something straight of hell. If the artist was portraying this, they have succeeded.
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel indeed. It builds on concepts from 1930s/40s/50s which were supressed during the "Baroque Terror" of the 1960s/70s. A fine organ for improvisation.
Of course no one was waiting for this -- if people would, there would be much more inventors all over the place. But, eventually, someone had the courage and money to push the limits -- and now here we are. 🙂
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel 4 manuals, ~143 ranks, ~110 stops (+ ? extensions + 7 transmissions.), 7,999 pipes -- this is by far NOT the largest organ worldwide.
Microtones - great, just what we need. Eyeroll. "Western music is so last century... " Glad to see the expensive destruction of the Western mind continues apace.
Are we really getting into the valve control nonsense? Try controlling the key fall while playing Back at speed. Of course when you push the key the valves open instantly. You are controlling this with electronics and NOT the way you really play. When are you tracker fanatics going to get off the horse and play organs the way they should be played without gimmicks. Sounds the same dude and it is isn't the pipes are out of tune. More gimicks, more things to go wrong and more electronics further separated the organist from the organ. You can hear the pitch change when you are pulling the proportional knobs. This is a sad joke, just like the snakes dribbling down the front of the expression boxes. Where did you get that idea, the abortion in the Disney organ in Los Angeles?
Que maravillosa obra de arte de técnica e ingeniería, honor a quien lo merece.
We need an organ tour and demonstration next !
What a great demonstration of the truly mindblowing features on this instrument!
I won't lie, the capabilities with this instrument are staggering, the amount of ways to play around with the organ are near infinite. I can definitely see many organists having their "kid in a candy store" moments on this organ, playing with and testing the limits of this instrument. However, my concern is with all the toys and gadgets and gizmos is that whether or not the maintenance becomes an issue over time. In my opinion, one of the largest reasons why the pipe organ has stood the test of time is that the fundamental way the organ works hasn't changed since its inception, and there's a certain beauty in simplicity.
Rooted in IT but with a passion to play pipe organs myself, I "only" got a two-weeks glimpse into hands-on organ building at a smaller workshop in Augsburg, Germany, when I had the chance to take the time between two subsequent jobs. I participated in everything the organ builder did -- including the restoration of a romantic organ with pneumatic action -- and can say that "simplicity" might be a VERY relative term... 🙂 There's so much detail involved in the inner workings of even smaller instruments -- and, to be honest, these additional "toys and gadgets and gizmos" aren't much of a concern regarding maintenance. In contrast, many of these features heavily rely on an electronically actuated groundwork, so effectively everything boils down to a piece of software to debug. Everything else is just the way it was some centuries ago, except for the fact that microcontrollers are now doing the job that good ol' solenoids and tiny valve bellows did when they replaced the wooden abstracts used in tracker organs.
@@WoodymCexcellent comment thanks!
@@epincion Glad I could help you out! 🙂
One other thing -- which I didn't mention in my comment, but this struck me in the aftermath: Many (most?) organists never take their time to "smell a bit of workshop air" at an organ builder of their choice. I'd say they don't know what they're missing...as an example, it's a remarkable experience to construct, build and voice pipes on your own, even if it's just a single one! At least, there are organists out there who are capable of tuning reed pipes, guess that's better than nothing. 😄
@richardharrold9736 No idea which practical experience or evidence this statement relies on; howeveer, according to logic, reliability is subject to careful material selection and manufacturing as well as proper testing -- so you can be either lucky or have bad luck on both architectures.
@richardharrold9736 Well, so we've made different experiences then. Over the past about 10~15 years, I did encounter all kinds of architectures you mentioned above; almost every tubular-pneumatic and electro-pneumatic organ had failing parts (although being restored or at least serviced just recently) while tracker, electric action and computerized ones were in an excellent condition. This may or may be not subject to the amount of money being put into service agreements/contracts, of course.
Regarding "legitimate artistic use": If -- and only _if_ -- this term just includes reportoire from the 20th century or older, you're perfectly right.
What a fascinating organ! I think my old brain would explode if I tried to access all of its capabilities. Thank you for your demonstration!
Wow - this is fascinating! I’ve never seen an organ with such flexibility. Congratulations to Reiger for being so innovative and forward-thinking. It makes my own organ look like a little toy in comparison!
