August 28, 2005

This dictionary of pipe organ stops is being offered as a worthy pastime to fill the vast seeming void between Hauptwerk V1 and V2. New stops will be added as information is acquired about them.

I invite anyone so inclined to send me additional stop descriptions to be included in this grand literary effort.  And, if by chance, the stop is designed by you, please specify this in order to be given full designer's credit (or blame, as the case may be).

organ@leochristopherson.com

These stop descriptions are meant to be a natural extension of those in the less up-to-date work by Steven Irwin, "Dictionary of Pipe Organ Stops," and this new list includes many stops overlooked, or possibly simply ignored,  by that 1960s' edition. Let it be known, in addition, that there is absolutely no connection between this work and Mr. Irwin's, which is very likely to be the way Mr. Irwin would like to keep it.

 -- L. Christopherson
-- August 2005

August 30, 2005

For quick reference I have added a "Summary of Dictionary of Organ Stops" table at the end of the dictionary proper.

-- L. Christopherson
-- August 2005

September 19, 2005

After a pause due to watching the serious TV coverage of Hurricane Katrina, I'll now try to get back into the necessary silly mood to continue adding to the Dictionary.

-- L. Christopherson
-- September 2005

October 06, 2005

Check out some additional crazy stops listed on the Theater Pipe Organ & Cinema Organ website by Chaz Bender. Select the "List of FORGOTTEN or UNKNOWN organ stops" link.

http://www.theatrepipeorgan.com/

-- L. Christopherson
-- October 2005

The Dictionary
new stop(s) added 9-19-2005

Burblebourdon.  A very old and rarely mentioned metal 8' manual flue stop. The only known score to call for it is the as yet unpublished Captain Nemo Sub-Symphony for Marine Pipe-Organ by Vierne (or perhaps Verne, the manuscript is unclear as to the signature). This stop is said to be especially effective in the Undersea Burial Movement, where the soft burbling of these pipes, mounted outside the hull, lull the listener into the appropriate somber mood. Though the original rank went down with the Nautilus, full blueprints are provided within the recently uncovered score for a faithful recreation of this wondrous stop.

Contra Bombasement.  An extremely low PEDAL reed(?) rank at the 128' pitch. The stop is considered mostly related to the reed family in all of its three forms since sound is produced by one air driven object hitting another static object at various tuned frequencies (as opposed to a vibrating column of air) producing a musical effect of very little use. The 128' pitch designation refers to the comparable pitch of a vibrating air pipe. However, the Contra Bombasement ranks have no resonators at all, freeing up a lot of vertical space.  The stop is found in three configurations:

1. Wooden - Wooden mallets of scaled sizes are spring-mounted and air-driven to strike against wooden blocks. The semi-powerful sound, nick-named "Floor-Pounder," begins at a spectacular 4 Hz bottom C and works its way up the scale from there. Needless to say, an organist employing this stop is going to attract a whole lot of constructive criticism.

2. Metal - Here, for a more powerful bass than the wooden version, the hammers are of steel and strike massive metal anvils. This provides a unique metallic ringing effect, nick-named "Dead-Ringer." Because of the anvils' ability to sustain the ringing a bit, and while this stop does add a vague pitch to the bottom end starting at 4 Hz, the main sound comes from the incredible overwhelming number of overtones, which totally drown out the rest of the organ. When this stop exists in your instrument, you need to watch carefully what is drawn as "Full Organ." A recent poll in one metal Contra Bombasement parish indicated that full support of its use was only given by the group's one and only tone-deaf member who tended to seek out catastrophic noise.

3. Rubber - This variation of the Contra Bombasement 128' uses rubber mallets beating against size-scaled automotive tires. Tire inflation provides one of the means of voicing this unique stop. Organists, and especially members of the congregation, agree that this form of the Bombasement stop is the least unpleasant to listen to, but usually hesitate to grant to it any musical value at all. The sound is a blurred sort of thudding, hence the nick-name "Thudder-Pedal." Organists tend to specify total deflation of the tires for maximum blending with the rest of the organ's stops.

