Author: Matt Dixon

It is easy to be pessimistic about the future of the organ as a living musical instrument. With the world-wide decline in church attendance and the influence of religion on the daily lives of the majority, there are fewer and fewer composers for whom the organ is a central part of their work. The recent…

There is indeed an argument to be pursued about what instrument or instruments are right for church worship – and this was as much true yesterday as it is today. All of us understand that there are things to be said against the pipe organ, as well as things to be said for it. All…

Historical Organ Notes is published and edited by the organ builder Martin Renshaw. It is a simply but neatly produced A5 typescript magazine covering subjects broadly similar to those that concern BIOS. I know it is read with interest by many of our members…

Elsewhere in this issue there is a report on progress on the organ in the Usher Hall, Edinburgh. This massive instrument, a true heavyweight amongst organs, is built in a self-confident style that the Edwardians could carry off with real conviction. Having received no major attention since it was built in 1914, and suffering from…

The most recent issue of the Organists Review has various things to say about electronic organs. There are letters on the subject, and they are mentioned in the Editorial column as well. As yet, there are no advertisements from their makers in the pages of the Review, as the Incorporated Association of Organists maintains a…

As a child – probably on the way to sail a boat in the Round Pond – and long before I became interested in organs, I remember the striking appearance presented by the Royal College of Organists in Kensington Gore. Though the elephants, camels and lions so carefully sculpted on the nearby Albert Memorial were…

We seem to be surrounded by reminders that Church Music is under siege. Or is it not in fact a battle? Are the disputes and difficulties that arise from time to time rather the kind of fractious squabbles that inevitably arise at a time of conspicuous decline? I do not think that one could argue…

I apologise for the rather lurid nature of the article that follows this Editorial. Though it contains several words of more than two syllables, it has the air of having been written by someone more at home describing the cost of strawberries in Wimbledon fortnight or the activities of dodgy double-glazing salesmen. It seems quite…

A recent leader in The Times was intruigingly headed ‘Organ Trade Must Cease’. Startled, I reflected briefly on the security – or otherwise – of my livelihood: but of course the editorial referred to the trade in human organs destined for transplant..

Yes, it is exasperating for all BIOS members that publications appear rather erratically. In the last Reporter I wrote a very brief note apologising for what, at the time of writing, seemed likely to be a delay of two or three weeks. In the event, all the parties involved in the production and mailing of…