After 21 years of dreaming and fund raising First Presbyterian assisted the fine staff of C. B. Fisk organ builders in unloading their new three manual instrument.  The instrument was built and assembled in Gloucester, MA at the C. B. Fisk set- up room.  The organ was taken apart and carefully packed and shipped to New Mexico in a 53' semi-trailer moving van.

The new organ for the historic First Presbyterian Church is a three-manual, mechanical action instrument of 41 ranks.  Housed in a painted case, the organ was designed to harmonize with the Territorial Revival interior of John Gaw Meem's 1937 church.

The "fireplace" -style cherry console includes keyboards with grenadilla naturals, bone-topped rosewood sharps; and stop knobs turned from Macassar ebony.  The organ's 2,065 pipes, some of wood and some of metal, the largest 16 feet long and the smallest less than 1/2 inch in length, encompass nearly the full pitch range of human hearing.  Eight pipes of the Pedal 16" Contrebasse stand in the façade from FF and are constructed of the clearest vertical grain fir.  Hammered lead pipes of the Great Prestant 8' are arrayed in the central section of the case.

Because Santa Fe sits at an altitude of 7000 feet, a blower that supplies more than 750 cubic feet per minute of wind is required.  The manual divisions are voiced on a pressure of 3 inches of water column and the Pedal on 4 inches.

Currently the organ is now installed and voicing of the flue pipes is complete.  In August, 2008 the voicing of the reed pipes was completed. The instrument weighs nearly 10 tons and represents more than 16,000 person/hours of work.
On Sunday, October 12, 2008, Dr. Larry Palmer, Professor of Organ and Harpsichord of Southern Methodist University played the dedication concert that included music of J. S. Bach, Durufle, Distler, and R. Strauss.
 
* Listen to Linda Raney play the Fisk organ (in a recording made by Andy Smith) by clicking here.  Give it some time to get started.