ORGUE À TUYAUX DE PIEDICORTE DI GAGGIO

The Piedicorte organ, built in 1902, could be described as "the most modern old organ in Corsica". This organ owes its historic value to its "quality-date" ratio. While organ building declined rapidly after 1900, both in Italy and in France, the Fabbrica di Filippo Tronci continued for a few more years to build a number of instruments worthy of those that had made the reputation of the Ateliers Agati-Tronci. Among the instruments from the Fabbrica di Fimippo Tronci imported to Corsica, the Piedicorte is the only one built after 1900 to match the quality of its predecessors. It was built in Pistoia by former workers still steeped in the great tradition of Nicomède Agati. However, it is no longer a classical Italian organ, since around 1880 Agati-Tronci had already grouped the three or four highest ranks of this "ripieno" with separate ranks in a single register. The instrument's 'transitional' character is reinforced by the emphasis placed on 'concert' stops, by the presence of 'campanelli' (struck timbres) and by numerous mechanical innovations that testify to the desire to be able to play a modern repertoire, nourished by the fin-de-siècle taste for Bel Canto or music that today would be described as light. Only this instrument remains capable of translating all the great literature of the classical organ, and not just Italian. It owes this to the remarkable quality of its pipework, made of excellent metal and "cut to the tone" according to the best traditions; it also owes it to the excellence of its action and the robustness of all its materials, which have enabled it to survive without too much damage "the dark years" during which it was deprived of an organist and maintenance. Thanks to the Organ Committee, under the leadership of Madame Pauline SALEMBIEN (who died in 2019), the organ was restored to its original condition by Serge Groleau in 1976, then regularly maintained by Antone Massoni in 1991 and Jean Louis LORIOT in 2009.