[HN Gopher] The story of my home made pipe organ (2000)
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The story of my home made pipe organ (2000)
Author : ynac
Score : 207 points
Date : 2025-01-26 17:44 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (www.sentex.ca)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.sentex.ca)
| ynac wrote:
| NPR had a story about a NEW pipe organ album:
|
| https://www.npr.org/2025/01/17/nx-s1-5232116/james-mcvinnie-...
|
| I enjoy modular synths and always felt they were essentially pipe
| organs - with some zzt zzt.
| tgv wrote:
| I've heard that quite often, but it isn't really, is it? You
| can't plug the flue rank into the diapason for frequency
| modulation, or change the envelope, etc. The sound isn't even
| synthetic, which --to me-- is the key meaning of the word
| _synthesizer_. A pipe organ combines sounds, but so does a
| brass band.
|
| The one thing it does have in common with a modular, is that it
| is a beast of an instrument, and requires much more
| understanding of the working than e.g. a piano.
|
| BTW, if you like "new" organ music, you might like Anna
| Lapwood's album "Luna," although it's more conventional than
| your link.
| codemixture wrote:
| I suppose one could say that an pipe organ and a typical
| synth setup may have somewhat similar interfaces, but wildly
| different implementations.
| organsnyder wrote:
| > You can't plug the flue rank into the diapason for
| frequency modulation, or change the envelope, etc.
|
| "String" sounds are implemented by having two ranks tuned
| slightly different from each other. They're not plugged
| "into" each other, but they're definitely working together to
| produce a certain sound.
|
| Anna Lapwood is a very exciting organist. She has the social
| media skills to build a huge following, enjoys exploring all
| facets of the instrument in both traditional and non-
| traditional contexts, and is an exceptional musician.
| cies wrote:
| Does/did Donald Knuth not have a pipe organ in his home?
|
| https://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/organ.html
| codemixture wrote:
| Indeed - and not to mention Hakon Wium Lie, of CSS and Opera
| fame, who also wanted to build his own home organ, but ended up
| buying an entire organ building company (https://ryde-berg.no).
| emursebrian wrote:
| I've been following Mattias' work for a while now. It's
| impressive the amount of really big projects he has finished over
| the years. His YouTube channel has all sorts of interesting
| projects on it.
|
| If you're into homemade instruments and the process behind making
| them, bellowphone is fun one to check out. He goes into detail
| about his builds and also has performances of himself playing his
| wacky creations.
| janlaureys wrote:
| He's one of the OG woodworkers on Youtube. Just went to check
| and I've been subscribed for 15 years apparently. Always happy
| to see one of his videos pop up.
| skykooler wrote:
| He just put out a video today of making a wooden CNC machine.
| jedimastert wrote:
| I didn't realize it was Matthias Wendell! Of course it has his
| fingerprints all over it, he has this way of balancing an
| attention to detail with knowing where to leave well enough
| alone that's deeply admirable
| Avshalom wrote:
| https://orgelkidsusa.org/commission_a_kit/ I don't know if
| they're still up and making them but orgelkids used to sell an
| assemble yourself kit.
| bluGill wrote:
| The local organ guild has one. I took my kids to an event to
| assemble it. Lots of fun but it is a better one time assemble
| event not a have and play thing. The local guild has one
| because they are a bunch of "old people" who noticed there are
| no young kids getting into their hobby/job and so they found
| something fun that they hope interests kids in the pipe organ.
| I hope it works out - the organ is really neat and this is fun
| for kids to assemble.
|
| The organ itself is a design from the Netherlands. The link you
| live has some sort of rights to the design in the US, but if
| you live elsewhere I'm not sure what the legal terms are -
| likely you can find a different answer.
|
| For those in the US, https://www.agohq.org/ is the place to go
| to find your local chapter.
| bluGill wrote:
| Openpipes.org is where I would send everyone first. Make a
| console to play with computer sounds. If you really like it buy a
| large house with a room for an organ but computers sound amazing
| with good speakers and are a lot cheaper.
| pentacent_hq wrote:
| Thanks for sharing this, I hadn't heard of Openpipes before but
| it looks great! GrandOrgue [1] is another Open Source digital
| organ and pretty neat too.
