A new 17^th-century organ

Our crowdfunding campaign is now online at Voordekunst! We are offering you lots of interesting gifts in return for your gift, so have a look at the website!

The bellows are now ready in Reil's workshop. This makes it possible to give wind to the organ by hand, without the help of electricity. The organ will really breathe! An amazing piece of work, that only a few organ builders know how to do...

The windchest connects all parts of the organ: from the keyboard to the pipes. The organ pipes will fit in the holes on the picture. This important part of our organ is now finished!

Great news: all metal organ pipes are finished now. We can't wait to hear how they will sound!

Coming Saturday, September 7, we will play a benefit concert in the Lutherse Kerk in our hometown The Hague. The most beautiful chamber music from the 17^th century, with the special historical Italian organ of this church! No need to reserve tickets, you can just walk in. We hope to see you there, at 15:30!

The regale might be the smallest register of the organ in size, but in volume it will be one of the biggest! The tone is produced with 'tongues', comparable to the reed of a bassoon or shawm.

Now the work is really going fast! The keyboard is finished, and it looks stunning! The lower keys are made of Buxus wood, and the upper keys and fronts are made of Ebony. And of course it has a short octave and 'split black keys' for the meantone temperament! Het schiet nu al behoorlijk op! Het klavier is helemaal af, en het ziet er prachtig uit! Buxushouten ondertoetsen, en ebbenhouten boventoetsen en frontons. En natuurlijk een kort octaaf en dubbele 'zwarte toetsen' voor de middentoonstemming!

Here is a first picture of the keyboard... The double black keys are already visible, can you find them?

Only a few of today's organ builders can make such wonderful artwork of an organ pipe! With this historical technique, shapes are 'folded' into the organ pipe, using a knife.

The lowest bass pijpes are made from wood (after historical examples) - of course open at the top, for the characteristic Principale-sound. It smells wonderful in Reil's workshop, because all wooden pipes are now finished!

During this visit we decided about all the final details, and checked out the technical drawings of the new organ. The organ maker can now really start building! The expected delivery will be in October 2019. Very exciting!

Today, Orgelmakerij Reil visited us in Den Haag to get some last inspiration before they finish the final drawings of the organ. We had much fun trying historical organs!

With this positive reply to our final fund application at Dioraphte, we can announce that the building of the organ can officially start!

The Municipality of The Hague also decided positive about our request for the Subsidy for Cultural Enterpreneurship. We are very happy with this helpful contribution!

This week we received more positive news: the wonderful Societé Gavigniès decided to support our project.

Another fantastic donation to the organ! This time by the Niemeijer Fonds.

We are very happy that also the Van Ommeren - de Voogt Stichting decided to support our project.

The regional department of the Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds decided positive about our request for support. Thank you very much!

Organ builder Reil (Heerde, NL) completed the first drawing of the new organ, and we are very enthusiastic about them! To give you an idea about the size: the instrument is a little more than two metres high, and can be taken apart in three separate parts. This way it will fit in any standard van or big car.

After speaking with several organ makers, we finally decided that Orgelmakerij Reil (Heerde, NL) may build the instrument for us. We found that their ideas corresponded best with ours. They also have a very good international reputation for restoring and building historical organs. We are looking forward to the final result!

The Gieskes-Strijbis Fonds is the first supporter of our project, with a gift of nearly 70 percent of the complete budget. We are very grateful for this wonderful help!

In the final days of our visit to Pavia, we got the chance to rehearse with an original 18^th-century church organ.

During our residency at GhislieriMusica in Pavia (Italy) we checked out every church to see if there was a historical organ, and with success! In the main cathedral, we found an original organ of roughly the same size as our project. We even got to try it out: click here for a short video on our Instagram (it was not tuned though...).

On the 20th of September we played a concert with the unique historical organ in Oosthuizen (NL). Some parts of it might even have been used at Sweelinck's wedding... A big difference with Italian organs from the same time is the volume: the organ in Oosthuizen has a high wind pressure (thus making it sound louder). At the top of this page is a video, where you can hear how it sounded.