October 8, 2014
For Immediate Release
By Drew Tucker, communications assistant
CAMPBELLSVILLE, Ky. — See and hear the pipes of the mighty Farrand and Votey Organ with an organ crawl on Campbellsville University’s campus on Saturday, Oct. 11, at 10 a.m. in Ransdell Chapel, located at 401 N. Hoskins Ave.
“An organ crawl is an event which showcases a pipe organ,” Dr. Wesley Roberts, professor of music at CU, said. “Normally the organ’s principal organist demonstrates the tonal capability of the instrument, plays a few pieces and takes those willing into the organ chambers to see the pipes and how the instrument has been assembled.”
Rarely are two pipe organs identical, he said, because of each pipe organ being designed to fit the space where it’s located. This can involve the acoustics and spacing of the instrument.
“From pipe construction to tonal qualities, balancing of sounds from one set of pipes to another and the method which the organ builder took to install the instrument, people can learn many things,” he said.
Roberts will be guiding visitors around in the organ loft while a student plays a different note to demonstrate sound qualities.
There will be no true crawling, as the word “crawl” is a nickname because, in some cases, “pipe organs are so densely packed into small spaces that one literally has to crawl around to get around into it,” Roberts said.
Roberts is a member of the Louisville and Lexington American Guild of Organists chapters, which sponsor organ crawls, and has given several crawls to students since the Farrand and Votey Pipe Organ was installed in Ransdell Chapel in 2007.
Campbellsville University is a widely acclaimed Kentucky-based Christian university with more than 3,500 students offering 63 undergraduate options, 17 master’s degrees, five postgraduate areas and eight pre-professional programs. The website for complete information is campbellsville.edu.