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Seeking recommendations: Which Organ should I buy for Hauptwerk?


Beginner-level question, sorry!

Background: I have built a virtual organ with 3 x 6-key manuals, 25-note pedalboard (from an old Lowrey organ), two expression/crescendo pedals and a Macbook running Hauptwerk 5.

Upgrade Plans: I might add another expression pedal, and might extend the pedalboard to 32 notes.

Questions:

1. To take full advantage of my setup, and to produce wither a concert organ or cathedral organ sound, ... which organ and sample set would you recommend please?

2. If I replace the macbook running it: how much RAM is enough, and do I need an SSD drive or is a Fusion drive enough.

Many thanks!
by pauloldmac
Jan 30, 2020 08:01 PM

Replies (4)

RE: Seeking recommendations: Which Organ should I buy for Hauptwerk?

pauloldmac wrote:

Beginner-level question, sorry!

Background: I have built a virtual organ with 3 x 6-key manuals, 25-note pedalboard (from an old Lowrey organ), two expression/crescendo pedals and a Macbook running Hauptwerk 5.

Upgrade Plans: I might add another expression pedal, and might extend the pedalboard to 32 notes.

Questions:

1. To take full advantage of my setup, and to produce wither a concert organ or cathedral organ sound, ... which organ and sample set would you recommend please?

2. If I replace the macbook running it: how much RAM is enough, and do I need an SSD drive or is a Fusion drive enough.

Many thanks!

Your two questions are closely related: You only know how much RAM you need when you have chosen your sample set(s). To start you should have no less then 32 GB since most of the newer sets are not easily loadable in 16 GB. I would recommend a SSD for the organ cache, but if a you are a patient person and load only small organs you might manage without one, as I did in the old days ;-)

So back to your first question: All depends on peronsonal taste and budget. I like the English cathedral organs like LA Hereford or AA Petersborough, but I never bought them because I cannot play them like the fabulous uploaders here on CCH. Same goes for the big French organs like SP Caen. So I stick to nice, cheap/even free organs like AVO Aeolian Skinner or PG Friesach or Prospectum Weissenau and many more of them. Therefore you should just listen to the various uploads here and make up your mind yourself - and believe me: You will end up with more than one wonderful organ on your PC sooner or later anyway ;-)

by Insulaner
Jan 31, 2020 07:02 AM

RE: Seeking recommendations: Which Organ should I buy for Hauptwerk?


What kind of music you do play the most? Romantic? French? English? German?
Baroque? French? German? English? Italian? Spanish? Other?

All of these musics?

Should your question be a singular choice, or is "organs" ok?

French romantic: Caen (SP) or the older Metz ext. (Milan)
German romantic: the Annaberg (OAM)

Large Baroque: Haarlem, Groningen (both need lots of RAM), Waltershausen (quite dry), Stade (ditto)
Smaller: Freiberg, Steinkirchen, Anloo (quite dry), Nijkerk

French baroque: many to chose from

Free organs: Piotr Grabowski's sets. Quite a variety of styles there.

Do everything organs: Sonnenorgel, Rotterdam

English/American organs: I don't have any, so I don't know. A free USA set (Aeolian-Skinner) from AVO (Augustine VPO) has just become available.

Etc.

Feel free to drop me a PM if desired.

-Adri
one the first Hauptwerkians (#10 on this site)
by adri
Feb 1, 2020 04:33 AM

RE: Seeking recommendations: Which Organ should I buy for Hauptwerk?


For Romantic and Baroque music MDA Bovenkerk Kampen is now nice option (50% Sale, but you need HW5). And for romantic music the Domkerk Utrecht sample set is also a beauty. Another do-it-all organ is Dudelange. But all is a matter of taste.
by FredM
Feb 3, 2020 04:56 AM

RE: Seeking recommendations: Which Organ should I buy for Hauptwerk?


Thank to those who replied already! I have sent individual replies to each of you.

Based on one recommendation I am downloading the Freisach organi from Piotr Grabowski's site to see what it's like and to learn how to install them.

On another front, if anyone is building a VPO from scratch, and wants some guidance about the Alessi V61 keyboards I used, the dimensions of the supports I made to get them as close as possible to proper standards, how I added in expression and crescendo pedals, and how I midified the old Lowrey organ pedalboard using Arduino micro computers, just send me a private message.

Regards
Paul
Brisbane, Australia
by pauloldmac
Feb 3, 2020 06:04 AM

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