December 31st this year will mark the 100th Anniversary of the outdoor organ in San Diego where Carol Williams is Civic Organist. A festive programme has been planned, including a composition by Carol to show off the newly-installed Centennial Tuba stop. The programme will be streamed live on the internet – visit the Spreckels Organ website for more information.
The Centennial Tuba isn’t the only new rank to be dedicated on New Year’s Eve – the Organ Society recently raised $135,000 to add a Gamba and a Gamba Celeste as well as the Tuba, along with a battery of percussion effects to make the organ more versatile in accompanying silent movies. And they’re not stopping there. The organ’s curator, Lyle Blackinton, has plans for four more ranks – a Geigen Celeste, and a Violina Celeste (134 more pipes) and a Vox Humana and Crumhorn (146 more pipes). This will take the Spreckels up to a grand total of 5,005 pipes making it, finally, the largest outdoor organ in the world (beating the Heroes Organ in Kufstein, Austria, with 4,948). Size isn’t everything of course – but the Spreckels Organ is a source of great civic pride, and bravo the Spreckels Organ Society, who seem to take this kind of impressive fund raising completely in their stride.
The December 31st dedication concert will be an extravaganza including bagpipers, brass ensemble, and contributions from Gina Seashore, official Carillonist for Balboa Park’s California Tower, and Civic Organists emeriti Jared Jacobsen and Robert Plimpton. Parts of the programme will replicate the original 1915 dedication.
More on Carol and the Spreckels Organ here.
Carol Williams has just released Freedom Op12 for organ, which she wrote for Frank Gehry and the 10th Anniversary of the Disney Hall organ, and performed on 23rd November this year at Disney Hall, Los Angeles. All her works are published by Melcot Music Publishing, and you can see and hear more at www.melcot.com.
