Claviorganum - The Claviorgan As A Remote Console

The Claviorgan As A Remote Console

The instrument described by the musician and historian Charles Burney is a more unusual type of claviorgan. Used in Westminster Abbey for one of the Handel commemoration services in 1784; the instrument consisting of a harpsichord at the front of the orchestra which was connected to an organ mounted on a screen behind the performers. Burney describes in brief the way the two instruments were connected;

“The keys of communication with the harpsichord, at which Mr. Bates, the conductor, was seated, extended nineteen feet from the body of the organ, and twenty feet seven inches below the perpendicular of the set of keys by which it is usually played … to convey them to so great a distance from the instrument, without rendering the touch impractically heavy, required uncommon ingenuity and mechanical resources.”

It was made by Samuel Green of Islington for Canterbury Cathedral. After the instrument was removed to Canterbury it was erected on the choir screen, and remained at Canterbury for over a century before it was replaced by the current Willis instrument.

Given the large specification of the Green organ, and the size of the orchestra that was employed for the performances at Westminster Abbey, it may be logical to suggest that the harpsichord’s only real use in the ensemble was as a remote console for the organ rather than as a timbre in its own right. Charles Burney does suggest that Handel had used a similar device before.