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Viscount Organs

The UK's leading Digital Church Organ specialist

About Viscount Classical Organs UK

Viscount Organs van with doors open.

For 50 years Viscount has been a world leader in electronic classical organs, with first-class engineering at the heart of their make-up.

In 2006 the distribution rights for the UK were bought by David Mason. Early on David realised that, in order to appeal to UK organists, it was imperative that our organs were designed with English stop lists, were voiced along English lines and had accessories such as general and divisional pistons. Up until this point all Viscount organs imported to the UK had not focussed on improving English voicing as much as they had in Europe. Working closely with the Italian designers, the first improved English specification organs were launched in 2007.

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We are passionate about all things organ

In 2008 Viscount Italy introduced their revolutionary ‘Physis’ physical modelling sound engine. This technology offered a huge advance in sound quality and gave us the ability to voice an organ in ways not previously possible. We decided the time was right to be able to offer custom-built organs using the Physis platform and so our sister business, Regent Classic Organs, was born.

Now our customers could choose their own stop list, console style, keyboard and features, only limited by their imagination and budget. Since 2008, Regent Classic Organs has grown to be a business in its own right, with many private schools and cathedrals in the UK and abroad as clients. This has included a brand new four manual commission from Wellington Cathedral in New Zealand.

Here at Viscount we’re also very keen to promote the organ (both pipe and digital) and provide learning access opportunities for young people, which is not always easy. We are delighted to have been able to help a variety of outreach projects and you can read about some of them on our blog.

Watch the short video below to learn more about our history and the Viscount Organs team and customers.

Come and visit the showroom in Bicester

At our offices in Bicester, our showroom has a wide range of instruments, from every range, set-up and available for you to try. With a standard range of over 40 different models from around £1,100 to over £56,000 you are sure to be able to find a Viscount organ with the right specification and within budget. If budgets are tighter, we usually have a stock of pre-owned instruments available.

Although you are most welcome to just ‘drop-in’, it’s always advisable to call us first to make sure we have the right instrument available for you to try.

In the meantime, below is an interactive 3D Tour of our showroom in Bicester. Be sure to click on the instruments you’re interested in, to hear video and audio samples.

If travelling to Bicester is difficult, you might find one of our authorised UK & Ireland dealers closer to you.

The Viscount UK team is made up of experienced staff, including church musicians with many years of experience advising on instruments for every circumstance. Whether you are looking for the perfect instrument for your home, church, school, concert hall or something bespoke, the Viscount UK team is committed to providing the very best classical digital organs money can buy, backed up by the very best service and support.

We look forward to serving our clients old and new for the next 50 years.

A timeline of our journey

2006:

  • Bought the business and launched our first website

2007:

  • Establish a good “English” sound for our instruments with enhancements based on the organs of Stowe School for bold fiery reeds and All Saints Hove for warm rounded diapasons. We also took inspiration from All Saints Leamington Spa and St Asaph Cathedral.
  • Built our first custom instrument and introduced moving drawstop instruments which, until then, had not been available in a Viscount instrument. This was the beginning of providing a ladder of different levels and enhanced instruments for customers to aspire to, which matched the choice offered by other competitors.

2008:

2010:

  • We were chosen to provide the hire organ for the Pope’s open-air service for the beatification of Cardin Newman in Cofton Park Birmingham. The ceremony was attended by more than 50,000 people.

2012:

2013:

  • We refreshed our website with more photography, and audio downloads.
  • We started to work with Jonathan Kingston, a professional organist, to create a series of musical tutorials – playing magnificent pieces on Viscount Organs.

2014:

  • One of our Regent 356 instruments was hired for the 3 Choirs Festival (a week long festival for all things choral, organ and chamber music orientated)
  • We welcomed new clients:
    • Selby Abbey chose a Regent 356 to cover the 2 year period while their pipe organ was rebuilt.
    • St Mary’s Nottingham added a Regent 356 to provide an English organ an addition to their continental pipe organ.
    • St Mary’s Witney chose us to rebuild their early Bradford electronic organ
  • United States Launch of Regent Classic, our sister brand, at the Boston AGO conference.
  • Appointment of our US partner agent, Whitesel Music.
  • This year we also undertook bigger opportunities to publicly promote the sound comparison between a Viscount digital church organ and traditional pipe organs in events like the Battle of the Organs in Dundee with Carol Williams.

2015:

  • Momentum growing rapidly and this year marks a big growth point in the wider professional organ community supporting what we have been saying since 2006 – Viscount Organs offer a magnificent opportunity for a true organ sound.
  • John Scott Whitley and D’Arcy Trinkwon worked with us to produce DVD’s in Selby Abbey, playing our Regent 356. This was an effort to help the Abbey raise funds towards their pipe organ rebuild.
  • We welcomed new client venues like: St Peter’s Caversham (chose Regent Classic to replace an old Copeman Hart); Freemasons Hall (this is more than likely the largest ever single UK order for 20 small instruments to replace instruments in various rooms at the Central Grand Lodge in London); Manchester Cathedral purchased an Envoy 350-FV to cover the pipe organ rebuild; and The Great Hall Swansea University.
  • We provide a free years RCO membership to all customers buying a new home practice instrument to help increase RCO membership and finance a greater range of teaching options.

