
With that said, Oamaru organ builder, restorer and tuner Dr Ron Newton is well into restoring the organ in the Waitaki Boys’ High School Hall of Memories. He knows a thing or two about organ surgery and this summer he is well-organised to begin its rebuild.
Late last year, Dr Newton spent weeks dismantling the grand old instrument, consisting of 1304 pipes.
His restoration of the 100-year-old organ follows his involvement during a 1990s rebuild and he has kept it going intermittently since.
A special workshop and storage space has been set up in the school grounds for the year-long project.
The organ repairs are expected to cost well above $10,000.
The organ’s components were originally built by Lawton in Aberdeen, Scotland, then imported and built by Onehunga-based Osborne in 1931.
Dr Newton is now well into cleaning and repairing, including the water sound boards and the Swell and Great.
The Swell and Great are two of the manuals (keyboards) on an organ.
"They need to be completely dismantled and cleaned. These are the heart and lungs, as you were, of the whole thing, so this requires the most delicate of operations. I’m going to be working on the entire organ from A to Z, the air pressure is then taken through different ducting, and everything gets repaired and cleaned, and then the air goes into the sound boards and then into the pipes, so the pipes then get cleaned and repaired."
Dr Newton said visible water damage on the wooden sound boards was due to a leaking roof in the hall. The Ministry of Education has now assumed ownership of the 1926-built hall and is working to bring it up to code.
This would also help preserve the future of the organ.
"The organ has had to have had plastic covers put on things, but it hasn’t been enough to avert the worst of the water."
He also said "inadequacies" in the original 1931 installation and the later overhaul meant the organ had "never reached 100% of its potential".
"With this restoration project — we’re really hoping to knock that on the head," Dr Newton said.