Stepping parts of a big organ

Roland Eberlein tells some of the history of how people tried and sometimes succeeded at supplying the wind for bigger and bigger pipe organs. His essay “Technique of the Organ, ” published by the Walcker Foundation for Organ Research, goes into detail about some of the largest improvements:

“The sound of the medieval organ must always have been a bit howling because of the fluctuations in wind pressure – that was probably part of the organ style of the time…. [In] the late Middle Ages, the bellows were made larger and no longer pressed together by hand, but loaded with a weight, since this automatically resulted in a fairly constant wind pressure. The self-weight of the calcane could be used to weigh down the bellows plate, provided the bellows were large enough. The calcant only had to stand on the bellows with one foot and pull it up and down with this foot. The Halberstadt cathedral organ from 1361, after a renovation in 1495, had a system with such bellows, which the calcaneans pulled up and pressed together with their feet. It still existed around 1600 and was described and illustrated [in the drawing you see here] by Michael Praetorius in 1619″

A Glimpse at a More Modern Example

If you have never seen an organist’s footwork (or if you have, and want to see more), take a look at this video:

Pedal Restoration, If You Will

And if you should ever obtain an old organ that needs repair work to its pedals, enjoy this video about how one person went about that kind of task: