Organist’s Instrument Finds a Home
The pipe organ that was in the home of the late Charlotte Rogers Smith, a well-known and esteemed Bridgehampton musician, is now making beautiful music in Queen of the Most Holy Rosary Catholic Church in the same hamlet, thanks to the generosity of her family and the initiative of some of the church’s parishioners.
Mrs. Rogers Smith was the organist at the Bridgehampton Presbyterian Church for many years starting in 1942, and was the founder in 1946 of the Choral Society of the Hamptons, an organization that is a vital part of the South Fork music scene today.
In addition to being a devoted and admired teacher of piano and organ, Mrs. Rogers Smith regularly held informal chamber music gatherings in her home, centered around the organ, said Susan Grun, her daughter. “She knew a lot of musicians, and sometimes twice a week had musicians over for duets, trios, quartets, and so on.” Her husband, Dinwiddie Smith, was also a violinist and violist and would sometimes participate. One of the highlights of her career was performing the 20th-century masterpiece Concerto for Organ, Timpani, and Strings by the French composer Francis Poulenc, Ms. Grun said.
After Mrs. Rogers Smith died in December at the age of 95, Alice Clifton, a member of Queen of the Most Holy Rosary church, contacted Ms. Grun, whom she knew, about the church’s interest in the organ.
After some discussion, Mrs. Rogers Smith’s four children decided, as they were preparing to sell the house, to donate the organ to the church in their mother’s memory, feeling strongly that she would have been happy to have the organ remain in Bridgehampton.
Gay Lynch and Joan Miller, also members of the church, championed the project. “We were flabbergasted and so delighted” that the organ in the church was a possibility, said Ms. Lynch. “We hope that it will reignite the spirit of the church and stimulate the music there.” The church’s older electronic organ was in a state of disrepair and had not been usable for some time. The church was not in a financial position to purchase the organ, and will be raising money to pay for the cost of moving the instrument.
The organ was built by Dobson Pipe Organ Builders of Lake City, Iowa, in 1988 as their Opus 39. The company designed the organ with Paul Rogers, a Water Mill architect and a son of Mrs. Rogers Smith, to make the instrument the centerpiece of the living room of her new house on Quimby Lane.
For the project of disassembling, transporting, reassembling, and retuning the organ, William Ayers of the Dobson company worked with Douglas McKeever and Matthew Sprague of Foley-Baker Inc., a pipe organ firm in Connecticut. Beginning in early May, the many parts were removed, indexed, packed in crates or boxes, moved about two and a half miles, and eventually hoisted into the balcony of the church and carefully set up again piece by piece. In about a week’s time the organ was playing again, retuned, and the facade pipes were polished as a finishing touch.
The wooden case that houses the instrument is made of fumed white oak and measures 131/2 feet high, 71/2 feet deep, and 61/2 feet wide. The church had engaged a structural engineer to be sure that the balcony would support the 3,000 or so pounds of the instrument, as well as an electrician to install the proper wiring for the electric bellows.
The modest-size organ has 376 pipes, each one giving a specific pitch and tone color. The 44 wooden bass pipes are made of poplar, while most of the pipes are made of various alloys of tin and lead, ranging from 20 percent tin to 50 percent tin for the brighter timbres. The many narrow wooden strips, called trackers, that connect each key to air valves under the pipes are made of quarter-sawn cedar. There are wind chests that the pipes sit on, made mostly of wood, and there are also numerous smaller parts of metal and leather.
Christine Cadarette, who is the organist and choir director for the Saturday Mass at the church, played the organ for the first time in public two weeks ago. “It’s beautiful to play, and the key action on the fingers is marvelous. It’s really a lovely instrument,” she said.
“It was wonderful to hear the organ after communion on Sunday morning,” said Ms. Miller.
Ms. Miller also said that the church, which is at 2350 Montauk Highway, is planning a blessing of the organ on June 28 at 2 p.m., to which the public is invited, as well as a later concert to feature the instrument and express appreciation to the family.
Though the instrument was donated, the cost of disassembling, moving, setting up the scaffolding, and reassembling it is about $23,000, and fund-raising programs are being planned to meet that expense. So far the church has raised about $8,000. Contributions can be sent to Queen of the Most Holy Rosary Church, Organ Fund, P.O. Box 3035, Bridgehampton 11932.