July 2025

Moving a pipe organ to a new home

Moving organs to a different location is becoming more than an occasional happening. There are some nice instruments out there looking for homes, and like other firms, we too are getting calls about moving an instrument. Over our nearly sixty years in business, we have tackled a number of pipe organ moves. There have been Skinners, Aeolians, Austins, and some Wurlitzers.

Editor’s note: Part 1 of this series appeared in the June 2025 issue, pages 12–17.

The organ occupies an important position in the life and work of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. Having received instruction on the instrument during his youth, he continued to compose for it throughout his life, although he only published two major cycles, Three Preludes and Fugues, opus 37, and Six Sonatas, opus 65.

Wilma Jensen has donated her collected archives to the Sibley Music Library of the Eastman School of Music, University of Rochester, Rochester, New York. Among the nine large binders and boxes of scores and audio and video recordings were included arrangements, creative programs, recital programs, European tour itineraries, and many teaching handouts. The timeline stretches from Jensen’s first concert in 1941 to the program from her ninetieth birthday concert and beyond.

Passing it on

John Hillis Carnahan

John Hillis Carnahan, 96, died May 7 in Randolph Center, Vermont. Born in Manhattan, Kansas, on January 22, 1929, he attended Harvard University (Class of 1950) and Harvard Law School (Class of 1954), Cambridge, Massachusetts, while serving in the United States Navy.