00:00 Good morning, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor for Sussex Newspapers. Fantastic
00:06 to be speaking to Rosemary Bell, Jenny Jackson and Ian Jackson, co-owners of the Chichester
00:11 City Arts Centre, about a wonderful project which has come to fruition now. You have restored
00:18 an organ which is pretty nearly 200 years old in what was the chapel to the old Theological
00:24 College in the western side of Chichester City Centre. Now you took over the building
00:30 to set up the City Arts Centre, when was that, last year wasn't it?
00:34 That was in May, we took possession in May of last year.
00:38 May of last year. And Ian, what condition was that organ in when you took over?
00:43 Well it was just playable, but then again none of us could actually play, and it was
00:49 making awful noises, and at one point we thought we should get rid of it, but then Alan Thurlow
00:56 turned up and…
00:58 Former Cathedral Organist.
00:59 Yes, and showed us what a wonderful sound it made. We took a video at the time and it
01:07 brought me to tears, I'll be honest, it was a fantastic moment.
01:11 Well that's understandable, you're tapping into something which is pretty much two centuries
01:17 old, aren't you? And what did you have to do to it to bring it back to where it is now?
01:22 Well some of the keys didn't work, some of the stops, I don't know if you know something
01:31 about organs, you have to pull out certain stops to make certain pipes operative. Well
01:36 if you pulled the stops then the pipes kept blowing, you couldn't stop them from playing.
01:43 Some of the pedals, it has a pedal board for your feet which controls other pipes, and
01:50 some of those didn't work at all, and there were little things like the ivory on the keys
01:58 was missing. When we started to investigate further, we then found that suddenly the electric
02:07 motor that provides the power of the blower to provide air to the pipes stopped working.
02:16 On investigation we found that the company who originally had fitted it back in 1940
02:22 was still in existence, and they showed us the handwritten record of the installation
02:29 in their archives, which was quite fascinating.
02:33 And you've crowdfunded this work and it's now been completed. So is it back as good
02:39 as new?
02:40 It is, the blower and motor was reconditioned, the same 1940s vintage system was reinstalled
02:51 by myself, and now we've had a local company, South Coast Organs, clean the organ, repair
03:00 the mechanisms that weren't working properly, and it's now, dare I say, almost as good as
03:06 new.
03:07 Wow. I guess it just shows that these things were absolutely built to last, weren't they
03:11 really?
03:12 Indeed.
03:13 And we just want to say a huge thank you to everyone that supported us. It was so overwhelming,
03:19 the donations that came in, and it's enabled us to do the work we've been completely self-sufficient
03:24 in.
03:25 I mean, no pun intended, you clearly struck a chord with people when you launched this
03:29 project, didn't you?
03:30 Nice one.
03:31 But Rosie, the principal purpose of the building now is your dance academy, isn't it? And you're
03:39 saying it's such a lovely thing when people come in, see the organ, say, "Oh, does that
03:43 work?" And you can say, "Yes, it does."
03:45 Yeah, it's the first thing people look at when they walk in the room, and it does give
03:51 the building the wow factor. This week we're holding our first exam session, our Royal
03:58 Academy of Music Dance Academy, here at CCAC, and I can't wait to bring external examiners
04:05 into this building and my pupils dance here for a while. It's going to be just the most
04:11 amazing dance venue in the area.
04:14 It's going to be fabulous, isn't it? So how do you imagine you will use this organ now
04:18 as back to nearly good as new?
04:21 Well, I'm getting married on the 19th of August.
04:28 Although I'm legally marrying at Ede's house because the church is deconsecrated, so we
04:33 can't have a legal wedding here. But we're going to have our celebration here on the
04:36 Saturday, and it will be a big white wedding. And we have an organist playing. Unfortunately,
04:42 Alan Othello's away, but we have another friend of his who's going to play for us, and the
04:48 organ will be used at the wedding. The annual Christmas Carol concert that takes place with
04:54 the local residents, which they were so keen to get back and to do here, will happen every
05:00 year.
05:01 Wow. But that's super cool to effectively restore the organ for your own wedding.
05:07 That's quite something.
05:10 And we also have a venue as well for anyone else, the parties, we've had music videos,
05:17 we've had a coronation party, a baroque concert. We've had lots of events and it's still available
05:24 for hire.
05:25 Fantastic. And anyone wanting to hire should just get in contact with the venue, just pop
05:30 up, presumably.
05:31 We're always here. We love the building.
05:34 Well, so you should. It gets better and better. Fantastic. We're really lovely to speak to
05:39 you all and congratulations on bringing this to fruition. And Rosie, congratulations on
05:44 the wedding.
05:45 Thank you.
05:46 Thank you.
05:47 Thank you, Phil.
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