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Paris, Saint-François-Xavier

Paris, Saint-François-Xavier

Paris, Saint-François-Xavier

This is the organ, where Gaston Litaize had been titular organist.

Concerning the history of the instrument in the church of Saint-Francois-Xavier, let us first give account of what Felix Raugel relates in his 1927 book on Paris organs: "The organ case, standing on a broad and spacious stone gallery offers an impressive silhouette. It stands out very well thanks to the crowning domes and the striking case towers. The instrument goes back to the year 1878 and is the work of the builder Jacques Fermis, built in the then-novel tubular pneumatic system invented in 1866. Mssrs Gonzalez and Ephreme were entrusted with a rebuild in 1923, whereby they revised the voicing, replaced the pneumatic system with a better one and placed the Positif stops in a swell box. In addition, they improved the stop action and rearranged the composition pedals. The organ has 58 stops, of which 31 are under expression."

That Cavaille-Coll must also have worked on the organ, in 1890, may be inferred from his opus list. The number of stops given there is the same as that mentioned by Raugel.

The organbuilder Müller also worked on the instrument in 1957. Lastly, a thorough rebuild of the instrument was carried out in 1993 by the organbuilder Bernard Dargassies. The entire organ was thereby electrified, and the console was replaced with a new one in American style. The manual compass was extended to 61 notes and the Pedal remained at 32 notes.



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