St. Paul’s Chapel, the oldest public building in New York, has a new pipe organ — only the sixth in the church’s history, which began in 1766. The “new” organ was originally fabricated in 1989 for the Church of the Redeemer in Massachusetts, but has been completely refurbished by the master artisans at Noack Organs (the instrument’s original builders, who are to pipe organs roughly was the Amati family was to violins) and fitted into the existing St. Paul’s Chapel organ case, which dates from 1802.
The Chapel, at the corner of Broadway and Vesey Street, was originally built a decade before the American Revolution as a “Chappell of Ease,” for members of Trinity Church (of which parish St. Paul’s is a part), meaning that it was more conveniently located for congregants who lived amid the wheat fields at the town’s then-northern border, near what is now City Hall.
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Trinity’s director of music and art, Julian Wachner (center), introduces the new organ at St. Paul’s Chapel to the congregation.
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In the years that followed, St. Paul’s counted George Washington as a parishioner. Above the altar is a a Neo-Baroque sculpture entitled “Glory,” by Pierre L’Enfant, whom the first president would later commission to design Washington, D.C. (It depicts Mount Sinai, surrounded by clouds and lightning, beneath the Hebrew word for “God,” and above the tablets bearing the Ten Commandments.)
But St. Paul’s newest work of art is its organ, and Trinity is celebrating its debut with a weeklong Inauguration Festival, starting Monday (February 19), when there will be a demonstration performance at 10:00 am, and an opening concert at noon, led by Trinity’s director of music and the arts, Julian Wachner, accompanied by the Trinity Baroque Orchestra and the Choir of Trinity Wall Street.
At 2:30 pm, a second recital will be led by Peter Sykes, of Boston University and the Juilliard School. Tuesday and Wednesday recitals (at 1:00 pm) will be led by L. Frederick Jodry V of Brown University and Nathan Laube, of the Eastman School of Music. On Wednesday evening (at 5:00 pm), a reprise of the organ inauguration will feature Katelyn Emerson, visiting from Boston’s Church of the Advent. On Thursday (at 1:00 pm), there will be performances of concerti by Poulenc, Wachner, and Rouse, and Friday afternoon (also at 1:00 pm) will feature an organ duet recital with works by Mozart and Schubert.
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Pipes being installed in the new organ,which was fabricated off-site and the brought to St. Paul Chapel to be assembled in pieces.
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Slated for Friday evening is an organ improvisation to accompany the classic 1928 silent film, “Speedy,” starring Harold Lloyd. The week of festivities will round out on Saturday with the season opener of the acclaimed “Bach at One” program, which will also feature the Trinity Baroque Orchestra and the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, and will continue on Monday afternoons through April 30. This series of observances will also mark the launch of a new series, “Pipes at One,” which will continue on Friday afternoons through June 8.
This spring, Trinity will also commence a new program,
“Total Embrace: Bernstein at 100,” celebrating the centenary of the legendary composer and conductor. The series begins on April 12 at 1:00 pm, with
“Songfest: A Cycle of American Poems for Six Singers and Orchestra.” This acclaimed Bernstein piece sets to music verse from the likes of
Frank O’Hara, Walt Whitman, Langston Hughes, Gertrude Stein, e.e. cummings, Conrad Aiken, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Edgar Allan Poe. The Total Embrace series continues on successive Thursdays through June 2.
All performances are free and open to the public. For more information, please browse TrinityWallStreet.org, or call 212-602-0800.
