Our Organ

The NORD C2 Combo Organ

Modern Technology meets Historic Worship

by Rob Howard, Director of Music

The saying “You’ve come a long way” was never met to describe the tumultuous journey
that a church makes moving from an historic down-town church to a brightly painted vacant
school building. It certainly was not meant to describe the musical journey a church makes
from an historic 4 manual pipe organ to a baby grand piano and then to the shiny red instrument pictured above, but...

We are in an exciting time of rebuilding and rebirth. Certainly anyone who has worshipped
with us at St. George’s in the last few months will hear something different on Sunday
morning than one would have during our humble beginning as St. George’s Anglican Church
just over a year ago. In order for our music ministry to begin moving to the next level we needed an instrument that would support that process. St. George’s needed an instrument that was versatile, did not need tuning and ongoing upkeep as did our previous instruments did and would be able to purchased for a modest sum. All of this and more are contained in that little fire-engine red organ leading in worship each Sunday morning.

In late 2009, research was begun to find out what instruments were on the market
and what would serve our congregation the best. Nothing that we were looking at in our
proposed price range compared to the Nord C2.

“From the golden age of organ building, commonly called the Baroque period of music,
The NORD company has carefully chosen an organ model with a beautiful sound and
wide range of expression. Using cutting edge sampling technique, no efforts have been
spared in producing the richest and most varied sound palette for a church organist.”
(adapted from www.nordkeyboards.com)

As in any classic pipe organ the C2 pipe organ is built upon the two basic types of organ
pipes; flue pipes and reed pipes. For each keyboard division the player can choose from
different sets of pipes or stops, to produce different sounds. Just as in a real pipe organ
each manual has its own sound; the Great division being the part of the organ with the
majestic sound, whereas the Swell has a more mellow tonal quality. The disposition of the
C2 has the classic tonal character of a baroque organ making it especially ideal for the music of Bach, Handel and other composers of the Baroque period.

The various sounds found on the NORD C2 are:

Swell (Manual II)                     Great (Manual I)                             Pedal
•Fugara 8                               •Principal 8                                     •Subbas 16
•Rohrflöte 8                            •Gamba 8                                       •Fagot 16
•Principal 4                            •Gedackt 8                                      •Gedackt 8
•Spitzflöte 4                           •Octava 4
•Nasat 3                                 •Rohrflöte 4                                      GT to PED
•Flöte 2                                   •Qvinta 3                                          SW to PED
•Vox Celeste                          •Octava 2                                        SW to GT
•Scharf II-III                              •Mixtur III-IV
•Oboe 8                                  •Trumpet 8

The numbers after each stop name indicate the approximate length in feet of the lowest
pipe for each stop. Actual organ pipes range in size from less than 1 foot to more than 32
feet in length. The Roman numerals indicate a stop with multiple pipes sounding at the
same time.

In addition to the pipe organ model the C2 is programmed with 3 other classic organ models:

The Farfisa and Vox Continental which are two transistor-type organs made famous during
the 1960’s and a classic Hammond B3, known the world over as a standard instrument
in Gospel and Jazz music.

Another fascinating feature of the C2 is the technology “under the hood”. All pipe organ
voices on the C2 are digitally sampled from actual Baroque organs so one is not simply
hearing a synthesized or simulated pipe organ sound like on a home keyboard but a digital
recording of the actual pipes from an actual pipe organ.

Also, because the sounds and functionality of the C2 are driven by an internal computer operating system future upgrades will be available to download onto the C2 via a USB port. As the technology gets better and as NORD continues to make breakthroughs in digital pipe organ sampling our C2 will get better and better as well. All this in a bright red package that weighs only 30 pounds!

The NORD C2 is a remarkable instrument that will be used for the glory of God in our
weekly worship for many years to come