GAS-PIPE ORGAN

Evening Star, Issue 20363, 20 December 1929, Page 7

GAS-PIPE ORGAN

WORK OF TWO BROTHERS. A romance is associated with- the eigh-teen-stop manual organ which has been opened at the Westhill Council School. Torquay, by Lady Florence Cecil, wife of the Bishop of Exeter. Master A. W. Allwood, son of the headmaster of the school, gained, as a prize at the local grammar school, a book entitled ‘ How To Build a Two-manual and Pedal Pipe Organ,’ and he became inspired with a desire to build an instrument for the Westhill School. He and his younger brother started on the work about eighteen months ago, and with the assistance of the manual instructors and. the boy and girl pupils the task was completed. Mr E. W. Goss, director of music for the Torquay Corporation, gave the first recital on the instrument. Its mellowness and sweetness were a great surprise. All kinds of materials were used in the work, including old gas pipes, billiard balls, and knife handles, but these cannot be traced in the finished article. There are between 600 and 700 pipes in the organ, which has been neatly encased by the school woodworkers. Organ builders have described the _ instrument as an extraordinarily clever piec° ot work. The organ cost about £l7O, whereas an instrument of the kind built by recognised organ l adders would have involved an expenditure of about £7OO. .