The Nigel Kennedy of the King's Instrument, American organist Cameron Carpenter (born Taylor Cameron Carpenter) has taken the British violinist's charge to another level, indeed, with his International Touring Organ--ITO, for short.
A student of the late Gerre Hancock and a graduate of the Juilliard School, Carpenter explains his kind of instrument thusly:
"The best of the classical organ--its emotional magnitude, its sonic range, its coloristic drama--but to liberate these from the pipe organ's immobility, its moving parts, its cost, its institutionality."
"I want the American Classic cathedral organ to combine with its counterpart, the cinema organ, in a single instrument," Mr. Carpenter says.
Yes, his ITO has a dual purpose.
"It has to have the cathedral organ's expansiveness and the Wurlitzer's clarity, rapidity and audacity," notes Carpenter. "It will be ethereal and rhythmless at times--and at other times more rhythmically intense than any pipe organ in the world."
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