Victoria Park Baptist Church

The organ at Victoria Park Baptist Church sits very proudly in a gallery at the end of a brick building waiting to be played. The church organist Margaret selected her favourite stop settings and explained that the pedal manual was out of action.

This organ has two manuals: the lower is called the Great and the higher one the Swell. The Great provides an unexpressed sound, that is to say that the pipes are set open with no shutters.

The Swell organ is enclosed in a chamber with swell shades or shutters controlled by an expression pedal, and on this organ a couple of the pipes, especially the Hautboy, were marvellously out of tune. Bristol organist Huw Morgan is brilliant at honing in on the out of tune potential of organ pipes and achieving some really scintillating wobbles.

I thought it was polite not to go on an out of tune Hautboy wobble mission, as there were people chatting post-service in the church hall, and besides I love playing around with diatonic chords on the Great manual, so I sat down and did what I normally do, improvising within familiar musical constraints.

I played without thinking for half an hour, and disappeared completely, and then pressed record and played a slightly hesitant improvisation. I loved the sound of the Great. It was rich and sonorous and I could have played it for hours!

After I finished, I got chatting to a member of the congregation, who told me about Ben Maton, aka the Salisbury Organist. I have just subscribed to his Youtube channel where he shares stories of village church organs as well as recordings of his excellent playing. I’m going to delve right in!

Thank you very much to Frazer for facilitating, and to Margaret for showing me the ropes!