George Ashdown Audsley - Personality and Artistic Temperament

Personality and Artistic Temperament

Audsley was dogmatic by nature and generally unwilling to compromise his ideals. In architecture he followed the teachings of John Ruskin and rejected "sham architecture" such as "miserable inch-thick plaster" imitating stone vaulting and iron columns finished to look like marble. Audsley strongly insisted on quality materials both in buildings and pipe organs. He made an important distinction in pipe-organ tone from what is musical and what is mere "musical noise." He was in the vanguard of the symphonic-organ music but also believed in fully developed principal choruses with real mixtures. He was very much his own worst critic and attention to detail is evident in every aspect of his works. He was dedicated to mid-19th century forms of architecture and rejected the Beaux Arts and subsequent movements, at perhaps much personal cost. Audsley's overarching theory of organ design has been considered either eccentric or particular to its period, and was never adopted fully by any builder. His urging of multiple divisions under expression proved prophetic, however, and there is much of value in his books on his discussions of organ stops, their natures, their materials, and the relative merits of the various forms of construction possible. As an example of his eccentricity, Audsley insisted that sound was not a wave in a medium, but some kind of particle phenomenon, rejecting all the science to the contrary. It has been said that Audsley was very right when he was right, but very wrong when he was wrong. In all his achievements, however, there is excellence in execution, deep thought, profound craftsmanship and high artistry. All his achievements reward patient study.