Belhelvie Parish Church August 2017

The organ at Belhelvie speaks through 8 external speaker cabinets and an additional sub bass unit.

Viscount Classical Organs has been a delight to work with and do business with, and the end product has been very satisfying indeed.
Belhelvie Parish Church, Aberdeenshire, Scotland is a small rural church with a membership of nearly 400 and a Sunday congregation of around 100, and a good singing congregation. A major development project started in 2015 and is due for completion in 2020. This involved a new car park, a storage extension to the church hall and alterations to the church sanctuary chancel area. The final part of the project is a hall annexe, doubling the size of the existing hall. It was clearly an ideal opportunity to change the church organ, at the time the church was having alterations done to the chancel part of the sanctuary. During the time leading up to the changeover three different digital organs were trialled, one of which was the Viscount Envoy 350-FV Organ. Following a lengthy consultation period it was decided, almost unanimously, to proceed with the Viscount organ to replace the very limited electric pipe organ of 1978, which, incidentally, required constant regular repair work. Viscount Classical Organs was extremely flexible in fitting in with the Belhelvie development timescale and the installation of the new organ was done most efficiently and with the highest degree of professionalism. The organ consul is solid medium oak and looks absolutely amazing and so well "in tune" in the revamped sanctuary. The time and care taken to voice each single note has been done with extraordinary patience and precision. The number of different sounds which can be produced is quite incredible and has resulted in very many favourable and complimentary comments from listeners, including the choir, who had not experienced such variety before. The organist is thoroughly enjoying the experience of playing pieces which involve tuba, trumpet, clarinet, cornopean and combinations of stops which create wonderfully lovely sounds. This Viscount Physis Organ produces really excellent "pipe" sounds with its well balanced specification and gives excellent variety of tone. There is so much more to explore, which will take time, but it is an extremely comfortable instrument to sit at and play and has given the organist a greater degree of confidence playing on a Sunday. There has been no regrets in the slightest in having gone down the digital route to replacing the organ at Belhelvie and promises to be a very worthwhile investment, both musically and financially.

Allan