Ducroquet

A few years out of college, I traveled to Saint Paul to visit the organs at House of Hope Presbyterian Church on Summit Avenue, especially the large Fisk tracker that occupies the rear balcony. Of course, the 1878 Merklin upfront is well known too. I found myself captivated, though, by the 1852 Ducroquet located in the Assembly Room, a one-manual tracker action Romantic-era French pipe organ, an intimate-sounding transition instrument built with beautiful reeds and well-voiced flues.

Last August, as part of a team, I helped remove the Ducroquet. For me, the process of dismantling became a design study in the emerging French Industrial-Romantic era of pipe organ building.

House of Hope Presbyterian Church acquired the Ducroquet from Jean Louis Loriault, who had removed it from a parish church in Aubusson, France. A history of the organ states that it appeared at the Paris Exposition of 1855. C.B. Fisk, Inc. of Gloucester, Massachusetts, restored the instrument before its installation at House of Hope Church.

Posted November 28, 2021 11:25