THE ORGAN STORY

Llandaff Cathedral stands on one of the oldest Christian sites in Britain with the present building dating back to 1107. Throughout the 20th century and to the present day Llandaff Cathedral has enjoyed a very high choral tradition.

Music is an essential part of the worship at the Cathedral. Llandaff is the only Anglican Cathedral in Wales with a dedicated Choir School and a professional choir that consists purely of boys and men. The Cathedral Choir sings at six services each week during term time as well as at the Christmas and Easter services. The organ accompanies the choir and therefore needs to have the tonal variety and subtlety for this purpose. It is also essential that it can lead large congregations in the singing of hymns, as well as being flexible enough to allow the playing of a worldwide organ repertoire.

• the tonal scheme is a perfect balance of the needs of the cathedral choir, cathedral congregation and solo repertoire – nothing had been overlooked.

• the dynamic range of the instrument extends from the hushed whisper of gently undulating Swell strings, box closed, to the colossal, cathedral-filling totally splendid tutti (or variety of tuttis).

• the tone is beautiful; everything well-voiced, characterful yet blending.

• the wind supply is effortlessly adequate, perfectly steady and completely silent.

• the actions are equally silent (no heavy-pressure clunks here) and both lightening fast and excellent in repetition (due to the use of compound magnets on soundboard wind pressure).

• the console is, as always with Nicholson, completely comfortable, with everything feeling solid and in the ‘right place’.  A shame it is closed with a roller-blind: it would delight visitors to look up to its gallery in the southeast bay of the chancel and see its keys and stops."
   

Unfortunately, due to financial circumstances in 2010, 11 speaking stops from the Solo organ and 4 speaking stops from the Pedal organ were not installed.

We are advised that we need £185,000 to install the solo organ and the missing pedal stops. In April 2011, an appeal was launched to raise this sum and a bank account - "Llandaff Cathedral Solo Organ" – was opened specifically to receive donations for this final phase. The money raised to date may be seen in the ‘Progress Report’.

At the end of November 2012, The Most Reverend, Dr. Barry Morgan, Archbishop of Wales, wrote to Nicholson of Malvern authorising them to proceed immediately with the manufacture of the Solo organ and missing pedal stops. Installation is scheduled to commence in early July 2013, with completion towards the end of September.

Llandaff Cathedral will finally have an organ that will reinforce its place on the international map of musical excellence, just as many other Welsh musical organisations have already done so. It is an iconic investment for the future, which has already created interest around the world and praise of the highest level from a number of eminent organists. Paul Hale concluded his article in Organists’ Review with the following paragraph:

“Heralded as the largest new British cathedral organ since Coventry I can say with conviction that the Llandaff Nicholson is also the best new cathedral organ since Coventry, which it matches for versatility, colour, glory in choruses, beauty in flutes, refinement in reeds and strings, and highest build quality. It simply must gain its Solo and its completed Pedal organ to take its rightful place at the pinnacle to British cathedral organ-building. Please help Llandaff find the funds; they and this masterpiece deserve it.”  

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WHAT'S MISSING?

Each pipe within an organ is scaled and voiced to imitate instruments of an orchestra or to generate sounds that are truly indigenous to the organ.