The National Pipe Organ Register (NPOR) at the Royal College of Music

BIOS Website | BIOS Reporter

Welcome to the NPOR at the Royal College of Music

© The British Institute of Organ Studies2008 (BIOS)

The NPOR move to The Royal College of Music (December 2008)

The NPOR server has moved to The Royal College of Music after spending all its life so far in Cambridge, firstly in the University Computing Service and, since 2005, in Emmanuel College. After Paul Houghton's retirement as Manager of the NPOR in 2005 responsibility for management of the content and liaison with the Editing Team was transferred to Frances Pond at the Birmingham City University. A celebratory lunch was held in Emmanuel College in 2005 (see photograph) for the Editing Team and the retiring and future Managers. The present server move makes no difference to the editing arrangements and additions or corrections should therefore continue to be notified to the NPOR Manager at Birmingham City University.

The public internet address for the NPOR is www.npor.org.uk.

The NPOR

The National Pipe Organ Register was begun in its present computer based form by Peter le Huray and Mike Sayers in 1991. It has been supported from 1992 to 1997 by the British Academy and by the British Institute of Organ Studies. Support for 1998 and 1999 has been provided by the Pilgrim Trust. The NPOR presently resides on a computer system in the University of Cambridge provided by the Thriplow Charitable Trustr. The NPOR project is guided by members of the Council of the British Institute of Organ Studies and data input and editing has been done by a small group of extremely valuable helpers. BIOS is most grateful to all those who have contributed material to the NPOR; without them it would not exist.
The coverage of Scotland is largely incomplete and out of date. Any surveys or collections of surveys would be appreciated.
Searches may be performed on building address and on builder name. The output from these is in the form of a short-list arranged by County and Town. For each survey the following information is shown:

Name of building
Address
Index for the survey in the NPOR
Surveyor code identifying the source of the information
Date of the survey
Number of manuals and whether pedals are present
Builders and dates

Specific surveys may be selected from the short-list display and full details obtained. For many buildings, especially famous ones, a number of surveys are listed. These may be of different periods in the organ's history or just different views of the organ compiled by different surveyors. As with any archive collection, it is the readers' responsibility to select what is appropriate for their purposes. The NPOR is not able to confirm the contents of any particular survey but would be most grateful for information on corrections or omissions. Please see the notes for contributors below.

Sponsors

The British Institute of Organ Studies is most grateful to the following grant awarding and educational charities, corporate sponsors and friends who have generously supported the work of the NPOR. If you would like to join them in supporting our work and helping us to keep the NPOR available and up-to-date, please consider making a donation.

Charities

The British Academy (1992-1994)
The Manifold Trust (2002)
The Pilgrim Trust (1998, 2003, 2004)
The Thriplow Charitable Trust (1995,2000,2002)
Emmanuel College, Cambridge (2002)
Trinity College, Cambridge (2002)

Corporate Sponsors

Mander Organs
Harrison and Harrison Ltd.
David Wells Organbuilders Ltd.

Friends

Colin Fothergill
 Alan Wood
 Philip J Wells
Graham Jones
 Alastair Macfadyen
 Robert Bowles
Paul Ebling
 John Norman
 Tim Eyles
David & Althea Bridgeman-Sutton
 Iain Stinson
 David Force
Ian Smith
 Nigel Browne
 Mary Saunders
Gary Rant
 Gordon Curtis
 Kenneth Gray
Alastair Johnston
 Anthony Yearsley
 The Organ Club
John Jones
 Anthony Percival (Christ Church, Ipswich Recital)
 Alastair Disley
Martin Payne
 Anthony Crook
David Pether
 Jose Hopkins

