evv_1st_pres

First Presbyterian Evansville, outside view

First Presbyterian Evansville, view
of organ in choir loft

First Presby
Evansville, close-up of Fisk console

First Presbyterian Church
Evansville, Indiana
C.B. Fisk Inc.
Gloucester, MA
1991, Opus 98

Stops: 30
Independent Voices: 29

Great

Prestant	16'
Principal	8'
Spire Flute	8'
Harmonic Flute	8'
Octave	4'
Chimney Flute	4'
Twelfth	2 2/3'
Fifteenth	2'
Seventeenth (to f3)	1 3/5'
Mixture	IV-VII
Bass Clarionet	16'
German Trumpet	8'

Swell

Bourdon 16'

Violin Diapason 8'

Celeste (from C0) 8'

Stopt Diapason 8'

Italian Principal 4'

Nazard 2 2/3'

Doublet 2'

Tierce (to d3) II

Sharp IV

French Trumpet 8'

Hautboy 8'

Pedal

Open Wood	16'
Prestant (Gt.)	16'
Bourdon	16'
Octave	8'
Super Octave	4'
Trombone	16'
Trumpet	8'

Couplers

Swell to Great
Great to Pedal
Swell to Pedal

Tremulant
Wind Stabilizer

Combination Pedals: Two adjustable pairs of pedals ("On" and "Off"), one pair for stops of the right-hand stop jamb (Great), one for stops of the left-hand jamb (Swell & Pedal).

Wind Pressures:
Great & Swell 3 1/4", Pedal 4 1/4"

Manual key compass CC-a3, 58 notes, Pedal compass CC-f1, 30 notes

Key Action: Direct Mechanical ("tracker")
Stop Action: Direct Mechanical

Placed in the rear gallery of the lofty sanctuary, the organ is housed in an American walnut case designed by Charles Nazarian to harmonize with the Victorian Gothic architecture of the church. The façade pipes are of hammered lead, the largest is DD# of the Great Prestant 16'.

Charles Fisk made an initial visit to the church in September 1980, and set the course for the design of the instrument. The contract was signed in April 1984, four months after Charles’s death, an expression of the church’s trust in his successors. The final tonal design reflects numerous discussions with Dr. Douglas Reed, Organ Consultant to the church and Professor of Organ at the University of Evansville. A number of pipes from the Marshall Brothers instrument of 1874 and the Casavant rebuild of 1925 were reconditioned at the Fisk workshop and revoiced to fit Opus 98’s tonal scheme. The temperament is Fisk I. The stop action is mechanical and is outfitted with a mechanical combination system.

In response to recommendations by acoustician R. Lawrence Kirkegaard of Chicago, the entire ceiling was resurfaced with sound-reflecting material. Kirkegaard, in consultation with architects Knapp, Given, Veazey & Shoulders, designed new air conditioning equipment to eliminate mechanical noise. The walls on both sides of the balcony were subtly reshaped to eliminate a flutter echo that would have adversely affected musical sound from the balcony.

-From the C. B. Fisk, Inc. website, http://www.cbfisk.com/do/DisplayInstrumentAbout/instId/98, accessed on 7-29-2010.

First Pres Evansville, Brunzema close-up

Brunzema Portative Organ
Or "Kisten Orgel"


    4 Stops:
    8' Flute
    4' Flute
    2' Principal
    1-1/3 Quint

An earlier organ at Grace Presbyterian Church, one of the predecessor congregations of First Presbyterian and the congregation which built the present building in 1874, is described here:

"The organ cost $5,000. It has two manuals of sixty-one notes and a pedal of thirty. There are 1,544 pipes the longest of which is 19 feet and the stops with the single exception of one run through the entire compass of the organ." *

This is presumably the instrument by the Marshall Brothers Organ Co. of Ripon, Wisconsin, which built organs during the 1870s in the English style. Here is a reference to the history of the Marshall Brothers Coompany from another church's website:

"John Lancashire, a master organ builder, came to the United States in 1864 to install a Willis pipe organ from London, England, in Grace Church, Ripon Wisconsin, which had been purchased by the Marshall Brothers firm. The Marshall brothers persuaded Lancashire to join them in organizing an organ factory which became known as the Marshall Brothers Organ Company. Lancashire in turn persuaded three Willis employees to join that enterprise: Charles S. Barlow, the key maker, Edward "Ted" Harris, an excellent pipe maker, and William H. Turner." **

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*From a description of the newly built church building in 1874, from: A History of Evansville and Vanderburgh County, Indiana A Complete and Concise Account from the Earliest Times to the Present, Embracing Reminiscences of the Pioneers and Biographical Sketches of the Men who Have Been Leaders in Commercial and Other Enterprises; By Joseph Peter Elliott (1897); accessed at http://books.google.com.

**From the website of the Holy Redeemer by the Sea Catholic Church in NC, http://www.obxcatholicparish.org/Music.htm, accessed on 7-19-2010.

Click here for some history of organs in "The Little Church on the Hill" later Walnut Street Presbyterian Church, the other predecessor congregation of First Presbyterian.

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