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Forster & Andrews 1867

Forster and Andrews were a Hull based company operating from 1843 to 1956 who produced some very fine toned and well built instruments. The company developed their house style based on many of the ideas introduced by Edmund Schulze of Paulinzelle, Germany. Indeed, the company worked very closely Schulze on several of his instruments in the UK and Schulze usually recommended Forster & Andrews when he was unable to take on a specific job himself. They started out their organ building lives apprenticed to J C Bishop in London before setting up in Yorkshire. Their Magnum Opus was the superb organ in Hull City Hall; a large four manual concert organ of exceptional tone. The firm was taken over by Christie (of H.N.B. and Christie's cinema organs) in 1924.

Both Forster and Andrews started their organ building careers as indentured apprentices to Bishop's of London and in later years, Philip Selfe took over the running of the company - he had been foreman at Bishop's

Unlike most of the other regional organ builders working during the latter half of the 19th. century, many Forster and Andrews instruments possessed well developed manual choruses often up to four or five rank mixtures. whilst their Choir organ specifications followed the general designs of the times their Great and Swell organs often included 8' and 4' reeds with a 16' reed on the Swell. However, in common with other late Victorian organ builders, their pedal organs were typically limited in all but their largest instruments. However, their proposed design for Holy Trinity, Hull (not realised) included a 5 1/3' Quint plus a 6 2/5 Tierce in the Pedal department and several other instruments included 2' stops in this division which shows that their ideas were well ahead of their time even if fashions dictated that such "avant garde" stops were not to become a reality.

The quality of their work and materials used was exceptional and tonally, their instruments were on a par with the leading organ builders in England. Being situated in the major port of Hull, they were able to obtain a ready supply of the highest quality timber and other materials from around the world.

Altogether they built just under 1400 instruments including many for foreign climes including Australia and South America

GREAT ORGAN

Open Diapason I 8'

Open Diapason II 8'

Clarabella 8'

Stopped Diapason 8'

Principal 4'

Harmonic Flute 4'

Twelfth 2 2/3'

Fifteenth 2'

Mixture IV Rks (19:22:26:29)

Trumpet 8'

SWELL ORGAN

Double Diapason 16'

Open Diapason 8'

Lieblich Gedeckt 8'

Viola da Gamba 8'

Vox Celeste 8'

Principal 4'

Octave 2'

Mixture V Rks (15:19:22:26:29)

Contra Fagotto 16'

Oboe 8'

Cornopean 8'

PEDAL ORGAN

Open Diapason 16'

Bourdon 16'

Violoncello 8'

Bass Flute 8'

Trombone 16'

In addition to the standard intermanual and pedal couplers we have provide Octave and Sub-octave couplers to the Swell as well as A Pedal Bass and a Swell to Great melody coupler. The organ is presented in two perspectives: Close and Medium Distant. The volume levels of each perspective can be adjusted via the volume sliders.

Screenshots

Below are screenshots of the console showing the single screen console as well as the two vertical jambs.

The graphics and some additional features were developed by Olivia Nagioff.

Larger images can be downloaded from the Cloud by pressing the buttons adjacent to the thumbnails.

Single Screen Console

LH Jamb RH Jamb

Demos

The first demo of the William Mathias Processional has been kindly provided by "Mirch"

William Mathias: Processional

£80.00

Sample Sets

We have been involved with church organs for over five decades. Initially working with conventional pipe organs, we moved into the world of pipeless instruments during their rapid technological expansion in the last quarter of the twentieth century.

With over 30 years experience in creating sample sets for organs for other digital organ manufacturers and since 2003, for the Hauptwerk software platform, we are one of the longest established sample set producers.

In addition to our "off the shelf" sample sets of existing or composite instruments, we also create custom instruments to suit individual requirements.

We have a library archive of many hundreds of stops to choose from. sampled from instruments throughout the UK and elsewhere.

We also supply sample sets and stops to several pipe organ builders throughout the world for use in hybrid instruments.

Hardware

We can supply everything that might be required for a pipeless organ installation from the basic console, amplification and speakers to the computers, software and audio interfaces needed.

The various components are sourced from a number of specialist established manufacturers and supply houses most of whom we have been involved with for many years.

In addition, we have a number of contacts both in the UK and abroad who specialise in obtaining and converting former consoles for use with the Hauptwerk platform.

Contact Information

For further information, please email us at

E-mail:

charlesbraund@gmail.com

info@silveroctopus.co.uk

N.B. Some sample sets may not work with basic older versions of Hauptwerk or the entry level version of the new Hauptwerk V and above because these editions do not include some of the features that are necessary for our libraries to work fully on the Hauptwerk platform.