The rebirth of the Voit-organ in the Grand Hall

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Photo: György Darabos

Having considered artistic, architectural, heritage maintenance-related, economic and organ historic criteria, the Senate of the Liszt Academy approved a resolution of the reconstruction of the original Voit-organ on 18 May, 2010. The President of the institution established an organ committee, which consisted not only of organists but also of financial, legal and technological experts.  The committee was in charge of preparing the project and of mapping its feasibility and possible funding sources. As the result of the intense study and scrutiny, in November, 2014, the Government of Hungary made a decree to support the introduced project. Having won the international public procurement tender, a German organ manufacturer with most excellent recommendations, Johannes Klais Orgelbau and its Hungarian partner company, AerisOrgona Ltd. carried out the reconstruction work. The reconstruction plan was devised and the organ-related expertise was brought in by Balázs Szabó in collaboration with the professional committee consisting of the members of the organ sub-department and the technical staff of the Liszt Academy. This is the very first reconstruction project in the world, in which not only the sound and technical parameters but also an early electric action has been reconstructed with complete authenticity in every part and detail. At the same time, independently of the former system, some of the most cutting edge features of organ building technology also come to show, such as the embedded Setzer combination, a computer-based system which facilitates the management of the stop combinations.  With the Voit-organ, not only the Liszt Academy, music education in general but also Hungary as a country is enriched with a globally unparalleled organ treasure.