Contra Bourdabasement.  An extremely low PEDAL flue rank at the 128' pitch. In contrast to the Contra Bombasement's lack of vertical size, the Contra Bourdabasement uses full length open wooden and metal pipes. The only instance of this stop is reported to be in a hall in Mausland, California, USA. The builder of the Mausland Organ tells of being greatly influenced by the new Disney Concert Hall Organ. After seeing this modern marvel he was made aware that it is possible to take a few liberties with the geometric organization of the organ pipes. This suited his needs, since his hall at Mausland is "U" shaped and has only an 8' ceiling. The organ, which is nearing completion, is implemented with a whole lot of angled and mitered pipes of both metal and wood. The unique Disney "leaning" pipe technique is used extensively, with Mausland pipes going from fully vertical to fully horizontal. A patent has been applied for to cover the windchest for this installation, but has not yet been approved due to the extreme difficulty of making any sense out of the blueprints.
As far as the 128' Contra Bourdabasement is concerned, its pipes pretty much fill in the entire left-over space at the ceiling and walls of the hall. The organ's other 500 stops naturally require the other half of the space. The bulk of the Mausland Organ stops (approximately 400 stops) are of the 2' and 1' pitch, providing a great deal of upper-end definition to the music. The Bourdabasement pipes are quickly identified, though at first often mistaken for heating ducts and water pipes running along the walls and ceiling. As would be expected, the stop's sound is ultra full and low, adding more than enough bottom end to balance the enhanced high end of this instrument's sound.

Ember ugrás.  An extremely unusual stop of Hungarian origin which falls into the Flex-Tube family of organ ranks. The stop is found on the PEDAL at the 16' pitch and on various manuals at the 8' and 4' pitches. It is thought that these lively ranks were primarily designed to entertain small children during services where the young ones' attention might understandably wander, but they have proven to be quite well received by some adults as well. A young and playful Franz Liszt is said to have enjoyed drawing on a full chorus of Ember ugrás' and playing his heart out to the delight of all present.
This is a stopped rank of metal pipes in which each note consists of an inner and outer pipe of equal length (one-half the pitch length). When at rest, the outer pipe fits like a sleeve over the inner pipe. Thus when at rest, a 16' rank's lowest pipe is 4' tall.  Ah, but when air is allowed into the pipe, the outer cylinder quickly rises to the note's full pitch length. The sliding octave-down pitch effect is a lot of fun to hear and the visual effect, especially at the 16' pitches, is a real kick in the pants. Most adults in a congregation do tend to tire of the effect in a few seconds and find themselves wondering about the sanity of the organist (not to mention the organ builder), while children are captivated by it all, of course.  See Telescopios saltandos

Fidofife.  A very high-pitched metal flute rank of 5-millimeter pitch found on the SWELL of some small English organs. The stop originated in Dibley, UK, as an aid to the famous "Blessing of the Animals" service there. This rank, aimed primarily at dogs, is said to effectively cause a major outbreak of canine singing, blending perfectly with the in-house Dibley Choir. The unusual millimeter pitch is attributed to an itinerate French organ builder who happened by peddling European influence. Tuning this stop is particularly difficult since humans can't hear the ultra high tones and their doggy assistants find it difficult to communicate pitch information. The rank is considered in tune when the majority of dogs sing loudly and pet bats go completely batty.  See Mosquito and Schlange

Flattern.  (Information is still being collected and organized about this German organ stop)

