Baumeister Maihingen

Quality test of the samples

It is very exceptional that the organ has been sampled by two companies, Pipeloops and Prospectum. However, after 17 years of research, Prospectum has developed a completely new method of sampling, which gave me the opportunity to compare the new system with the existing method. An opportunity to look for evidence for the novelties that Prospectum puts forward.

My Sonarte organ has the same precious speakers that Prospectum used to judge the samples. To arrive at an objective assessment, I involved two fellow voicers in the test. However, the difference in quality is so great that all three of us soon heard how much better the Prospectum samples are.

Real sounds of pipes; the Sonarte organ makes the pipe sounds extremely realistic.

Ordering and method of payment

Order: Prospectum

Payment: Europäische Banküberweisung (SEPA, gebührenfrei - empfohlen in der EU)

The payment via SEPA is the same as the normal method of payment via your bank, provided that you enter in the box below the bank number:
european bank transfer

About this virtual organ

The recordings for this sample set have been made using reference quality equipment and methods based on almost 20 years of experience. Processing was done using our new high quality VPOlab© system based on 17 years of experience in digital signal processing algorithms research and development. The result is a high quality sample set that sounds close to what is achievable with the dry+IR approach but can still be used like any conventional wet sample set.

This sample set introduces several innovations:

No denoising applied - sound details preserved A special processing toolchain eliminates the need for denoising and therefore avoids denoising related quality losses

High quality reverb using hundreds of carefully recorded and optimized IRs of the Klosterkirche, all rendered into the samples using a specially developed rendering engine. The HW convolution engine is not used/required.

Up to 7 release samples per pipe The number of releases and their corresponding tone lengths were determined individually for each pipe depending on its speech to minimize playing artifacts.

Prospectum samples of Baumeister organ 1737

According to the book Die Baumeister-Orgel von 1737 in der Klosterkirche Maihingen, this unique organ was built by Johann Martin Baumeister from 1734 to 1737, with the exception of the Rückpositiv which is attributed to Jakob Philipp Bouthellier.

What makes it so special is that, due to an incredible combination of fortunate circumstances, it is almost perfectly preserved, including its original voicing. In the course of the secularisation of the Monastery of Maihingen, the instrument was sealed in octobre 1802 and no longer used as masses where then held in the nearby parish church Mariä Himmelfahrt. In addition, Baumeister did not equip the organ with an entrance - an inconvenience which appears to have prevented potential attempts to perform maintenance work for a long time. Thus, when the organ was finally opened and restored from 1988-1990, it was de facto still in its original state as built and voiced bei Baumeister.

The restoration was carried out very carefully, and it was exceptionally well documented. The goal was to make the organ playable while working on it as little as possible so as to preserve its original state.
Having remained in its original state, its sound is unusual for today's ears, and, as Christoph Bossert (1) demonstrates, one needs to take one's time and get involved with it.

Patricularly noteworthy are the incredibly beautiful 8' flute, string and Quintatön stops, including the Cythara 8' which is a celeste stop to be used together with Flauten 8' for a tremulant like effect.

The mixtures in the main work contain terz choirs and so the cymbel is a pure third mixture. It has only thirds and octave pipes, while from c1 the thirds are added. The mixture in the backpositive, on the other hand, contains only fifths and octaves. In the pedal only the low basic voices (16' and 8') are present, a quint 6' carries the 16' foundation.
(1)    Maihingen, Baumeister-Orgel 1737 - Orgelführung mit Christoph Bossert

                                                                Prospectum innovative Sampling

Exceptional sounds

When an organ builder accepts the order to build an organ, he starts making the pipes. The construction of the organ can take one or more years and meanwhile the pipes are aging. The metal is given time to relax, the molecular structure comes to rest.
It has no use to voice the pipes if they have just been made, because a week later a pipe will sound different. Violin builders will recognize this; processed wood must first come to rest. Important for the sound of a pipe is the resonance of the pipe corpus. Processed metal must first age before the resonance plays a noticeable role in the sound formation.

The Baumeister organ had not been played for 186 years before the organ builder started the restoration in 1988. Due to this aging, each pipe was able to form magnificent sounds, thanks to the resonance of the corpus. The innovative sampling developed by Prospectum, the result of 17 years of research, allows these melodious sounds to be heard in full glory in the sample set. Sonarte has fitted my organ with top of the range loudspeakers as well as the DA Converter. As a result, the sounds are reproduced as if they come directly from the pipes.

The PROSPECTUM samples from Maihingen are of very high quality