Oh, hey Richard! :)
I would travel to hear you play this giant!
@richardharrold9736 Guess we'll find out in a few years then... Or don't we?
@richardharrold9736 That's a bet you're probably going to loose. You _do_ know that they signed a service contract, do you? :-) This means that defective parts (if any) are guaranteed to be replaced and the instrument becoming unplayable, thus, is far out of reach.
One additional thought from my own pipe organ performances: There were more than a handful of occasions where I _wished_ I had microtonal keyboards and pipe tunings (besaid Blues music and sountrack FX) as well as variable wind pressure on specific chests and full enclosure on all divisions to make the pieces I were playing sound "less harsh" in terms of note intervals and dynamics. So, even if these features will be used sparingly or even rarely, I bet there's a bunch of musicians waiting already to experiment with it and finally build upon 'em.
The complexity of the operation of tracker organs has always been mind blowing to me & how they were building them 3, 4, 5, maybe even as much as 600 years ago when you couldn't so much as go to a hardware store to buy simple screws, nuts, bolts or anything we take for granted today makes the concept even more boggling! That being said, this organ takes things to an even more incredible level. Having a fixed tracker action console & a movable electronic one that even attempts to replicate tracker action is so far "over-the-top" I can't even fathom it....
Thanks so much for uploading this - what a fascinating instrument!
You are welcome!
This is one of the craziest things I've ever seen. There are some extremely interesting features here, especially the proportionate stop action and that "glissando" stop.
@richardharrold9736 - Sounds like a "you" problem
Oh. My. Goodness. What an extraordinary creation!
Remember, just like a car, the more electronics, automation, stepper motors etc, the more that can go wrong… and it will, just give it time.
Extraordinary instrument, innovation and craftsmanship thought!
Sooner or later, someone at Casavant or Flentrop will see this video, and jaws will drop! lol I have been playing pipe organs for 40 years, and I can't even imagine how I could registrate these features into a piece.
These keys in the drawer on the left are probably the choice of the dividing point on the pedal keyboard. Splitpoint option. You can play with different sets of registers in the pedal.
Yes you are correct!
This has many of the more outlandish features of the new Rieger in the Stephansdom, in Wien.
I guess money was no object in either case! Thanks for the fine demo. 😁
Like with Parco della Musica in Rome Auditorium 😢
Wow, this is an advanced beast! Proportional stops, proportional wind, just marvelous!. Also microtonal and chromatic guys from the past are applauding and cheering! (Luzzaschi, Vicentino, Gesualdo et. al.)
What an awesome organ! 😃 Can't wait to play it one day. 😁 Thanks for sharing this brief demo with us. 😊
Hey Jonny, long time no see!
Well...can't wait to hear some of your stuff being fed into that beast. I _think_ there might be a "MIDI IN" connector somewhere on the console... 😉
@@WoodymC I would be more than happy to want to do both live performances and midi-playback with it, to see how versatile it is. 😊
The variable wind demo reminds me of the transporter sound from Star Trek.
Thanks for sharing this insight. Now I understand why I prefer so much mechanically actuated organs over electrically actuated organs. The direct electrical valve opening creates a very hard sound, while the mechanical opening - or here the reproduced mechanical opening - creates a natural warm sound.
It is better to play a synthesizer then
Hello Balint, here's my suggestion for a composition this organ actually yearns for: Dominik Susteck: Farblichter. Published at Dohr Verlag. This piece was performed by Winfried Bönig during the Tuesday night's Orgelfeierstunden @Cologne Cathedral. During the concert, a flexible wind controller was mounted and activated to meet the requirements of the piece. Why not give it a try? One of my favourite piece in the contemporary repertoire.
I’ll check it out
Hey Jurgen, can we listen to this piece anywhere?
Spettacolare! Magnifico!
Hammond drawbar like stops 🥰
Wishlist this console be replicated for Hauptwerk 🥰
That’s an *insane* organ. It’s probably the most advanced pipe organ in the entire world…. whether that’s a good thing or not, or how much, is probably up for debate (especially in terms of reliability), but it is very cool to see.
As i Built Parts for it i can say The built quality and relieability is excellent , greetings from Austria
no, that's the hyper organ in orgelpark amsterdam, litteral control over the motor rpm, colour combo's trem adjustability and the likes
As an amateur I could never make good use of the features of this organ.
