Organ of the Dorfkirche Sankt Maria (Lochtum)

The **organ of the Evangelische Dorfkirche Sankt Maria** (St. Mary) in **Lochtum**, is a North German Baroque organ in the village of Lochtum which is located in the Goslar district of Lower Saxony. It was built in 1746 by an anonymous builder. It has been greatly modified over time, and is surprisingly in a well-preserved state (presently, save for the tuning and temperament). 13 stops (in whole and in part) are original - 9 completely original (including the entirety of the Pedal division) and 4 partly original (half of which had the top octave supplemented by Schuke due to them being shifted down an octave. The pitch of the organ is A = 448hz and is tuned to near-equal temperament.

## Description

The organ is located in the rear of the church, and has an elaborately decorated case with ornaments including angels, some of which are playing musical instruments. It has 2 manuals and a pedalboard with 17 stops which are spread across three divisions: *Pedal (P)*, *Hauptwerk (I)*, and *Brustwerk (II)*. The organ has 22 ranks with multiple bizarre (yet interesting) features including an overblown flute which is a very convincing imitation of a *flauto traverso* of the period (for this, the air is fed through a small tube to a small hole) and a 4-rank repeating mixture with an included *tierce* rank (most of the mixture is original save for the tierce). The organ's two other (non-repeating) mixtures; the Terzian II and Sesquialtera II, also include a *tierce* in their compositions. As with most organs of this time, the low C# of all divisions is missing.

The organ has a strong pedal division which is located at the back of the organ of 4 stops and 4 ranks with a powerful Posaune 16' and a Bastrompete 8' - the entire division is completely original. The Brustwerk also serves as a "little brother" to the Hauptwerk and has 5 stops and 6 ranks (half the size of the Hauptwerk) and is based on a 2' Principal and positioned below the Hauptwerk. The Hauptwerk is positioned in the centre of the organ and is based on a 4' Principal and has 8 stops and 12 ranks. The organ carries a very direct and dry sound due to the barrel-vault of the church which has 1.4 seconds of reverb. It has slider chests, and mechanical stop action and mechanical tracker action. It is presently tuned to A = 448hz and near-equal temperament (however the original tuning was A = 478hz, also known as *"Cornetton"*, and its original temperament was Niedhardt II).

A tremulant affects the entire instrument - it had wedge bellows (common at the time) but is presently electrically pumped.

It has exactly 960 pipes (576 in the Hauptwerk, 288 in the Brustwerk, and 96 in the Pedal).

## History

The organ was built in the 15th-century church in 1746; the church was recently expanded at the time. The builder of the instrument is debated upon and cannot be correctly identified; the contenders for the builder being either Andreas Müller, a journeyman at the workshop of the famous organbuilder Arp Schnitger (a member of the Müller organbuilding family which includes the famous Dutch (German-born) organbuilder Christian Müller, among uthers) - according to the scholar Gustav Fock or the organbuilder Johann Adolarius Papenius (1697-1776) or the organbuilders Johann Gottfried Hildebrandt (1724/5-1775, son of Zacharias Hildebrandt), Joachim Wagner (1690-1749, from Berlin), or Wagner's pupil Peter Migend due to similarities in their instruments.

The initial renovation of the organ (1834) drastically changed it including the covering of the reed resonators with newspaper due to their loud and direct Baroque snarl which did not suit the concurrent tastes. The original pipes of the *Prinzipal 4'* of the Hauptwerk were lost during World War I as a measure for collecting lead. In 1929 the Brustwerk was then expanded with a Romantic Salicional 8' and was then heavily renovated. It carried the following disposition at the time (below) and half of the registers (both in whole and in part) were reused. It had exactly 1,130 pipes at the time.

### Disposition (1929-1971)

#### ***Pedal*** *(C-c')*

*Couplers: II/I, I/P*

*Accessories: Cimbelstern (C-D-E-G) and Tremulant for the entire organ*

**Note: in the 1967 document "Klingendes Ostfalen" a Zimbel IV is present in the organ's disposition in the Hauptwerk. This is either a mistake or a stop removed by Schuke.**

The organ was restored by Karl Schuke Orgelbau GmbH from 1971 to 1972 which brought back the original condition of the instrument including the original sounds of the reeds and the reconstruction of the *Flautotraver 8' along with the extension of the pedal compass*. The façade pipes of the Principal 4' were also replaced in their original style. It is currently tuned to near-equal temperament and is pitched at A= 448hz. The current disposition of the instrument (1972, Schuke restoration) is below:

## Disposition (1972-present)

### ***II. Brustwerk** (CD-c''')*

*Note: The original drawstop and label for the Salicional are present, but the stop was removed in 1972. It is vacant.*

### **Pedal** *(CD-c')*

 15
 16
 17

*Accessories: Cimbelstern (C-D-E-G, 18, above the Principal 4' pipes of the façade) and Tremulant for the entire organ*

*Couplers: Brustwerk to Hauptwerk and Hauptwerk to Pedal*

## Gallery

*All images from Binaural Pipes (see below for source)*

Detail of the top of the case (notice the Cimbelstern)Case ornament detail (left)Console (notice a bent pipe of the Prinzipal 2)Church interior (notice the barrel vault which gives the organ a very direct and dry acoustic, as well as the chandelier which partly absorbs sound)Pipework (Hauptwerk)
## References, credits, and recordings

**DISCLAIMER:** **Unfortunately because we were unable to locate any recordings of the real organ we had to use a recordings of the sampleset instead - our apologies**

* http://binauralpipes.com/lochtum (Sampleset page and information in German - contains images used in the article)
* http://orgbase.nl/scripts/ogb.exe?database=ob2&%250=2006475&LGE=EN&LIJST=lang (Orgbase entry - contains façade picture)
* https://youtu.be/l9cvf6dnRLE (Sampleset recording: Louis-James-Alfred Lefebure-Wély's *Sortie in B flat* (from *L'organiste moderne*) - by *Discord Baroque Society*)
* https://youtu.be/F\_UJBLXxx0M (Sampleset recording: Dances from John Playford's *The English Dancing Master* - by *Binaural Pipes*)