October 2 5 , 202 4 at 7:00 pm
PIPESCREAMS CONCERT
w ith organist
SARAH HAWBECKER
Toccata in D minor, BWV 565
Johann Sebastian Bach
This is Halloween Danny Elfman from “Nightmare Before Christmas”
The Imperial March John Williams from “Star Wars”
Overture
Andrew Lloyd Webber from “Phantom of the Opera”
The Halloween Ball Robin Dinda
Introduction
The Halloween Ball
Mummies
Zombies
Ghosts
Toccata Demonique
Funeral March of a Marionette
Charles Gounod transcribed for organ by W.T. Best
Moto ostinato Petr Eben
UPCOMING CONCERTS
Sunday, November 17~ 7:00 pm
HARVEST HOME CONCERT~ A Midtown Thanksgiving Celebration with the Redeemer Choir, Midtown High School Treble Mastery Chorus, and soloists
Friday, January 31 ~ 7:30 pm
BORROMEO STRING QUARTET from the New England Conservatory
Friday, February 21 ~ 7:30 pm
ORGAN ANNIVERSARY CONCERT
Chelsea, Chen, guest artist
About the Organ
Each pipe organ is unique and designed for the space in which it will be used. Redeemer’s instrument was built by Orgues Létourneau in Saint-Hyacinthe, Québec, Canada. It was installed and voiced in the church in 2002 and dedicated on December 15, 2002. This organ has three keyboards for the hands to play, called manuals, and one for the feet, called the pedal. Each keyboard controls a division, or grouping of pipes. There is a separate pipe for each key in every tone color. The pipes are arranged in rows, called ranks. To get the pipes to play, the organist pulls a knob, or stop. (It’s called a “stop” because when it’s pushed in, it stops the pipe from sounding.) Some stops control more than one rank, which blend to make one voice. Redeemer’s organ has 59 stops comprised of 4,119 individual pipes divided among 73 ranks.
Each stop on the organ also has a number, which tells at which pitch the note sounds. An 8’ stop will sound at the written pitch; 4’ an octave higher; 2’ two octaves higher; 16’ an octave lower. Two divisions, the Swell and the Postiv, are each housed in a box with shutters. The organist can control the shutters with a pedal, causing the sound to swell or diminish according to whether the shutters are open or closed.
The pipes of the organ are made of either wood or a metal alloy, and are either flue pipes or reed pipes. Most organ pipes are flues and are categorized into three groups according to their tone color. First are the principals. Principals are the basic organ sound, not trying to imitate any other sound. The pipes you can see in the façade are principals. The second family is the flutes. Flutes can be made of wood or metal, and they do sound like flutes, or recorders. Strings make up the third family. String pipes are narrow in scale and imitate the sound of a violin. Most organs have very few string stops. Making up the fourth family of pipes are the reeds. These pipes actually have a metal tongue that vibrates against a brass tube called a shallot. Many of the reed stops have names borrowed from the orchestra, like oboe and trumpet.
Sitting at the console, the organist has access to not just the stop drawknobs, but a number of other buttons and controls. The organist can change combinations of sounds quickly by setting pistons, buttons under each manual, which are stored in a computer memory.
After the concert, please come up to the console, take a closer look, and ask questions. See why Mozart called the organ “the King of Instruments!”
