An Inside Look at the Historic Company That Maintains the Magnificent Pipe Organs of England

Great Big Story visited with David Wilde, the managing director of the historic organ company Henry Willis & Sons, which has been in business since 1845. Wilde explains the process by which they craft the pipes, speaks about how the length of the pipe affects the pitch of the sound and expresses the incredible pride he feels every he hears one of their organs play.

when I hear one of our organs played in the big acoustic, it can be very moving. The larger organs have speaking pipes from a quarter of an inch long down to 32 feet long across an entire tonal and dynamic spectrum and there’s no better feeling when standing at an opening recital of a new organ looking up at it and saying we made that.