|
| [1] https://github.com/GrandOrgue/grandorgue
| bluGill wrote:
| GrandOrgue is the software behind OpenPipes (well one of
| several options). Open pipes is more about the whole system
| of owning an organ.
| claar wrote:
| My son converted an analog organ to a digital organ - I think
| he used GrandOrgue if I recall.
|
| His "Converting an Old Organ into a Digital Organ" video [1]
| quickly became the most popular YouTube video on my tiny
| channel
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Kb6SQpgSqk
| cbsks wrote:
| There's a fascinating series of YouTube videos of someone buying
| and refurbishing a church organ
| https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLluPQLh1xzlI7EMB5qIxDd_1O...
| Jordan_Pelt wrote:
| An amazing project, and I love that he always calls it "Joan's
| organ." What a tribute.
| jedimastert wrote:
| LOOK MUM NO COMPUTER is such an awesome guy, and a shining star
| of how PUNK DIY electronics can get
| technothrasher wrote:
| My neighbor's son, who is an amazingly gifted organist but a
| bit of a disaster with mechanical things, bought himself an old
| organ and currently has it in about ten thousand pieces all
| around the basement. I've been helping him with it, as I'm the
| exact opposite of him- zero musical talent but pretty good with
| mechanical stuff. It's a daunting project, but a lot of fun to
| work through.
| bradyd wrote:
| Here's his webpage for it, including the PCB and code for the
| MIDI controller he built for it.
|
| https://www.lookmumnocomputer.com/joans-church-organ
| epiccoleman wrote:
| I love DIY music of any kind. Weird Javascript synths, PVC pipe
| flutes, badly tuned wooden vibraphones on the playgrounds, tissue
| box and rubber band guitars - give me all of it. Every time
| someone builds something to make a sound they're doing art,
| expressing one of the things I love most about humans - that we
| like to make interesting noises. (and ugly ones too!)
|
| The _physicality_ of music is maybe the closest thing I can think
| of to real actual magic. We build these devices to modulate the
| pressure of air in specific ways so that we can transmit sound.
| Us humans have got built in hardware that is capable of
| incredibly fine control of air pressure and hardware for decoding
| those pressure waves into language - and even sometimes to bypass
| the language decoding and hit us directly in our emotions.
|
| Take some time to really think about how sound works and how
| we're able to produce and receive it. It sounds like something
| out of a fantasy novel!
| georgelyon wrote:
| Then you probably have already heard of this guy:
| https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqzB9Ks5H939XLuSuVLuPVw
|
| He does a bunch of awesome stuff with PVC and 3D printed parts.
| epiccoleman wrote:
| I meant to include his name near my mention of PVC flutes.
| Love watching him play (both in the sense of playing music
| and in the sense of seeing his creativity and passion on
| display). Nicolas Bras is always a fun watch!
| throwawayForMe2 wrote:
| Fundamentals of Musical Acoustics by Benade is a great Dover
| book for those interested in musical instruments.
| organsnyder wrote:
| What a beautiful instrument! When I saw the title I assumed this
| would be another instrument cobbled together from various
| decommissioned instruments. This is a much more interesting
| project!
| afandian wrote:
| I stumbled across this page myself recently whilst wondering what
| was possible DIY.
|
| Also the Baumorgel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weAV0i8fGFE
|
| Question for anyone knowledgeable. I had an idea to take a large
| block of wood and a router to cut a number of channels. Then put
| plywood on the top to make a rank of pipes. The lip and throat
| could be also done with a router.
|
| I imagine the physics of each pipe would work fine
| monophonically. I think it would work polyphonically but I wonder
| if there would be interference?
|
| How much does the resonance of the individual pipe contribute to
| timbre?
| rob74 wrote:
| > _Also the
| Baumorgelhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=weAV0i8fGFE_
|
| Wow, that thing is really a work of art! Also, using bellows
| instead of a pump is a nice touch...
| bluGill wrote:
| As the "pipe" gets longer the size (diameter, length/width...)
| needs to get bigger too. This link doesn't do that and the
| pipes are the worse for it though he made a number of other
| "mistakes" that made is not as good as it could be - but hey it
| works and doesn't sound too bad so give it credit even if it
| isn't ideal.