2016:

  • We launched our very popular Hymn of the Month musical tutorial series (in collaboration with Jonathan Kingston).
  • We held a large scale organ quiz competition to give away a £10,000 instrument to the winning entry. Through this campaign we gained ground in demonstrating the audio magnificence of the digital church organ rivals that of the pipe. You can read the story about the 22 year old organ player who won the organ for his parish church.
  • Regent Classic Custom organs were installed in St Mary Chagrove, Normanton Baptist Church and St Joseph’s Redemptorist Church Dundalk.
  • International Concert Artist Joseph Nolan does a UK tour playing 6 of our organs and a DVD on a custom instrument in Selby Abbey.
  • Envoy and Regent organs features explained on in online video tutorials
  • We support the London Organ Outreach Programme delivering the first 3 of 5 long term loan instruments into East End London Schools to allow access to the organ to pupils that would not otherwise have a school instrument

2017:

  • Launched our own series of organ speakers and speaker casings
  • Improved Chorum range of sampled sound instruments introduced to replace Cadet.
  • Chethams School Manchester orders a Viscount Organs for its new Stoller Concert Hall
  • The Royal Northern College of Music order a new Viscount to add to their teaching facilities.
  • New Regent Classic instruments ordered by the Leys School Cambridge and the United Grand Lodge of England for Room 10 in London
  • St Mary’s Melton Mowbray hire and Envoy 35-F to cover their pipe organ rebuild, part of a £1 million refurbishment

2018:

  • Tewksbury Abbey hire an Envoy 35 to cover their pipe organ repair period.
  • Wells Cathedral hire an Envoy 23-S needed due to organ blower repairs.
  • Canterbury Cathedral hire a Regent Classic instrument for 2 years while the pipe organ is rebuilt.
  • Wellington Cathedral New Zealand order a 4 manual Regent Classic instrument to replace the pipe organ destroyed in the 2016 earthquake.
  • Chamber Organ introduced by Regent Classic custom organ division.
  • Skinner replica console is built by Regent Classic and Skinner voice models developed for use in it.
  • York Minster hires 2 instruments for 2 years while the pipe organ is rebuilt.

2019:

  • Our Skinner Style Organ is played for the Papal Mass in Abu Dhabi, by Paul Griffiths, FRCO (CEO of Dubai Airport)

2020:

  • Covid 19 hit us and we saw a dramatic decline in demand for Church Organs
  • We started the year in the lovely country church of St John’s in Great Gaddesden where the marvellous Envoy 35-F instrument was installed on a speaker system hidden in the pipe organ casework.
  • Surge in Demand for Home Practice Organs. By May many organists, especially students were realising access to instruments for practice was going to be a long time away.
  • The pandemic also generated far more interest in the 2 manual Cantorum Duo.
  • By July we believed we were seeing the light at the end of the tunnel and Regent Classic undertook what is possibly its most complex UK installation to date in the church of St Andrew in Sonning.
  • As well as individual requests, we also get asked to help with larger organ outreach schemes, something we always try to assist with where we can. One such scheme was for Holy Trinity School in Ramsgate where we were delighted to loan a Chorum 40-S for their pupils to practice.
  • We were delighted to get an invitation to provide the hire instrument for St Mary’s Church Portsea where their fine pipe organ was under restoration by Nicholson & Co.

2021:

  • The first quarter of 2021 was ominously quiet with forward church work inaccessible due to travel and work restrictions.
  • To cheer our spirits at this time we decided to live stream a concert from my home ‘organ cave’ on a very cold February evening featuring 4 different instruments.
  • 2021 turned out to be a better year than 2020 and starting this a of prestigious venues was a sale of an instrument to Peterhouse in Cambridge.
  • A very short notice requirement did emerge on Easter Sunday at the Old Royal Naval College Chapel in Greenwich. The pipe organ proved too unreliable over Easter for that important event so we got a 3 manual hire instrument in place by 4.00pm on Easter Monday.
  • Derby Cathedral are blessed with two organs, a small 2 manual in the retro choir and a renowned Compton on the west gallery.  Sadly, the instrument is renowned as much for its long expected rebuild as for the ingenuity and quality of the Compton design. But it was failure of the retro choir instrument that summoned us to Derby.
  • Later in the year we supplied an identical Regent 356 hire instrument to Radley College.
  • Next came the Guards Chapel at Wellington Barracks where the pipe organ was due to be rebuilt.
  • June finally saw us install a small instrument in Lambeth Palace Chapel, an order taken before the very first lockdown in 2020.
  • Derby decided on a ‘used’ Regent Classic 3 manual drawstop organ which was fully refurbished with new keyboards and sold with a new 10 year warranty. This was installed just before Christmas on speakers in the retro choir with plans to add west end speakers later in 2022.

2022:

  • The first event of the year saw the realisation of a well planned challenge to create a series of video tutorials that explored psalmody, which is such a crucial element of the English choral tradition and a cornerstone of our sung choral evensong services. We were most fortunate to secure the use of the Old Royal Naval College Chapel and Trinity Laban College Choir directed by Ralph Allwood.
  • The year got off to a good start and it was clear that our important church customer base was waking up from the long Covid interlude. Then came the tragedy of the Ukraine war.
  • The year saw us complete some 15 church installations, a far cry from the 2019 peak of near 50 but importantly new orders were also flowing in.
  • We installed a custom built Regent Classic instrument at Holy Trinity Rayleigh where a major internal refurbishment was completed in time for Easter.
  • We also completed a significant number of school instruments and saw 2 new practice instruments arrive at Sidney Sussex College Cambridge (adding to our 2 at Kings College) and an instrument for St John’s College School.
  • Our Summer highlight was supporting Anna Lapwood with a hire instrument for a recital in the Aldeburgh Festival.
  • In the summer we saw an installation of a 3 manual drawstop instrument in Bristol Cathedral.
  • 2021 saw Regent Classic receive a very exciting and unusual commission to build a single manual chamber organ with detachable pedal board.

2023:

2024:

Interested in trying one of our organs? Call us, on 01869 247333 or drop us an email. We have various opportunities for you to test a Viscount or speak to an existing customer.