Extended visit to organs in the Portsmouth and Southampton area

A handful of intrepid EOA members booked into the Holiday Inn in Portsmouth for a few days of friendship together as part of visits to an extremely wide range of pipe organs in Portsmouth and Southampton, all organised by EOA Committee member Lyndon Ford. We began on the afternoon of Tuesday 24th October, at Southampton Guildhall, with its unique 1937 John Compton organ, complete with two consoles: (one classical of 127 stops and one theatre organ of 196 stops), creating two very different large instruments in the same hall. After the Guildhall, we headed to the rather unusual parish church of St Faith’s, Lee on the Solent. On Wednesday morning, after breakfast, we walked to Portsmouth Guildhall, which has one of the last organs that the John Compton Organ Company built in 1963. From there, we drove out to St Mark’s Church, North End, a modern Anglo-Catholic church keeping a weekly choral tradition during Sung Mass, and then to the church of All Saints, Denmead. For our last day in Portsmouth, Lyndon had fixed for us to play the organs in the Roman Catholic Cathedral of St John’s, and the Anglican Cathedral of St Thomas. Our sincere and very grateful thanks must go to EOA Committee Member (and Hampshire resident!) Lyndon Ford for the incredible amount of time that organising such a visit takes, and for the wonderful range of playing opportunities which he arranged for us over the three days, with organs both classical and theatrical!