|
| Because you would be coupling the pipes it would change things.
| However how much isn't clear. The important thing is each pipes
| sounds the same other than the pitch so if you go from a flute
| sound to a trumpet sound that would be bad, but if it all
| sounds like the same instrument except for the pitch you did
| great. I think any negative could be mitigated by just having a
| few "pipes" on the end that never have air but are there only
| to 'finish' the resonance of the nearby pipes. The important
| thing is that the pipes end up in tune and sound the same other
| than pitch. You can do that.
|
| Now the next question is if you follow the same plan again can
| you get a set of pipes that sound like a different instrument
| from the first. Or more importantly can you get enough
| different sounds to be worth it? I'm not clear.
| afandian wrote:
| By using a router and simple construction my aim was more
| consistency! Vs building many boxes and individual mouths.
|
| I've never built anything like this and probably never will.
| I think that's the biggest variable here!
| MatthiasWandel wrote:
| Cutting away a lot with a router is a slow, noisy and dusty
| process. Less work to just glue together the channels out of
| smaller pieces of wood. Also, that way you can take individual
| pipes out and tweak them (called voicing).
|
| Another thing to be wary of -- pipes too close together
| sometimes pull together in pitch if both are played at the same
| time.
| hvs wrote:
| Mattias is a wizard of woodworking. His other site has numerous
| amazing projects: https://woodgears.ca/index.html (like a 26"
| bandsaw: https://woodgears.ca/big_bandsaw/26in.html and
| pantorouter: https://woodgears.ca/pantorouter/xl.html)
| tantalor wrote:
| The wooden CNC router is great:
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wMi0TJx-7ks
| p0w3n3d wrote:
| Donald E. Knuth approves. https://www-cs-
| faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/organ.html
|
| I too approve, but I'm sickly envying a pedal keyboard to
| exercise. I have no place in my home really, I know I could just
| buy a Studiologic pedalboard with 17 keys, along with SL X SE,
| but it's quite expensive and space consuming...
| snowfarthing wrote:
| When I first saw the headline, I imagined a big huge organ with
| 100 keys and pedals, lots of stops, and huge pipes. I was _very_
| pleasantly surprised to see something small, with maybe 48 keys,
| and a handful of creatively-placed pipes!
|
| Sometimes when we imagine a project, we think about how big it
| is, and get discouraged -- but this is a good reminder that some
| of the best projects are small, and thus, are less daunting and
| more easily tackled!
| jimnotgym wrote:
| If you want to see a big pipe organ, try lookmumnocomputer on
| YouTube. He got a giant setup, and added MIDI!
| natebc wrote:
| Sam is a real hacker too. Such a delightful personality.
| tomcam wrote:
| Strongly encourage people to hear a big pipe organ at least once,
| like the Wanamaker in Philadelphia. Church ones are usually great
| because of the acoustics. It is a visceral pleasure like no
| other. No matter how good your home sound system is, it won't
| compare to the chest-rattling and wholly immersive in-person
| experience.
| smj-edison wrote:
| +1 to this! And is classical music isn't your jam, there's
| always theatre organs[1] :)
|
| [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_8AoVxO1fg
| ofalkaed wrote:
| This brings back memories, found this site 20 years ago when I
| dreamed of building a pipe organ. My dreams were more ambitious
| and I used to spend a good number of hours scouring ebay for used
| pipes and researching and dreaming, got myself a copy of The Art
| of Organ Building and drew lots of plans. Eventually I realized
| the sort of organ I would need to be happy was beyond my means
| and ambitions but it was a fun dream.
|
| The organ which inspired my dreams: https://jehanalain.ch/orgue/
|
| Edit: The Alain Organ, not the Tagliavini, did not check the link
| closely enough and missed it covered two organs.
| fortran77 wrote:
| We had a small 6-rank organ in our shop for a while. A Holtkamp
| orignally in a funeral home, and then modified for a residence
| before we picked it up. But it became a nuisance to maintain,
| keep in tune, and play.
|
| I went to a Hauptwerk digital DIY one and it really is better for
| small and residential use. For one thing, you can have the volume
| at safe levels!
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