Cathedral of St. Paul, MN recordings. Finally!

Hello all,

After a 3+ year and 3+ million dollar overhaul, it's been a long wait but it's about time some good recordings featuring both the before and after have finally come up to hear. This weeks Pipedreams program is entirely dedicated to our local beloved St. Paul Cathedral in St. Paul, Minnesota featuring the 1927 EM Skinner sanctuary and 1963 Aeolian Skinner gallery organs. Still not like being there in person but still pretty good and you are able to get a good idea of the acoustics in this rather large space quite easily. The dome is 95+ feet in diameter and 190+ feet in height contributing to the awesome acoustics. Skinner organs in all their glory (in stereo non the less ) to the front and back sure doesn't hurt either and makes it even better! They crank it up in a few places as well. How about a sample set of this one? Put on your headphones and have a little pipedream of your own. Enjoy!

http://pipedreams.publicradio.org/listings/2014/1442/

Marc

Thanks for sharing, Marc. The magnificent sound speaks for itself.

I still have the belief that half of such a beautiful instrument (in the case of this cathedral - plural, two organs). is the organist.

Rgds,
Ed

Hi Ed,

No problem, I'm very happy to share this one and we're obviously quite proud of our St. Paul Cathedral and it's wonderful organs.

Here's another good recent video and recording, pretty much all you can say is wow! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jw9oUwf3cA

This fellows hand held camera actually almost did a better overall job of capturing how the sound really is than the Pipedreams folks did. Hard to describe, but the sound just comes pouring down on you from above, you're surrounded from every direction with a with a very lush, almost chorus effect sound.

If anyone out there in HW land ever finds themselves in the Minneapolis / St. Paul area and has some time on their hands, this is a must see and hopefully hear as well. It's open to the public daily and sees many visitors from all over the world, the organs get used every Sunday and usually on several other occasions on a monthly basis. Who knows, you might get lucky enough to take them for a spin yourself?

Marc