To build, rebuild, or buy: a modern organist’s dilemma

Note: these are my personal thoughts and not representative of the views of any clients or employers.

There’s a common social media trope where people make light of the TV show House Hunters, wherein couples would share their occupations and budget before looking for their dream houses. The running joke is that there were several couples that had jobs that didn’t match the budget - this eventually turned into jokes about weaving baskets and looking at butterflies then having a budget of $8 million.

To that end, I never anticipated “virtual pipe organ builder” to be one of the many hats I wear. Hell, I didn’t even consider “organist” as something I’d pick up over the years, but I happened upon a Director of Music position that I couldn’t pass up. However, once I started playing the organ I began to notice some mechanical issues cropping up. There’s been more than one occasion where the winding system has dropped pressure in the middle of pieces, keys have stopped working, and stops have been so inconsistent in volume that they’ve become unusable.

Talking with our organ tuner/tech, it quickly became clear that the organ has been past due for some major maintenance and renovations. I then had the awkward duty to present this information less than a month into my job, where some more immediate repairs were approved. In the back of my mind, I began to worry about the cost of the pipe organ and the amount of time and money that would need to be poured into the instrument.

So…I did what I always do and started researching options. I very quickly narrowed it down to three choices: rebuild/renovate the current pipe organ, replace it with a digital organ, or consider a virtual pipe organ. Each option had pros and cons. The fact that the church even has a pipe organ in (semi) functional condition is not something easily ignored, but the costs of renovations and repairs don’t make it a fiscally responsible solution. While we could absolutely raise the funds, by the time we had the money the organ would likely need even more work to keep it playable for any amount of time. And given the age of the instrument we were looking at even more significant projects in the next 5 years to ensure the continued use of the instrument. Not a great way to start this job!

What about a commercially available digital organ? There are several companies who offer turnkey systems, but long-term costs can pretty quickly spiral out of control when your organ model is no longer made and parts become scarce. Support technicians can also quickly rack up bills equivalent to tuning a pipe organ when dealing with issues, and all for what? The draw to a digital organ is the fact that it’s digital, but the sounds from many digital organs don’t pass the acoustic sniff test in a church. Being in a more musically traditional congregation, this option was economically sensible but acoustically subpar.

And then there was one: a virtual pipe organ (VPO). While comparatively new, they present an attractive meeting of the previous two options with the sounds of a pipe organ and the lower operating costs of a digital organ. What’s the catch? This is DIY and is time and resource intensive. While there are some VPO builders, most people rely on the wisdom of those brave enough before them and build their own organs. This path comes with a lot of trial and error, Google searches, head scratches, and doubt that this is the right idea.

So if this is the most personally difficult option, why would I (and my church’s committee) choose this? Cost is a big factor. As Drew Worthen states brilliantly in his essay on building his congregation’s VPO, there is a significant cost saving in building your own organ. Sound also plays a huge role in the decision. When you’ve attended a church with a pipe organ for years and then swap to a traditional digital organ, you very quickly feel the difference in sound. With a VPO, we can use any number of organ sample sets and with minimal voicing alterations and the right sound system (more on this later) be transported to another church and organ if you closed your eyes.

I have about two more weeks to wait until I either get approved for my VPO build or go back to the drawing board, but every second of research done on this project has led me to believe that with the right person in charge of the build a VPO is the next generation of mainstream organ in churches and institutions. My hope is that as years progress we see simplifications in the software to allow for more installations that require less troubleshooting and make the technology more widespread in places where a budget-friendlier option is needed for organ music to be heard again.