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Throughout the 1960's and 1970's Ames area churches graciously provided practice time on their pipe organs. The two-manual, 13-rank Holtkamp installed in 1957 in Memorial Lutheran Church marked the first neo-baroque instrument in Ames. The three-manual, 40-rank Reuter installed in 1961 in Collegiate Methodist Church was used for practice and teaching for many years. The Nichols Chapel organ at Collegiate Methodist Church has the honor of being the first mechanical-action instrument in an Ames church. This 1966 installation by Fritz Noack consists of a single manual with six stops. By 1972 the city could boast a two-manual mechanical-action instrument in Gabriel Kney's 24-stop installation at United Church of Christ Congregational. Many faculty recitals have been performed on both the Reuter and Kney through the years.
It is unenclosed and placed in the rear balcony located at the West end of the chapel. Looking up at the organ, one sees from the nave three separate groups of pipes. These groups represent the 3 divisions of this organ: Positiv (brilliance); Great (foundation tones); Pedal (bass). Placed above the main case and in pyramidal arrangement against the west wall are the pipes in the pedal division. Chests which contain the Positiv and Great divisions, respectively, are brought out forward obliquely from the main case and suspended from the beams. The instrument is played from a console with two manual keyboards and a foot keyboard. Variations in tonal color are regulated by 11 stops, a series of tablet controls, placed above the upper keyboard. Each stop controls an individual set of pipes. In all there are 706 pipes, grouped into 13 ranks, in the organ. These pipes vary in length from less than one inch to 16 feet. The pipes are made of pine and combinations of tin, lead and zinc. The Memorial Lutheran organ represents another instrument in a series of contemporary baroque designs by Walter Holtkamp. Other instruments in this series designed by Mr. Holtkamp and installed by his company are Battel Chapel (Apse Organ), Yale University, the MIT Chapel, Kent School and Concordia Teachers College, River Forest, Ill. Other Holtkamp organs in this area are at University Christian Church, Des Moines, Trinity Lutheran Church, Grand Island, Nebr., and Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. In this instrument, Mr. Holtkamp, without attempting to reproduce a baroque period organ, has aimed at restoring its best features which make it an instrument of independent, non-imitative character. It is unenclosed and without swell pedals. It has principal and flue stops, but no reed stops. It has full ensemble chorus for signing, clarity for polyphonic texture, brilliance, and incisive attack, although it is capable of softer and lighter timbres. All these features make the instrument outstanding for leading the congregational signing and most suitable for performing the music that is traditional in the Lutheran Church. Detailed specifications follow-- the figure to the left of each stop indicates the length of the longest pipe in the rank; the figure to the right indicates the number of pipes involved:
The organ consists of three manual and pedal divisions, Great, Swell, Choir and Pedal. The great organ is located in exposed positions on either side of the chancel with the Principal, Bourdon, Quint and Fifteenth on the right and Quintaton, Octave, Spillflote and fourniture on the left. The other three organs are back of the chancel screen with the Swell division at the left and the Choir at the right and the Pedal at the center, the Choir and Swell being under expression. Located in these positions the organs speak directly down the nave utilizing fully the acoustical qualities of the building. The organs has 40 ranks of pipes and includes 2363 pipes. There are a total of 49 stops, 34 of which are speaking stops. The console is of the drawknob type and has a full complement of pistons, couplers and accessories. The organ was built especially for us by the Reuter Organ Company of Lawrence, Kansas. The general tonal design was planned by Mr. Franklin Mitchell, tonal director of the company. The finishing of the voicing was done in the church by Mr. Mitchell. The installation of the organ was done by Mr. R. W. Dirkson, Midwest representative for the Reuter Company. STOP LIST OF THE ORGAN
Action mechanical Coupler: Man. to Pedal
As you view this organ from all sides you can observe almost all of its sound-producing parts, for the instrument is self-contained and free-standing. Its pipes are grouped compactly yet in a manner to allow them to speak out with freedom and clarity. And it is a cased organ, the wooden ease serving to blend the tones together, to resonate them as a sounding board and to project them forward into the Sanctuary. You are actually looking at not one, but three distinct organs, although each of them is called a "division" of the total instrument. Each of the divisions is played by its own keyboard, two of them by the hands (the manuals) and one by the feet (the pedalboard). The division of pipes standing behind the three central towers of front pipes, and including them, is the Hauptwerk (literally "head section") and is played by the lower manual. The drawknobs controlling the selection of pipes to be played on the Hauptwerk are to the right of the player. Some of the bolder and brighter-speaking pipes are in the Hauptwerk.