Gastropoda.  A very smooth and mellow stop found on some French and Italian organs consisting of carefully selected snail shells. It is usually of the 8' pitch and begins in the tenor C octave. Organists who are privileged to have this fine sounding rank in their instruments love to tell the story of its origin. It seems there was this itinerate French organ builder who happened by peddling snails one day. So many snails went 'down the hatch' that there was the potential of a kind of shell shock pollution problem. Coupling his two interests, snails and organs, the visitor created his first Gastropoda stop. It met with such overwhelming success that the fellow continued through that area of Europe sowing shell ranks where ever he went; sort of the French version of the USA's Johnny Appleseed. The shells are positioned with an air nozzle blowing across the shell's opening, much as one might coax a tone out of a bottle or jug by blowing across its neck.  See Nautilus
 An important variation to this stop is the very lovely Gastropoda céleste. For information about the French Canadian instrument containing this variation: See  Footnote³

Grenouille coassante.  A very obscure stop found on one seldom played organ in a far Northern area of France. This instrument has been neglected due to its lack of any Cavaille-Colle reed stops. In fact, the organ has no traditional reeds at all. In place of the normal French fiery reed sound, we find a whole group of  Grenouille coassante ranks, explaining, in all likelihood, why this instrument is so neglected. The Grenouille coassante (or croaking frog in English) notes are produced by various sized air bags that become inflated when a key is pressed (one bag per note). When the key is released the air is then allowed to escape past a rather crudely made vibrating reed positioned in the mouth of a horizontal cone-shaped resonator. The sound is rather akin to an extremely poorly designed and played oboe, or bassoon, depending upon the pitch of the note. Critics of this stop, some of whom find it difficult to hide their overwhelming hostility toward it, point to a few shortcomings which they claim to perceive:

1. There is a noticeable latency problem since the lowest pitched notes take too long to begin playing, their bags being bigger. (It has been suggested by the one known supporter of these ranks, that this latency problem could be solved by providing higher air pressure for the larger bags, but no one has cared enough so far to test this idea out.)

2. Bags do not begin to sound until the key is released, resulting in a nasty delayed action effect that most organists (at least the very few that have had the unpleasant experience of playing this instrument) do not care for. These stops need to be played staccato using very quick and careful touch on the keyboard, or alternatively, one can play a whole chord, holding the keys down until all bags are filled (perhaps 4 or 5 seconds for the large PEDAL 16' Grenouille coassante ranks) and then release all keys at the same time.

3. Larger bags play longer than smaller ones. The bags, made from animal bladders, are surrounded by a stretched rubber coating which provides the force to squeeze the air from the bladders once the key is released. To even out the playing time of each note, stronger and stronger rubber sheets would be needed as pitches got lower. Again this approach has not actually been tried due entirely to lack of interest.

4. Due to the lowering pressure as the bags deflate, the pitch of the notes tends to sag, or lower, while sounding. Visiting organists playing these stops for the first time complain of this pitch wandering. In fact, none has ever been able to actually adjust their playing to compensate for it, and instead just choose to never play the instrument again. One organist did suggest that this pitch sag gave the music being played a very sad sound. It's not clear if this means he felt that sad music, funeral-type perhaps, could be rendered well by these stops, or whether he meant the comment as a negative evaluation of the character of the tones themselves.

Sadly, the Grenouille coassante stops will probably just pass into oblivion with the death of the current organist of the St. Amphibie Church since he has been unable to generate much enthusiasm for these sounds. In fact, once heard, organists make a point of avoiding this whole area of France to be sure of never needing to endure such an encounter for a second time.  See Svømmelblære and Footnote¹  

Listzian.  This delightful Hungarian stop is said to have been designed by the great Franz Liszt during an otherwise rather dull summer's vacation while still a teenager. The 8' manual stop is of the obscure Piped-String family. A note's tone is produced by a heavy metal string stretched down the middle of a closed wooden pipe. The string is tuned to the pitch of the pipe. Sound is created when an air driven hammer hits the string just inside the mouth of the pipe. Vibration of the large gauge string causes sympathetic vibrations in the air of the pipe, reinforcing the overall volume of the sound at the pipe's mouth.
A unique characteristic of the Listzian rank is that pipes lie horizontally at the back of the organ console. The sound of this rank is very similar to that of a heavy-duty cimbalom and gives the organist a more effective way to render rhapsodies and Hungarian dances.
Unfortunately, this stop cannot be heard these days because the Hungarian Cimbalom Guild has obtained a court order to ban its use on the grounds of some nineteenth century patent infringement. See Stravanger and Footnote⁸