Places, counties and grid references in the NPOR

The NPOR comprises surveys of pipe organs in Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Originally, addresses in the NPOR were based on the 1985 County boundaries, as defined in the Ordnance Survey Gazetteer. This caused much concern because of the disappearance of Rutland, the invention of Avon and Humberside and the very substantial changes in Wales and Scotland. Place are now primarily located by their Historic County which corresponds to the Ancient County from the 1891 census as defined in the Association of British Counties' gazetteer (see their website for a map of UK counties at this date, and for further information at http://www.abcounties.co.uk. Where the 1891 and 1985 counties differ, the 1985 county is shown in brackets. Each place is identified by its National Grid reference to a 1Km square. National Grid references are defined by a 2-letter pair (identifying a 100Km tile) followed by 2 digits for eastwards offset and 2 digits for northwards (e.g SP5008). Individual buildings are capable of being identified to the nearest 100m by 2 letters + 3 digits + 3 digits (e.g. SP 506 086). We would be happy to receive such grid references for individual buildings where you are sure the information is accurate. The Ordnance Survey Gazetteer and OS maps are used to verify the location of places before they are entered in the NPOR. The counties of Northern Ireland are identified by the Irish Grid Reference System, which is similar except that the 100km tiles are identified by a single letter. There being no gazetteer for Northern Ireland, the places have been identified from the Discoverer Series maps with the invaluable assistance of Alistair McCartney. All places in Northern Ireland have the same Historic County of Ulster. The Channel Islands lie outside any Grid Reference system, and use a dummy reference.

Notes for contributors

The NPOR continues to welcome contributions to the database but in order to enable the editors to process information as quickly and efficiently as possible, contributors are asked to note the following:

New surveys – information about instruments not currently listed on NPOR

Contributors should check the database carefully to ensure that the instrument in question is not listed, then complete the NPOR Survey Form which may be downloaded here as text and returned by email, or printed off as an rtf file and returned by post. Notes are included in the word doc file but are available separately here as text. Please be sure to include your name and full contact details.

Amendments to existing surveys         (These notes can be printed for ready reference)

Contributors are asked carefully to compare the information which they have with the NPOR survey in question, then list the changes as succinctly as possible in the following order:

Please note that the editors do not have the time or resources to follow up speculative information, and this will be accorded low priority.

Photographs

Photographs (colour or black and white) may be submitted electronically, but these should be in JPEG format not exceeding 55 kilobytes in size and should always be clearly identified either by NPOR survey reference number or (in the case of new surveys) by building name and place. Close-up images of stop jambs, if clearly legible, are also welcomed to supplement written stop lists.

Care must be exercised when submitting illustrations from printed books or pictures from Websites. As a general rule, photographs from books and other printed matter published less than 70 years ago should not be submitted without the express written permission of the publisher. Prior permission should be obtained from the owners of Website photographs (Webmasters may be able to assist), and evidence of this should be forwarded to the NPOR Database Manager at the address below with your contribution.

Email

It is very helpful if all email subject lines can include the survey number, where appropriate, and a brief indication of the building(s) concerned.

If you require further information on any of the above points, please contact the NPOR Database Manager at the address below

Donations

It costs money to run the NPOR, to process all the information which we receive and to keep the database up to date. If you use the NPOR and would like to help, please consider joining the British Institute of Organ Studies (BIOS) and/or making a donation. Corporate sponsors can be given a link on the NPOR to their home page in exchange for a donation of £500 or more.

Cheques (made payable to BIOS) can be sent directly to the BIOS Treasurer at the address below. Please state that the money is for the NPOR and include a statement (if relevant) that your contribution may be treated for tax purposes as Gift Aid. A Gift Aid declaration form is available from the treasurer. Donations may also be made by credit card; please send your card details - exact name on the card, card number and expiry date to the Treasurer.

Contacts

Information about additions or corrections should be sent to:

    Frances Pond
    NPOR Database Manager, British Organ Library, 
    Library and Learning Resources
    Birmingham City University,
    Franchise St,
    Perry Barr, 
    Birmingham  B42 2SU
    (e-mail: manager@npor.bcu.ac.uk)  
 
 

For comments about software and presentation contact: 
    Dr. M.D. Sayers  ( e-Mail: mds11@cam.ac.uk) 


For donations and information on how to make them:
    Adrian Mumford, Hon Treasurer of BIOS,
    63 Atbara Road,
    Teddington, TW11 9PA
    Tel: 0208 973 1929 / 0207 898 1166
    (e-mail: adrian.mumford@europe.c-of-e.org.uk)

Privacy Policy

Statistics of use but not personal information may be recorded and used in applications to various bodies for financial support. We may also contact you occasionally in connection with your use of the NPOR.

Valid HTML 4.01!

nporlogo About Us | Privacy Policy | Contact Us | ©2008 British Institute of Organ Studies rcmlogo