ORGAN MUSIC WILL AGAIN WAFT THROUGH THE PARK

After nine months of silence, the Spreckels Organ will again unleash its stentorian tones in Sunday afternoon’s party celebrating the completion of the refurbished organ pavilion grounds. The $900,000 project to landscape the pavilion’s audience area and install new seating in the Balboa Park landmark completes the final phase of the organ pavilion’s total restoration, a project that began seven years ago and cost $2 million in public and private funds.

About a decade ago, interest had ebbed in the Spreckels Organ, which was constructed for San Diego’s 1915 Panama-California Exposition and was given to the city by philanthropists Adolph and Rudolph Spreckels. Attendance at the weekly Sunday afternoon organ recitals had dwindled to a handful, and it was rumored that the pavilion would be razed and replaced with a parking lot. In truth, the asphalt floor of the seating area already resembled a parking lot, and the dilapidated condition of the wooden benches was symptomatic of the city’s neglect.

Now the pavilion’s audience facility has 600 new metal benches painted to match the pavilion, a new floor made of 150,000 hand-set bricks called interlocking pavers, new shrubbery, and graceful trees planted around the perimeter of the former asphalt arena. Bobbie Salvini of the Park and Recreation Department explained that the 32 locust trees, chosen for the lacy texture of their foliage, will eventually provide shade for families that wish to picnic along the raised areas at the pavilion’s outer edge. Since the trees are deciduous, they will not provide shade in the cooler winter months,

With the Park and Recreation Department, the Committee of 100 will host the Sunday program, which begins at 2 p.m. The Committee of 100 led the drive to raise funds for the restoration project’s first two stages--the rebuilding of the historic Austin pipe organ (1979-81) and the refurbishing of the pavilion building with its ornate colonnades (1982-83). The committee was formed in 1967 to preserve Balboa Park’s Spanish Colonial architecture.

Civic organist Robert Plimpton will perform a 45-minute recital as part of the celebration, resuming his Sunday recitals that the construction project interrupted. Plimpton noted that Sunday’s festivities are intended to evoke the pre-World War I era that produced the Spreckels Organ. Free sarsaparilla and popcorn will be served; people will be dressed in period costume, and an exhibit of antique cars on display in front of the pavilion will add to the period decor. In addition, the Navy Marching Band will perform to inaugurate the event, and a calliope from the Hazard Collection will be demonstrated.

Along with the customary flashy organ toccatas, Plimpton’s program will tie into the celebration’s theme by including Scott Joplin rags, a medley of tunes by George Gershwin and Jerome Kern, and Edwin Lemare’s “Andantino,” a period organ solo whose melody was purloined and turned into the popular song “Moonlight and Roses.” A British organist with a worldwide reputation, Lemare was San Francisco’s civic organist when the Spreckels Organ was built.

Plimpton, whose energetic personality and shrewd programming have won a large following for the Spreckels Organ, noted that San Diego is unique in restoring its civic organ. “When the Spreckels Organ was built, nearly every city in the country had a municipal organ and a civic organist. Today, only a few of these grand instruments remain in playing condition, such as the organ in San Francisco’s art museum, the California Palace of the Legion of Honor, and the former Boston civic organ, relocated in Methuen, Mass.”

According to Jack Bethards of San Francisco’s Schoenstein Organbuilders, the civic organ at the Legion of Honor, which is played every weekend by that city’s two civic organists, was also the result of the philanthropy of the Spreckels family. San Francisco has a second municipal organ, located in the San Francisco Civic Auditorium, although it is not used for regular public concerts. Bethards noted that the Civic Auditorium instrument is the twin of San Diego’s Spreckels Organ, having been built by the Austin company for San Francisco’s 1915 exposition.

San Diego’s Spreckels Organ has the distinction of being the world’s largest outdoor organ, although that is not a crowded category. In the United States there are only two other outdoor organs, both located in California. One is owned by the Bohemian Grove Club, an exclusive retreat on the Russian River for Bay Area businessmen, and the other outdoor organ is in a cemetery in Gardena.