Mosquito.  A percussive stop designed for the Dibley, UK, organ by a Norwegian settler from Northern Minnesota, USA, on the off chance that a visitor might bring a pet mosquito to the "Blessing of the Animals" service. The stop consists of only the eight notes from middle C through G. These frequencies correspond to the vibration rates of most mosquitoes' wings and hence ought to achieve an otherwise difficult to attain rapport with such insects. The C is provided to comfort the very large Minnesotan mosquitoes if one of these super-sized insects happens to be traveling abroad. However, the F is most likely to suit the typical mosquito best. This mid-keyboard stop consists of eight tuning forks that are struck by rubber mallets with random timing. It has been given a keyboard of its own on the Dibley instrument owing to the difficulty of playing only one note, say F, repeatedly while other music needs to be rendered as well. The organist will usually, upon notification that a mosquitoed parishioner has arrived, wedge a little gob of folded-up paper in the Mosquito keyboard to keep one note playing, thus freeing the hands to play other keyboards.  See Fidofife, Schlange, and Footnote⁷

Motteleuchtender.  An ancient special purpose stop somewhat akin to the Zimbelstern, but with a very different and subtle sound. Like the Zimbelstern, this stop consists of a rotating horizontal wheel. However rather than bells being gently struck by a small mallet, here we have a circle of burning candles that rotate around, attracting moths. To employ this stop musically, the organist must select a very thin registration so as to not overpower the delicate sound of cooking insects. In addition, the organist must see to it that new candles of adequate length to last out the service are installed in the Motteleuchtender before the service begins, since this stop is a member of the rare always-on category, and it's generally considered bad form to interrupt a service to replace Motteleuchtender candles on the fly.  (English name: Moth-burner.)

Nautilus.  Another recently rediscovered organ stop, the specifications for which are given in the as yet unpublished Captain Nemo Sub-Symphony for Marine Pipe-Organ by Vierne (or perhaps Verne, the manuscript is unclear as to the signature). The actual Nautilus' Nautilus Nautilus-shell ranks were of the rare coiled-shell family of organ stops and were implemented at the 19' and 8' pitches (lengths here refer to a pipe size equal to the size of an un-coiled shell). The stops are described as having a rather soothing, almost horn-like, mellow tone, produced by a gentle stream of air passing across their open ends. They are said to have had a sound of great value in attracting fishes. Hence, the score's specifying their use during the Food-Gathering Movement of the Sub-Symphony.  See Burblebourdon, Gastropoda, and Footnote⁴

Niños gritadores.  A plaintive sounding stop found on a difficult to reach organ located in the Pyrenees of Northern Spain. The stop's pitch is in the 4' range, though it actually runs for three and one-half octaves starting from tenor C#. The musical tones of the Niños gritadores come from the droning sounds of a line of Friars each with his own personal bagpipe. The bagpipes each have three pipes: two thin relatively quiet pipes tuned to harmonize the fifth interval of C# - Gb; and a larger scale pipe that provides the stronger pitch representing the note being played. The pipers are attached to the organ keyboard by tracker action. When a key is pressed, a long, thin strip of wood is made to poke at the appropriate note (Friar) and that note's large pipe is allowed to sound. Each note is responsible for its own wind supply.
The sound of the organ (the Niños gritadores 4' is the only stop on this small instrument) is highly prized by the local sheep herders who flock to Sunday service with their own flocks (sheep seeming to have a natural appreciation for the wailing sound of this music).  See Footnote²

