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Youngstown Symphony concert will rededicate Stambaugh pipe organ A GRAND SOUND
By GUY D’ASTOLFO
YOUNGSTOWN
Years in the making, Sunday’s pipe organ rededication concert at Stambaugh Auditorium has the aura of an historic event.
Not only does it mark the return of the pipe organ after a two-year, $1.5 million renovation, but it also marks the 85th anniversary of the instrument — and of the Youngstown Symphony Orchestra, which will perform.
The organ was built and installed in 1926, the year Stambaugh Auditorium opened, and the same year the YSO was formed.
Leaky pipes damaged the pipe organ in the 1940s, reducing it to a shell of its former glory.
The restoration project began in March 2009, after Stambaugh received a $750,000 grant from the Bradley Foundation. A state grant for $260,000 also was received, and the hall raised the rest of the funds.
The organ and its 3,847 pipes — which range from pencil-size to 30 inches in diameter and 30 feet tall — were dismantled and trucked to the A. Thompson-Allen Co. in New Haven, Conn., for the work. The job was completed in late 2010, and the organ was reassembled at Stambaugh by last December. A few concerts have taken place since then to properly tune the massive instrument.
The organ console now sits in the orchestra pit at center stage. The pipes have been remounted on both sides of the stage, behind a decorative facade.
Sunday’s concert — which also will feature guest accompanist David Higgs of the Eastman School of Music in Rocherster, N.Y. — is actually the first in a series to feature the pipe organ. The other two will be Oct. 9 with organist Thomas Murray and Oct. 29 with Todd Wilson and a children’s Halloween party. The YSO will not be part of the latter two concerts.
William Conti, president of the Stambaugh board of trustees, said Sunday’s concert, a collaboration with the YSO, is “a historic event that should not be missed.”
He put in perspective what the pipe organ means to Stambaugh Auditorium and its place in history. “The organ is inherent to the hall and part of [philanthropist and auditorium founder] Henry Stambaugh’s dream,” he said
The massive Opus 582 organ, manufactured by the E.M. Skinner Co., was scaled to fit the hall, said Conti, and is part of the building’s architectural design. But its size is not its most important trait. “It’s not just the number of pipes,” he said.” It’s the execution of it that makes it so rare and fine sounding.”
Because the pipes are split between both sides of the stage — the choir and swell at stage right, and the great organ and pedal (bass) at stage left — the result is “a stereophonic effect that was unheard of in those days,” said Conti. “It has balance with a choir, orchestra or anything, and wonderful projection.”
Stambaugh Auditorium is renowned for its fine acoustics, which rival the world’s top concert halls, and Conti said the room is “grand” for pipe organ.
Sunday’s concert will include the Poulenc organ concerto for strings and timpani, which Conti called a stunning accompaniment to the organ. The second half will be Saint-Saens’ Symphony No. 3. In this piece, the organ becomes the undergirding for the orchestra, he said.
Conti, Patricia Syak, director of the Youngstown Symphony Society, and Randall Craig Fleischer, music director and conductor of the YSO, selected the program because of its familiarity and its balance with an orchestra.
The Youngstown Symphony called Stambaugh home until it moved into the newly refurbished Powers Auditorium in 1968. The orchestra last played at Stambaugh in 2005, at a concert to mark the renovation of the hall.
“It is proper that the Youngs-town Symphony be part of the organ rededication concert,” said Conti, a strong proponent of collaboration among cultural organizations.
Fleischer will conduct Sunday’s concert, and he’s very much looking forward to it.
“It will be fantastic, featuring two amazing instruments — the organ, which is sort of a symphony unto itself with all the different stops and sounds, and the symphony,” he said.
Fleischer has never performed with the Eastman School’s Higgs. But he has experience with this unique branch of symphonic work.
“Years ago, I formed an orchestra in a beautiful church in New York City: St. Bartholomew’s on Park Avenue and 51st Street,” said Fleischer. “It has the largest pipe organ in New York, and I enjoyed conducting a number of works for organ and symphony orchestra. Because of this experience, I know this corner of the repertoire pretty well.”
Fleischer added that he’s excited about the possibility of future concerts with the YSO and Stambaugh’s newly restored pipe organ.