@@wouterattheorgan which organ in the Orgelpark do you mean?
@@WMAlbers1 Wouterattheorgan is referring to The Utopa Baroque Organ in the Orgelpark. It is a meticulously-crafted Baroque organ in the manner of Zacharias Hildebrandt (voiced by Munetaka Yokota), with fully-mechanical console. But, it also has a proportional electric action, with a valve under every pipe, and a separate modern console with a Sinua touchscreen software system affording complete control over pipe speech (attack, sustain, decay, plus effects like staccato, delay, fluttertongue, etc) mappable from any pipe to any key in any combination for unlimited mixture compositions, and velocity-sensitive keyboards for constructing complexe layers of articulative effects (i.e. play the key softly and get one sound, a little faster and add a new note, faster yet and add more sound/pitches, or flange/distortion effects, etc). It is also networkable through MIDI and OSC for performance from a laptop or any sort of controller (such as other hyper-instruments, gestural controllers, wired dancers, etc) playable from anywhere in the world. It presents a whole universe of potential for acoustic musical art. Rieger is doing great work devising their own advanced proportional key and stop actions, but they're still a whole generation behind Sinua and the Orgelpark Utopa Baroque Organ. In fact, they should work together, rather than make competing, proprietary hyperorgan systems.
Up close shots show off the amazing wood! This organ must have been built with an unlimited budget.
Impressive application of technology!
Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho donated 1 million euros of her own money to build it, and also conviced her friend Olivier Latry to join the planning committee. After that the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and State of Finland gave some hefty sum of money. They also sold pipes with names of the donor engraved in them so in total they gathered a little over 4 million euros for this instrument
Thank you Balint for demonstrating the capabilities of this extraordinary instrument. I wasn't previously aware of this organ and note that, on the Musikkittalo website it is described as having "Unlimited creative potential" and "From the project’s inception, what mattered was ensuring that the new organ would lend itself to performing new contemporary music." It appears that they have achieved their aim. I must be too old for this as I wonder when creating "sound effects" becomes music? Certainly there will be some composers and performers who will relish this organ's capabilities. I dare say that the organ tuners have a fun time!
Amazing and wow!
Lots of things to break down!
That's the case with any pipe organ i'd say.... All not-small pipe organs have thousands and thousands of parts. I don't think the functions shown require sensitive parts. The solenoids are probably just driven with PWM (Pulse Width Modulation) which allows a solenoid to be on a partial position. Slowing down the blower motor is not difficult either, there are VFD (Variable Frequency Drive) units for that which exist already for decades. The people behind this organ just had the courage to put all these things in there.
@@Engineer9736 I don't think PWM will cut it here. The Druckpunkt he is talking about is physical, opening the valve against the wind pressure - after the first tiny opening it suddenly gets much easyer because the pressure differential decreases rapidly. For the organ to have a progressive mode you need either two magnets (one pulling and one pushing) or stepper motors, at least those are the systems I know to have been used in the past.
For the drawstops I'm really curious what Rieger did, because I know for a fact that the two biggest suppliers of organ parts in Germany cancelled the project of drawstop solenoids capable of doing what is shown here after several years of development.
Lastly the blower motor: Usually Rieger does actually not alter the RPM, because it would interfere with the bellows managing the wind supply. It's simpler and more genius at the same Time - they use a lever and a moveable weight pressing on the bellows.
the maple flecking on the case behind the stops is amazing
I never knew Dr. Frankenstein was also an organ builder. An instrument to fill "The Abominable Dr. Phibes" with an irresistible urge
to play the "March from Athalie" on it. Does it also have A.I., or will that be added? Imagine an organ talking back - "you aren't playing that. It will not be allowed". 😅 From Chicago, U.S.A.
Nice that you were able to demonstrate this organ in this way. I just wondered why no Finnish organist has managed to do this 😉
You're right... Where's Marko Hakanpää when you need him the most?!? 😆
My organist husband thinks this instrument is very interesting and cool… but I’m reminded of Scotty’s classic line from “Star Trek III": “The more they overtake the plumbing, the easier it is to stop up the drain.’
Beam me up Scotty, we need to find another organist. The current one is overwhelmed!😂😂😂
The keymode tracker is really nicely done. I never thought about such thing. But it looks and sounds really like it's mechanically connected (while it's not of course). The proportionate stop action... I don't know if that really has a use case. Half-open stops are good for spooky sounds but i don't know if it has a place in normal organ playing.
