FIRST UNITED METHODIST CHURCH ORGAN COMMITTEE REPORT

The Need

Music is integral to worship and, as a result, our church has always sought quality of its music programs. Recently, our organists have brought to our attention several issues with our organ and the need for some major refurbishments. The average “age” of an organ is 40 years and ours is nearing that milestone.  We purchased it for $40,000 in May of 1972. During the next 17 years it had two refurbishing upgrades for a total of $80,000.00. Since 1989, there has only been regular organ maintenance and cleaning.

Our nine-member committee was charged to research what could be done to get the full range of sounds the pipes are capable of producing – within an appropriate budget and timeframe. We contacted three major organ companies in the LA area. Each sent representatives out and found the following:

1. You have a two manual console[i] with many problems.
2. You have a good set of organ pipes that need some cleaning up, refurbishing, and revoicing.
3. You have two organ pipe chambers that need a good deal of refurbishing, cleaning and upgrading.

After consultation, research and discussion, we found the following:

1. It would not be cost-effective to make repairs to the current console.
2. Conducting the expansion work necessary with a traditional pipe organ company would cost approximately $500,000.
3. We wanted to explore the possibility of a pipe-digital organ combination that would allow us a necessary three manual console with state-of-the-art technology.