Silver Octopus Studios

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.