🤣
What is normal now?!
💜
This is a hugely expensive toy for Helsinki but at the end of the day surely it's the music that counts. Is there organ music using quarter tones, proportional winds? Or it is becoming a special effects generator? I like the feature to adjust the console dimensions to some extent.
20:31 Stop number 7 Chamade B 4', number 8 Chamade D 8', what are B and D?
At least in Finnish they would be B = Basso (bass) and D = Diskantti (treble), so you can have the chamades split in half, only to give brightness to the treble or just to give power to the bassline.
The page-turning function and adjustable console functions would be good to have on organs generally (and maybe that could adjust the bench's height and forward placement also).
I must admit, I do like it when the world of the pipe organ takes a bit of a “Quantum jump“
They're going to need to build a digital copy of this thing so that visiting organists can spend a week or 2 figuring it all out before getting to the real thing 🤣 . .
Thank you for your video. Looks fantastic. Never seen something like that before. The good way to go in terms of how 21 century organ can look like. On the other hand there might be an issue how to maintain this huge and complicated instrument in good condition. More engineering devices take more time to overhall. More complicated ingineering is less reliable compared to less complicated one. Nevertheless, it looks very interesting and exciting!
I think they have an organ technician on staff
What an incredibly cool instrument! My concern is just if it's functioning properly in 40-50 years, but very cool now.
It won’t be. The first to go wrong will be the electronics. I like the possibility for extended techniques though.
The only response that readily comes to mind is that the early vacuum-tube based ENIAC computer of 1946 that was used by the US Army's Ballistic Research Laboratory, had over 17,000 tubes & was said to suffer a tube failure (which supposedly took only 15 minutes to locate) every two days on average. Somehow, it survived & managed to serve its purpose... Hopefully this organ will also.
When the instrument becomes the "star," the musician, and the music fade into the background.
Is that what they said at Haarlem, Notre Dame de Paris, Weingarten, Liverpool Anglican Cathedral?
@richardharrold9736 Eduard was talking about the instrument becoming the “star”, nothing about gimmicks.
@richardharrold9736 The point is whether the instrument can be, or is, “greater”, more impressive, more renowned, than the player. And I would say that is certainly true, almost by definition, for what you describe as legendary instruments. One person’s “gimmick” is another’s useful, musical innovations. All the instruments I mentioned had those. Builders have been innovating for 600 years, otherwise we would only have organs with no stops and heavy levers instead of keys.
@richardharrold9736 Maybe Eduard will come back and clarify his position. But you carry on doing you.
the first thing i thought when seeing those stop tabs is their weird way of pulling out. they would seem so uncomfortable, am i right in saying this?
Thanks for insightful demo. My personal takeaway is yes, that organ has a good sounding principal 8 in the great (which is my #1 wish on every organ), especially with the proportional action.
As for the "innovations" (most of them ancient but used more systematically here than elsewhere), I appreciate the open-mindedness of both the builder and the player. However I remember my disappointment at listening Keith Jarrett's "Sphere" recording in Ottobeuren, back in the seventies. Most of the stuff was played with half-drawn stops and the result was a boring failure. The fact that I am both a Keith Jarrett fan and an organ fan only sharpened the disappointment.
For most organists, microtones are less useful than the ability to switch temperaments. Some (tracker !) organs have that, using extra pipes per octave and special "couplers" to select the right ones (rather than having sub-semitones that are difficult to play).
It would really be nice if there were a way to mount automated tuning mechanisms to the pipes, and perhaps also an expanded number of pipes like you describe, to support a greater variety of tunings that can be switched to on the fly. But to be accurate and useful for any appreciable length of time, it would seem to require a level of stability that lead alloys just can't provide.
Mind you, there's no _theoretical_ barrier to making organ pipes out of different stuff - but developing the craft of organ voicing in a different and much more resistant material is a can of worms I can't see anyone in the field wanting to open in the foreseeable future.
(Based on my own research into the properties of different alloys, my top picks for such materials are aluminium bronze and/or nickel silver, but with no known examples of pipe being made out of those materials comparable in voice to the traditional method, I might as well be farting into the wind...)