Schlange.  A SOLO stop, generally encountered as a 16',  8', 4', 2', and/or 1' pitch. This rank consists of a windchest with all the pipes removed, and provides hissing air sounds at various broad pitches across the keyboard--a kind of tuned white noise. The pipe-less rank was added to the famous Dibley, UK, organ to comfort parishioners who brought various reptiles to the "Blessing of the Animals" service. It was designed by a visiting German organist who got the idea from playing an old Bach-era organ which was missing many a pipe. See Fidofife and Mosquito

Spinnrad.  A family of stops found on some organs of Northern Germany, usually 16' on the PEDAL and 8' or 4' on the manuals. Some versions are voiced as chorus stops and blend well with other organ ranks, while other Spinnrad ranks are intended for SOLO applications. A well appointed instrument in fact will have a few stops of both categories.
The North German variation of this stop consists of a set of spinning disks, all on one axis. All disks of a rank are of the same diameter, though of course, 16' ranks use much larger disks than 4' ranks do. A series of holes are drilled around the circumference of each disk near the outer edge, and air under pressure is blasted by a nozzle through the hole in the spinning disk producing the musical tone. The spacing (number per circumference) of the holes determines the note's pitch. The overall tuning of the rank is adjusted by small changes in the rotating speed of the rank's disks. Moderate harmonic voicing can be accomplished by creating different shaped holes, though most organists prefer the smoother tones of the round-holed type.  See Wachet-Auf and Footnote⁵

String-String.  This family of stops is totally unrelated to the usual pipe organ string ranks. Traditionally, a string stop is made up of a series of small diameter pipes of the flue type and have a lighter and brighter sound than the diapason. String-String stops however are actually made up of stretched strings of fiber or sometimes metal. The sound is produced when an air blast (normally at a wind pressure of 200 psi) is directed past the string at one of its nodes. The result is a kind of whistling, screaming tone, not unlike that achieved by blowing on a blade of grass between one's thumbs, or possibly experiencing a hurricane up close. An organ needs only one extended String-String stop to provide the whole set of pitches from 16' through 1' since multiple air nozzles are located at differing nodes along each string, producing different pitches when blown. Off-node nozzle locations produce a much sought-after group of mutation pitches. Some organists complain about the difficulty of integrating the shrieking sound of the String-String with main line organ ranks, but all USA folks agree that the rank(s) are quite useful around Halloween time (though few churches actually choose to offer a Halloween service).

Stravanger.  This Norwegian organ stop was inspired by the folksy fiddling of Norse peasants who were not allowed to bring their fiddles into church. When the church hierarchy banned fiddling around in the pews, an angry organ builder from Dvergsdal (Valley of the Dwarfs), named Dvergsdal the Dwarf, figured out a way around the ban. He designed a special organ rank such that each pipe had a stretched string along its front. The strings were tuned to the same pitches as the pipes and were vibrated by tiny reindeer-hair bows driven by the air movement at the pipes' mouths.
The musical sound of this rank is so moving that even church elders can be seen dancing in the aisles. This stop with its bowed strings on the front of the wooden pipes is in contrast to the only other Piped-String stop, the Listzian, which has hammered strings stretched inside the pipes. See Listzian

Svømmelblære.  An unusual Norwegian innovation which adds a whole new family of sounds to the pipe organ. Each note of a rank of the Svømmelblære consists of two rubber balloons that act in a kind of tandem push-pull way, providing the air needed to vibrate the rubber "lips" of the device. When a note is played, air is allowed into the first balloon, and the note begins to speak. The organist must take care not to depress the manual key too long or the balloon could possibly overfill creating a  condition referred to as a Svømmelblære-blowout. As the first balloon begins to deflate, playing the fart-like tone so characteristic of this Norse stop, about one-half of the output air is channeled into the second balloon which fills like a reservoir to keep the note sounding longer. Then, of course, by means of an ingenious Scandinavian bi-valve, the first balloon is partially re-inflated by the exhaust of the second--and so on. This dying out effect has earned this stop the nick-name of "Passing-Of-Air-With-Echoes," or simply, "FARTER-farter-farter." It is rare to find this stop at the 32' pitch, since inflating a couple of weather balloons per note in any kind of sensible time-frame is impractical. Likewise, the higher pitches are also rare due to the likelihood of popping the tiny balloons involved with the slightest key press.  See Grenouille coassante  and Footnote¹

