The project:
the Variable Structure Organ
Photo credit Ph. Klais
"The organ has certainly been, since its invention in the 3rd century B.C., the instrument most subject to aesthetic and technical innovations: size, choice of timbres, mode of transmission, distribution of pipes, presence or absence of cases... have evolved according to languages, musical tastes, technical requirements, choice of materials, configuration of places... Now, if we are perfectly familiar with the classical organ, then the romantic organ, and the symphonic organ, curiously, despite the technical means offered by our era, there are very few instruments that can be described as "Twentieth Century Organs"!
(Jean Guillou: The Organ, Memory, Future)
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A tradition dies of repeating itself. True tradition is made up of inventions that rediscover the audacity of its origins. The organ of the 21st century must therefore be created! Is it normal, in this day and age, to spend millions of Euros or Dollars on the construction of "old-fashioned" instruments that only reach an increasingly small audience? If the pipe organ is to continue to develop, it must satisfy a double requirement:
• to present the qualities of a great organ built according to the know-how of the tradition ;
• to respond to a new aesthetic, in particular by its mobility and its possibility of installation in
any site.