@@Kaiveran there is an experimental organ with automated tuning mechanisms, the amount of overthinking that went into that is just astounding - hermode and voigt did this in Eisleben.
And on the one hand there is an ongoing project for making pipes from aluminium, on the other hand that lead/tin alloy has really proven itself, to the point where you use it for the parts relevant for voicing even if the body of the pipe is made from zinc, copper or brass.
@richardharrold9736 If you want to _genuinely_ reproduce earlier music from eras in which the equal temperament didn't exist, you'd have no choice to go "out of tune".
Oh wait, there _are_ TONS of named temperaments that each have their pros and cons, but let's just ignore them for the convenience of stubbornness.
Tuning a 1624 Scherer instrument to anything else but its original mean-tone temperament would most certainly deprive it of its character, not mentioning of how much of a historic loss this would be to. This would be the parallel to repainting a unique painting in a modern style while destroying the original.
@richardharrold9736 That's correct.
@richardharrold9736 Better? In terms of feeling "less awkward" to our ears of today? -- Well, definitely; and, personally, I would indeed prefer it the equally temperamented way.
However, it's just not the answer to the question how historic music _really_ sounded back then. To be fair: If that question is never asked (i.e. nobody is interested in experiencing that original sound), keeping the old relics doesn't make much sense. "Unfortunately", there _are_ people interested in it, so I think we should preserve and respect our ancestors' legacy.
Demo THX theme on this Organ
Wow! A stunning instrument for airline pilots who play the pipe organs in their local churches...😊
😳 Holy Moley! 🙉
🥲 💜 🎉
Lovely!
21. század. :)
thats it rieger is out of control
This organ is fascinating, but I ask, was it worth it to build it with pipes? Wouldn't top notch samples, and a really good speaker system work just as well? And so much easier to do.
And a question, is the spaghetti stuff on the case just decorative? Thanks.
It would not be possible to have some of the effects without pipes, also it is a pretty damn good regular concert organ!
The spaghetti pipes appear to have mouths, so perhaps they speak (or belch or whatever)? I'd like to know too!
ETA: I looked at the specification and found Faggotts but not Spaghetti.
ETA2: According to ruclips.net/video/qdbIbETcT2o/видео.html they are "bent air tubes" and the is a mention of 3D printing which I think rules out their ability to produce musical notes.
Pedal 32' principal.
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel Only the four lowest wooden pipes on the sides of the organ are the 32' princ. The speaking facade pipes are from 16' violonbass.
Oh the service problems are coming with this beast jut wait!
They have an organ technician on staff. Just think how much maintenance the Wanamaker organ needs, this one needs certainly less
@@bkarosi time will tell.
The Volkswagen of organs.
Ligeti's dream.
14:10 I guess that might be the pedal divide point?
Yes
the start reminds me of the THX intro
Great to see a non tracker action organ, or at least one with the option of electric action. It isn’t always the best solution for an organ. The proportionate key action is nothing new and has been around in one form or another for years, in fact the Willis floating lever was probably the forerunner. Of course on most tracker actions you can’t play like in the demo because of the “pluck” so I can’t see its or much value. Those drawstops look very disconcerting!
How do they actually make it proportional? Is it air valves that can stand still in any position instead of the usual open or closed?
Extremely powerful magnets that control the pallets and can stop midway
@@bkarosi Speaking as an engineer that sounds like something requiring quite complicated electronics to control.
@@organfairy Speaking as a software developer, I can revise this to "state-of-the-art electronics AND software".
Hi Balint, is the bench heat feature?😂
Interesting features, yet I feel they mostly produce ”noise” and disharmony rather than beauty. I now that this is in the ”eye of the beholder”.
it's usually the way of playing those stops. bit like a 10 2/3th quint wouldn't sound good on it's own
Do you know whether or not the curved looking pipes that make up the facade are speaking pipes or are they just for decoration? I can see that each has a mouth which made me curious as to whether or not they speak. With such an eclectic organ I would almost automatically assume that they do speak but wanted to see if you knew. 😊Excellent demonstration as usual. I love to see your organ demonstrations! Thank you for posting these!
Principal 32'.
Offenbass 16' are the five facade pipes that speak.
@@Mandibela oh ok. I figured that they were speaking but wanted to confirm it. Thank you so much for your reply! I really do appreciate it.
