MORNINGSIDE HEIGHTS, NY — In 2019, a fire in the crypt of the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine filled the cathedral’s historic organ with corrosive smoke, badly damaging the more than 8,500 pipes of the instrument.
But, after more than five years and a multi-million dollar restoration, the organ will be officially welcomed home at the cathedral’s annual Christmas concert this Saturday.
“No two organs sound alike,” the cathedral’s organist, Daniel Ficarri, told Patch of the organ, which was built by the Ernest M. Skinner Company in 1910, and rebuilt and enlarged by G. Donald Harrison of Aeolian-Skinner in 1954.
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“When you listen to this pipe organ in the space, it’s as if the stones are singing to you, in the walls around you. It totally surrounds you.”
In the years since the fire, the cathedral had been renting a digital organ, but there is nothing quite like the real thing, the Harlem local said.
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“This restored organ has eight-and-a-half thousand pipes and it happens to be situated in the largest Gothic cathedral in the world, so the marriage of the space and this world-class instrument is really what makes it so exciting,” Ficarri said. “It’s hard to describe — it has to be experienced in person.”
Ficcari will be playing the instrument this Saturday at 4 p.m. at the annual Christmas concert, where thousands of people will attend and sing classic carols alongside the organ, including “O Come, All Ye Faithful,” “Silent Night” and “Joy to the World.”
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Ficarri has been the organist at the cathedral since 2021, where he played the digital organ, but he first played the original one in 2012 as a high schooler.
“[The organ] left such a lasting impression on me, and it’s largely because of this specific instrument that I decided to become an organist. So it’s very personally special to me,” Ficarri said.
The Cathedral Church of St. John The Divine is located at 1047 Amsterdam Ave. For more information on the upcoming concert, click here.
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