A quick question about Caen

I bought the Caen sample set earlier this year. I am now in the process of rebuilding the caches for all my organs after upgrading to HW6, and I have noticed that I have two Caen organs, one called Caen Surround 2.0, and the other one Caen Extended. According to the Sonus Paradisi Web site, the Caen sampleset was revised to version 2.5 in 2013 with some improvements to the sound quality as well as extending the compass to 61 notes on the manuals and 32 on the pedals.

I have been using Caen Surround 2.0, which has some additional stops not on the original instrument, and an extended compass. Loading Caen Extended I see that there are some additional views of the stops, providing a rather attractive layout to AGO specifications for those who find Cavaille-Coll's stop layout difficult to cope with (are American organists as inflexible as American doctors, who are unable to use the same drug names as the rest of the world, and who measure blood levels of glucose and electrolytes in milligrams instead of millimoles per litre, as is standard elsewhere?). The other visible difference is that an expression pedal for the Positif has appeared in the simple jamb view.

From the SP Web site:
"There is audible audio improvement especially for the Récit, where the samples were newly processed using the latest dual channel tremulant technique to allow for better artificial tremulant behavior, the swell was newly designed to allow for more dynamic span, and the samples were additionally denoised to beat the majority of the remnants of the tracker noise."

Could anybody tell me whether the improved samples are only used in the Caen Extended version, or in both?

I have Caen 2.5, and the organ still is called "Caen Surround v.2" on my load organ list, but it came from the 2.5 installation files. That organ includes the extension stops and a simple screen.

The Caen 2.5 install you downloaded this year includes all the previous updates rolled up, including the tonal improvements.

No Americanized screens... No, we're not all that inflexible, but we uniformly pronounce "scone" badly.

Could your extended organ have come from a third party?

Mike,

Thanks for the reply. I think perhaps the extended version probably is from a third party. I downloaded a few of these a while back, and then decided that they weren't really for me (with the exception of one for Kreszcow, which simplifies the otherwise incomprehensible stop jamb and one for a neobaroque organ which restores the bottom C# - why would an organ builder in the 21st century build an instrument with this note missing, required for a lot of Bach?). Other than the ones included by the manufacturers, the only third party extension that I really like playing is Aristide No. 1.

I don't know how you pronounce scone in America. There are two different pronunciations in England, depending on what part of the country you are from, so they are both correct (if you are posh the o is short, however). Isn't it odd how people brought up in England find it very difficult to do an American accent - you hear actors attempting it and it is painful. Mind you, mostly when I hear American actors trying to manage an English accent I don't even realise that is what it is. I am very impressed, however, with Gillian Anderson's portrayal of Margaret Thatcher in the latest series of The Crown, which is exactly how I remember her. Mind you, Mrs Thatcher's accent was entirely artificial and sounded nothing like anybody else.

Yes, I think you might mean the low A on the C# key on Dom Bedos. There was no need for the low C# on an 18th century French organ, and that was built according to the Bedos tome's specifications. Not meant for Bach. Better for Boyvin if you want a B composer.

My impressive knowledge (snort) of UK accents comes from Matt Smith's Mr. Collins in Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, a classic Austen story known to be faithful to the text...

Al Morse did program an extension for the Caen, may be that's the one https://almorse.net/content_enhancements.html

There is a 2.51 ODF under the Updates tab for the Caen. That ODF includes a "simple" screen, especially good if you don't have dual monitors, and some other enhancements.

There is a 2.51 ODF under the Updates tab for the Caen. That ODF includes a "simple" screen, especially good if you don't have dual monitors, and some other enhancements.

2.51 is what I have.

Grant,

I do have the simple screen, so I suppose that means I have 2.51. Is there anywhere I can check the version?

Yes, it is probably Al Morse's extension that I downloaded, installed, didn't use and then forgot about which is puzzling me.

Grant,

I do have the simple screen, so I suppose that means I have 2.51. Is there anywhere I can check the version?

There may be other places to look …

But you can go to the File -> Uninstall Menu and select the Caen Organ definition. The uninstall page will show you the version number. On my Mac installation the file data is grayed out — but still readable if you squint at it . Obviously you don't really want to uninstall it.

I suspect there is a bug in this menu screen.