@@jcolbyt82 Thanks, I had the same question immediately when I saw the organ. But, after I checked, it's actually the violonbass 16'. I was at a demonstration of the organ and the demonstrator got it wrong at first. I got confused, sorry. You can find the info by searching the stop names and Helsinki together.
Oh and there are more than five pipes speaking, but I'm not sure what notes, but looking at photos you can see at least nine pipes that can speak.
Great. Rieger made the most expensive Hammond organ.
Having an old Hammond organ myself i had the same feeling ...:)
Key component of a Hammond organ are the tone wheels, which this organ doesn't have. Only the "user interface" is kinda similar to a Hammond organ.
1. Gedanke:
Erstaunlich, was heute im Orgelbau möglich ist.
2. Gedanke:
Wer braucht sowas?
3. Gedanke:
Die Registerzüge wirken sehr billig und instabil.
4. Gedanke:
Da müssen so unfassbar viele Sensoren verbaut worden sein.
Wenn da irgendwann mal einige ausfallen, will ich nicht der Orgelbauer sein, der
die Fehler finden muß!
Fazit: Ich wünsche der Orgel alles Gute!
Aber ist es notwendig alles umzusetzten was möglich ist?
Zu 1.: In der Tat. 🙂 Gibt es aber schon seit 2018, seit Rieger seine erste Orgel dieser Art in St. Martin in Kassel gebaut hat.
Zu 2.: Musiker, die über Ihren Horizont hinauswachsen und sich mit Eingeschliffenem nicht zufrieden geben möchten. Praktische Anwendung: Effekte für Film-Soundtracks etc.
Zu 3.: Ja, _wirken_ sie -- dachte ich auch erst. Aber dann: Karbonfaser! Ein äußerst robuster und dabei doch flexibler und extrem leichter Werkstoff, der bei großen Orgeln mittlerweile auch gern für Abstrakte eingesetzt wird, um den Tastendruckaufwand bei mechanischen Spieltrakturen zu senken. Hatte sowas im Magdeburger Dom unter den Fingern -- mit sehr angenehmem Spielgefühl.
Zu 4.: Nicht unbedingt Sensoren, sondern eher elektromechanische Steuerungstechnik (Servos usw.). Insbesondere die digital steuer-, speicher- und anzeigbaren Komponenten (Winddruck, Registerschübe) gehen rein über elektronische Signalwege. Für den Orgelbauer dürfte die Fehlersuche da nicht so schwierig sein, denn es gibt unter Garantie einen Schaltplan zur Dokumentation und Fehlersuche.
Zum Fazit: Dito! 😊Und meine ganz persönliche Meinung: "Brauchen" tut man nicht alles, was möglich ist. Aber wenn die Möglichkeiten erstmal da sind, fängt man unfreiwillig an zu experimentieren und sie auszureizen. Das ermöglicht Kreativität und führt sicherlich zu dem einen oder anderen überraschenden Ergebnis.
@@WoodymC Danke für Dein Feedback :-)
@@nock5771 Immer gerne.
Could you hook up and electric guitar to this pipe organ.
Perhaps not to this one, but I've seen it done with several others. Plug in the guitar and play the pipes.
BTW, the microtonal division is NOT unique. In 2018, Rieger built an experimental organ at St. Martin, Kassel, Germany, which already has many of the features included that you demonstrated in your video: Variable wind pressure on individual divisions, microtonal keyboard on the IV manual, etc. -- however, the Kassel organ seems a bit like a blueprint or prototype, where Rieger wanted to try or test some things before going big on large-scale instruments. Rieger also released a promo video on RUclips, in which they demonstrate some of the features:
ruclips.net/video/z6VNb2TUfk0/видео.html
The instrument in Kassel was the inspiration for the Helsinki folks to get a similar organ with features for avant-garde organ repertoire.
@@bkarosi Haha, it's just like I wrote in another comment below: If new things are designed and built, people start to experiment with it and get inspired. 🙂
Looking forward to listen to and watch some interesting concerts from the Musikkittalo in the future!
Penderecki for organ
Was spielt der Organist ab sekunde etwas 40ff ??
Austrian organ in Finland with all controls in English!