Telescopios saltandos.  This Mexican organ 8' manual rank is one of only three kinds of Flex-Tube stops that this author is aware of. (See Embre ugrás and Flattern)   While the pipes surely fall into the Flex-Tube family, these New World ranks clearly developed separately from the Central European ones. Here, we find four metal cylinders sleeved together. Unlike the Hungarian stop, the Mexican rank allows the inner pipes to rise rather than the outer one. At rest the pipes are at one-quarter pitch length, thus the 8' pipe starts at a 2' length. When air enters the pipe, it telescopes up to its full height and its tone descends to the pipe's true pitch.
One complaint organists have with this Flex-Tube design is that the tubes need to be kept well lubricated otherwise they tend to stick at in-between pitches, somewhat disrupting the music's coherence.
Another complaint is that a very small temperature shift is enough to stick cylinders together, turning the 8' tone into a 2' one, again somewhat disrupting the music's coherence.
Still another complaint centers in on the tendency the smallest inner cylinders have to pop off the top of the pipes causing a sudden shift to open status and the rising of the tone to a three-quarter off, one-octave up pitch, which again may somewhat disrupt the music's coherence.
All in all, we may conclude that this particular version of the Flex-Tube family of ranks is next to worthless musically when it becomes part of any instrument. See Footnote⁶

Wachet-Auf.  An 16' SOLO stop of considerable volume found on some organs of Southern Germany. The Wachet-Auf belongs to the spinning-wheel family of rank construction. This stop differs in design and purpose from the Northern German Spinnrad stop of the same family.
Like the Spinnrad, the musical tone of the Wachet-Auf is produced by nozzles blowing air through holes in spinning disks along one axis. However, here the disks are graduated in size from large, for low-pitched notes, to small, for the upper keyboard notes. The number of holes in each disk is the same, and pitch is varied by the number of holes blasted per second, which in turn is determined by the size of the disk. The stop is only found at the 16' pitch since the smaller a disk becomes (for higher pitches) the less accurately holes can represent a given frequency.
The name of this stop comes from a unique use for it that has become common-place in many churches in Southern Germany. A special "Wachet-Auf" toe piston is installed which when engaged causes the bottom five notes to play simultaneously while at the same time the speed of disk rotation is decreased and increased dramatically. The resulting high powered siren sound of the "Wachet-Auf" toe piston is sure to keep any congregation on its toes.  See Spinnrad and Footnote⁵

Welkian.  A special purpose wooden stop at 8' pitch, generally found on the PEDAL. The pipes are thought to be the only examples of a Bourdon en Chamade style. This unique rank was developed to satisfy the tastes of older mid - USA congregations who appreciate a facade of champagne bubbles behind the altar. The horizontal pipes are partially filled with soapy water and produce multitudinous bubbles when air is passed through them. A special toe piston is usually provided to simulate the sound of a popping cork. Hymns accompanied by this stop are usually introduced with the choir director's "a-one, a-two, a-three. . ."

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Footnote¹  Not too long ago, an international incident occurred which organists around the world followed with great interest.  It seems that French organists discovered for the first time that certain Scandinavian organs were equipped with the Svømmelblære stop. The French felt this stop bore too close a resemblance to their own neglected Grenouille coassante stop and they demanded that the Norwegians be entirely blamed for the invention of these despised air bag type stops. For their part, the whole Norwegian and Swedish organ community insisted that the French deserved the credit for these rarely praised stops. The uproar was finally put to rest when it was discovered that both the Svømmelblære and the Grenouille coassante stops were crafted by the same person: a wandering itinerate Scottish bagpipe salesman, down on his luck, willing to apply his skills to organ building for the odd Franc, Kroner, or Shilling here and there.

