02-08-2016, 02:37 AM
While I am totally not discounting the skills and experience of the builders of the pipe organs, it makes sense to me: it's sheet metal work at it's core. The thing that really blows me away are the people who can play pipe organs to their full capacity: I utterly lack the mental parallel-processing required to play one.
Oakland has a lovely old theater with a pipe organ in the orchestra pit (on a hydraulic lift, no less!) and there is a retired gentleman who can play it quite well -- it's a thing to behold. There are what seem like 100 switches, and 3 layers of keyboards, and a keyboard on the floor that he plays with his feet. His brain and my brain are fundamentally wired differently, I can't imagine any amount of training which would have me playing like that. The funny thing is that I play guitar, so it's not the musical part.
Oakland has a lovely old theater with a pipe organ in the orchestra pit (on a hydraulic lift, no less!) and there is a retired gentleman who can play it quite well -- it's a thing to behold. There are what seem like 100 switches, and 3 layers of keyboards, and a keyboard on the floor that he plays with his feet. His brain and my brain are fundamentally wired differently, I can't imagine any amount of training which would have me playing like that. The funny thing is that I play guitar, so it's not the musical part.