...and organists from all over the world! :)
A triumph of technology over musicality. Somehow pretending that pipes gasping for wind thanks to partially opened valves or sliders are in some way "musical"... it's a joke. And all that money and they couldn't even sort out a bench that doesn't creak. Or maybe that's part of the innovation?
The thing I would like to know is how much of these gimmicks will be usable without a large amount of practice and rehearsal time which is always in short supply in concert halls. I suspect it won’t get much use.
You beat me to it on the bench thing! 😁
Saves paying for it to be tuned.
What organ shoes are you wearing? Are they organmaster?
Play in socks or barefoot.
Yes, Organmaster!
Does the concert hall allow organists interested in the organ to contact them and ask to play the organ?
Since you now have the proportional playing modes, why bother with the mechanical-action console? The playing system renders it redundant.
Nothing more than a gimmick. It’s nothing new and has been around for years, just few people really want it.
Ah, that it just a Hammond remade..they stole the drawsbars from Hammond...
Fuer mich sind das zu viel Spielereien. Das braucht kein Mensch.
Von einem einzigen Menschen auf den Rest der Menschheit zu schließen, ist schon ein kleines bisschen naiv -- und überheblich.
@@WoodymC Nun gut, Sie haben Ihre Meinung dazu, ich die meine; ob das überheblich ist?
@@erichkusterer6339 Nein. Verschiedene Meinungen sind völlig akzeptabel und regen eine gesunde Diskussion an. Das ist auch gut so. Mir ging es mehr um den Teil Aussage, in dem es darum ging, dass kein Mensch die "Spielereien" brauche, die in diesem Instrument stecken.
@richardharrold9736 Blues music, modern music and movie scores:
_"Am I nothing to you?!?"_
Also, I'd be interested in your opinion about Keith Jarret's music. Honestly.
Amazing organ. Not a fan of the prospect, though.
Absolutely not a fan of modern art, I find most of it distasteful and disordered. In other words not beautiful. I say this because the casework looks like something straight of hell. If the artist was portraying this, they have succeeded.
Do you think trees come from Hell?
Ridiculous organ. No one is waiting for this.
Speak for yourself.
It is actually a marvelous concert hall organ, extremely good sounding. Largest (pipe count) or second largest (speaking stops) in the world.
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel indeed. It builds on concepts from 1930s/40s/50s which were supressed during the "Baroque Terror" of the 1960s/70s. A fine organ for improvisation.
Of course no one was waiting for this -- if people would, there would be much more inventors all over the place.
But, eventually, someone had the courage and money to push the limits -- and now here we are. 🙂
@@Arkienkeli_Working_Angel 4 manuals, ~143 ranks, ~110 stops (+ ? extensions + 7 transmissions.), 7,999 pipes -- this is by far NOT the largest organ worldwide.
Microtones - great, just what we need. Eyeroll. "Western music is so last century... " Glad to see the expensive destruction of the Western mind continues apace.
Nonsense.
The microtonal pipes are an option; you don't have to play with them if you don't want to!
Just because you can't see the beauty in something doesn't mean it isn't real.
Microtones aren't a new thing.
@@jamesprins9735exactly. Vicentino is approving and applauding from the past!
Extreeeeemly expensive. How much money from the EU went in this toy?
Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho provided €1,000,000 towards the construction of this organ.
None, cost about 5M €.
@@timothytikker1147 My sincere gratitude to an organ lover with such a great generosity (and the ability to donate an amount this huge).
Are we really getting into the valve control nonsense? Try controlling the key fall while playing Back at speed. Of course when you push the key the valves open instantly. You are controlling this with electronics and NOT the way you really play. When are you tracker fanatics going to get off the horse and play organs the way they should be played without gimmicks. Sounds the same dude and it is isn't the pipes are out of tune. More gimicks, more things to go wrong and more electronics further separated the organist from the organ. You can hear the pitch change when you are pulling the proportional knobs. This is a sad joke, just like the snakes dribbling down the front of the expression boxes. Where did you get that idea, the abortion in the Disney organ in Los Angeles?
I hope you are not really an organbuilder, one that cannot even spell Bach.
Yawn
Despite of the perhaps interesting new features, the most ugly organ design ever seen, I can't stand to look at this!
Un pò macchinoso. Adesso bisogna aspettare che i compositori scrivano musiche adeguate per questo strumento o esistono già?. Grazie
There is some music for its capabilities - usually considered as 'experimental' music