Pipe organs are musical treasures. To keep such instruments up and running calls for costly restoration and maintainance. Three of the five pipe organs in Mumbai city are still surviving, writes Nerita D’Cruz.
For almost a century, the Cathedral of the Holy Name, located at Colaba Mumbai, has been preserving its prized possesion; an ancient pipe organ. The instrument has a beautiful facade with large silver coloured pipes and a wooden body with a single manual (keyboard). It stands on one side of the loft. Its tuneful sound echoes through the Cathedral during the saturday evening church service.
Mario Nazareth, the choir conductor at the Cathedral of the Holy Name, says “there is no record of how old this pipe organ is, but I am estimating that it should be close to a century old.” It was assembled by S.Rose and Company.
He informs that the pipe organ is in working condition. “You must come and visit the Cathedral to experience what a pipe organ sounds like to know the grandness of the instrument,” suggests Nazareth.
Nazareth recalls the time when his father played the pipe organ at the Gloria Church in Byculla. “That was in the 1940s” he says. Today the century-old German pipe organ at Byculla’s Gloria Church is non-operational. Sources from the Gloria Church, inform that the instrument is collecting dust on the church loft and given the high restoration cost, there is very little chance of its revival.
Nazareth says “the major setback with these instruments is the high cost of restoration and maintainance. This is a very delicate instrument which requires minute care. There are many parts which need to be maintained like the mechanical felting, cleaning up of the bellows (which supply the pipe organ with air). Moisture also affects the functioning of the instrument. Secondly, reliable restoration experts in the country are very few.” He further adds that “there are not many people who show interest in the playing the instrument.”
The most striking feature of a pipe organ is its massive size. Its height can extend from 12 to 20 feet or more. While Nazareth plays the instrument, one can only marvel at the sound variations it produces. He says “with the instrument that we have, not all the notes are perfect. But one has to manage through these imperfections”. He points out to the ‘stops’ of the pipe organ, which when pulled outward produce different sounds. As you look up at the pipes, you will observe that some of the pipes look worn out and need to be replaced. According to Nazareth “there are some possibilities which are yet to be explored. There are warehouses in London which sell used pipes of old pipe organs and these can be imported at a relatively low cost. So we could try to work on such options” he says.
The other functional pipe organ in the city is a baby pipe organ at the Church of St Andrew located at Fort, Mumbai. This 163-year-old pipe organ was manufactured by Bishop and Sons, London. Lawrence Hardinge, a member of the church, informs that the only restoration experts in Mumbai were S. Rose and Company who shut down business because servicing only three to four pipe organs in the city wasn’t beneficial. He informs “if we want to tune or service the instrument we have to call an expert from Chennai and each time we call an expert, it costs approximately one lakh. But we have to do this once a year or else the instrument will suffer damages,” he says.
The National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA) also owns a concert pipe organ manufactured by Beckerath of Hamburg (Germany) which was purchased in 1988. The instrument was restored in 2013 at a cost of Rs 22 lakhs, inform NCPA sources. The NCPA pipe organ is used as and when required for concerts.
The Wesley Church at Colaba also has a century-old pipe organ made by the Conacher Brothers, England. The instrument, which was damaged due to heavy seepages in the church, has been silent since July 2011. “We are looking into the possibilities of restoring the instrument,” informs Reverend Israel Dyvasirvadam of the Wesley Church. He says “the restoration will cost approximately 30 to 35
lakhs. It will take time to collect funds but we are strongly inclined towards restoration of the pipe organ and preserving it for future generations to experience its music.”
There seems to be a deep sense of responsibility towards preserving these ancient musical treasures. Nazareth mentions that “a few years ago, we requested people to contribute towards maintainance of the pipe organ and the money that came in was a sizeable amount. We have the responsibility of keeping this instrument working and keeping this tradition alive.”
Sixteen-year-old, Brenda Hardinge, who plays the pipe organ at the Church of St Andrew says “there are other instruments which are convenient to use such as digital keyboards and electronic organs but the mechanical pipe organ has a unique sound and no other instrument matches up to it.”
With the passage of time and with the availability of more convenient options such as digital keyboards and other electronic instruments, one can only hope that these few pipe organs which are still surviving, continue to stand the test of time.
