Kuhn Organ Builders Ltd, 2002
Restoration
www.orgelbau.ch/ope=801200
II/P/20
Austria, Styria
Kath. Kirche
A historical record of past musical practice
Our task in the Austrian church of St. Veit am Vogau proved to be a challenge like almost no other. On one hand this 17th century instrument was in a lamentable state, both optically and acoustically, but on the other hand we encountered an amazing quantity of historical material - pipework, windchests and action were almost exclusively original. On top of this the organ revealed a hidden treasure: the builder, probably Christoph Egedacher, had re-used the original 16' pipes of the previous organ from the 16th century.
The first investigations of the pipework proved alarming: some of the pipes were damaged or even snapped off, others displayed evidence of amateurish repair work and there were pipes with characteristics of various forms of construction mixed within a rank.
With much precision, positive commitment and through the devotion of a large amount of time to the work, we were able to restore order to the interior of the instrument. This organ's wonderful tone was recovered - without dispensing with any functional historical material. Only the console needed reconstruction, in the style of the original builder, and was rebuilt into the organ, having been replaced by a free-standing console in the 19th century.
The organ of St. Veit am Vogau is, however, not only an important cultural asset, but also an interesting object of study: the out-of-action transposition device for the Principal 8' stop in the Great and the practically identical stop-list in each of the organ's divisions could provide important evidence for the musical practices of the 18th century at the Kloster Mariazell (A) from where the organ originates.
