Opus 2
Greenwood, IN
This instrument is my new home practice organ, of 5 manuals, back-lit thumb pistons, and is built largely from scratch. The organ console is unique for several reasons.
Being a home instrument, there were several "utilitarian" factors that I wanted to incorporate into this design. I wanted it to be very easy to move, as to be easy to service and easy to clean around. It also needed to match the decor and ambience of my office and home, so it needed to match the mid-century modern elements, as well as match the natural maple hardwood floors.
The organ sits on a welded steel frame, made of 2" square steel tubing, with heavy-duty locking casters. When the casters are unlocked, the entire console moves around effortlessly, making it extremely simple to clean under and around, as well as pull out for servicing and tinkering.
In addition to the mobility of the entire console, all 5 manuals are hinged so that the piston rails and micromatch connectors can be easily accessed. This also means that the individual manuals can be serviced without disconnection or removing any of the other manuals!
The lower four manuals are equipped with back-lit thumb pistons, which are fully programmable within Hauptwerk to control virtually anything. The entire organ is driven from an hwce2x MIDI encoder, while individual lamps are controlled via an mddp128 MIDI decoder, both from MIDI Gadgets Boutique. Over the coming weeks, I will begin working on building my swell shoes and toe studs.
The key cheeks, piston rails, manual support frame, and piston rail mounting brackets used on this instrument are all available from my store. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions or are curious to know more.
Photo Gallery
These piston rails can be ordered on my store.
Here you can see how simple Opus 2 really is. The concept was to make a console that was functional first, then beautiful.