Footnote²  Organ historians have concluded with a high degree of certainty that the Spanish Niños gritadores is, in fact, another stop of the air-bag family of ranks created by the wandering itinerate Scottish bagpipe salesman mentioned in Footnote¹. In this case, however, the stop is extremely well thought of, at least by those in the immediate area served by the small Spanish parish. Oddly enough, most of the inhabitants of these mountains wear kilts and have red hair--go figure.

Footnote³  A large cathedral, Notre Dame des Escargots, near Quebec, Canada, has a marvelous organ made up entirely of Gastropoda ranks. Among the 1789 - 1799 shells that make up this instrument are included the nearly matched pairs of the lovely Gastropoda céleste. All individual shells are actually artificially grown, rather than being entirely natural, using a precise mathematically computer-generated specification. Snail growth is carefully monitored so as to conform to the computer model, assuring an accurate pitch and harmonic character. Who knows where this sort of 'New World' organ building technique may lead?

Footnote⁴  The origin of the Nautilus family of stops is somewhat vague.  The account that most organ historians agree upon states that there was this itinerate French organ builder who happened by peddling snails one day while the Nautilus (the submarine) was in dry-dock at a Northern Italian port. For security purposes the boat was incognito disguised as a Swiss frigate. The boat's captain was immediately attracted to the idea of adding to his on-board pipe organ a stop composed of Nautilus shells, which the organ builder happened to have a surplus of. The scant records of this time indicate that the itinerate organ builder was hired as a member of the boat's crew and may well have gone down with the sub off the stormy coast of Norway. Some researchers insist that there is evidence that he in fact survived and that one of his present day descendants has been touring through a number of small English villages.

Footnote⁵  It has been noticed by the author of this work that the German spinning-wheel family of organ stops has a parallel in the electronic organ industry in the USA. Apparently, a historic US organ builder developed an organ that produced its tones by electro-magnetically "reading" the bumpy edges of a series of metal disks rotating on one axis.  This electro-magnetic "vibration" was then amplified electrically and fed to a "speaker" which caused a similar vibration of air molecules. The wheels of the American instrument varied in size and thus are closer in design to the Southern German Wachet-Auf stop than the Spinnrads found in Northern Germany.
Most German organists insist that their purely mechanical ranks have no connection whatsoever with the American "artificial" ones, and their ranks also produce a vastly superior sound (as anyone awakened from a deep, pew-oriented sleep by the shriek of the Wachet-Auf can attest to).

Footnote⁶  Legend has it that the Telescopios saltandos stop was the brainchild of a traveling itinerate Spanish organ builder and telescope salesman who, thinking he was hopping a galleon to Italy to peddle his wears, actually found himself heading to Mexico. Once there, and having a vast surplus of telescopes of all sizes, he found a novel way to put them to use.

Footnote⁷  The Dictionary's author has been contacted recently by one of the organists at the Dibley, UK, church with an interesting bit of information about their organ's Mosquito stop. It seems that use of the stop tends to attract every spider within miles of the church. A special fund has been set aside to pay for the sweeping away the extensive web-work that builds up weekly. One might expect that not too many visitors would bring pet mosquitoes, and while that is true, numerous vagabond mosquitoes do get drawn into the services when the stop is played.

Footnote⁸  It is sad that the use of the Listzian is in legal limbo at this time. Just last month a dusty old musical score was found wedged in the Gb, bottom octave, pipe of the Listzian rank. It was evidently located there to hold the pipe's stopper in tighter and had been there for many years. Incredibly, the score was penned by Liszt himself and was composed to show off the Piped-String stop. The piece is proving very difficult to master since it is filled with many keyboard runs requiring both hands to sound chords spanning an octave and a half each, something that Liszt's large hands were easily capable of, but few others can match.