There are two main types of sound sources in the organ: flue pipes (flutes and principals are two kinds) and reeds (such as the trumpet and krummhorn). The flue pipes are either metal, and round in shape, or wood and square. The pipes of the reeds are properly called resonators. The pipes and resonators are arranged by graduated sizes in rows called ranks, each rank having a distinctive timbre of sound. The pipes in a rank, each played by a key of its manual, form a continuous scale of notes – usually 56 in the manual divisions (corresponding to the manual’s 56 keys) and 32 in the Pedal. The operation by which the playing of a key opens a small valve, or pallet, to admit air under pressure to the pipe is called the "key action." This organ employs a purely mechanical linkage between the key and the pallet, instead of the electro-pneumatic system which came into use in the 1860’s and has predominated since. Standing beside the organ near the back, one can see some of the rods, wires, roller bars, and levers of this mechanical key action. often called "tracker action" Because of this direct linkage the speaking of the pipe is; almost simultaneous with the playing of the key, and is; even responsive to the manner in which the key is depressed and released. A well-built tracker action is the most responsive and sensitive of all ac-tions, and Gabriel Kney is a master of this ancient craft. Traditionally the common black and white relationship of keys is reversed in tracker action organs. The black natural keys of this organ are of granadilla wood and the white chromatic keys are of palisander (Brazilian rosewood) covered with ivory. The rosewood drawknobs were hand-turned by Apprentice Susan Tattershall. The drawknobs are generally referred to, as "stops." This word also is applied to the set of pipes that a drawknob brings into play, that set usually being one rank of pipes. In some cases a drawknob will make more than one rank of pipes available -- up to five, in fact. These added ranks consist of small pipes that add color and brilliance to the tone. This explains why the organ has 24 stops, but 32 ranks. In all, the organ possesses some 1540 pipes and resonators. The stop called ''Spanish Trumpet'' traditionally extends horizontally from the organ, and this has a functional basis. The sound of a reed issues from the end of its resonator, rather than from a slot, as in the case of a flue pipe. The horizontal disposition of this strong reed allows it to speak more directly to the listener. Beside building an organ to match the style and proportions of a church, the builder must also match its speaking characteristics with the acoustical environment. for an organ and its church are literally one acoustical entity. The delicate and exacting work of tonal finishing, or voicing the pipes after the installation of the instrument in the church, was done by Mr. Kney personally. The German terms used in all aspects of this organ are appropriate, since the character of its tones and the blending and balancing of these tones partake to a marked degree of the traditions laid down by the great organ builders of pre-nineteenth century Europe. Outstanding examples of their instruments, like the famous violins of their time, are thought by many to be unsurpassed to this day. Yet creative innovations of later master builders, as well as modern engineering and materials, have allowed organs such as this one to emerge, instruments firmly grounded in the best traditions yet modern in every sense. Although fairly small by some standards, this organ is distinguished by versatility, a lively tone, careful balance, and ensemble effects to which each of its voices contributes. It is an instrument responsive to the demands of a wide range of the organ literature. It is hoped that the worship of God and service to Him by all who come into this Sanctuary will he strengthened and made more joyful by the voice of the Memorial Organ. THE ORGAN BUILDER The organ was designed for the church by Gabriel Kney of London, Ontario. The instrument was constructed in London under his supervi-sion. When the organ was installed in the church, it was voiced to meet the acoustical properties of the church. Mr. Kney began his career at the age of 15 (just after World War II), as an apprentice with the Paul Sattel firm in his hometown of Speyer-am-Rhein, West Germany. At the same time he studied organ and composition at The Institute of Church Music in Speyer with Erhard Quack and with Ludwig Doerr, who is now head of the organ de-partment at Freiburg University. In 1951, Kney accepted a position as voicer for the Canadian firm of Keates. When, in 1955, he established his own company for the purpose of building tracker organs, he was considered rather eccentric because the idea of mechanical action or-gans had not caught on in either Canada or the United States. However, when he now builds an organ for a church, concert hall, or home, it is al-ways with tracker action.
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