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Pura Fantascienza




Il 21 Settembre scorso è morto John Peragallo Jr.
Detta così non penso possa essere una notizia degna di attenzione. Ed anche se precisiamo che il de cuius era l'organaro che "manuteneva" l'organo della St. Patrick Cathedral di New York, pensiamo che tale notizia possa essere di interesse molto relativo per i lettori di queste pagine e per gli addetti ai lavori del nostro Paese, della cui attività i media non si curano nel modo più assoluto.
Senza arrivare alle ferali novelle, sulle pagine dei quotidiani nostrani non abbiamo mai avuto il piacere di leggere articoli dedicati a questo o quell'organaro, alla loro attività oppure anche solo qualche citazione a margine di qualche pezzo di colore. Per la nostra stampa (e per i nostri media in generale e per la televisione in particolare) la figura dell'organaro, semplicemente, non esiste. Riusciamo a sapere a malapena il nome dell'organista quando seguiamo le Sante Messe in televisione la domenica mattina, ma quanto a particolarità sugli organi e sui loro costruttori è il buio assoluto. D'altra parte l'organo, qui da noi, è dimenticato in primis proprio da chi lo dovrebbe valorizzare: la Chiesa; pertanto non ci stupiamo affatto se di questo strumento, della sua musica e dei suoi artefici non troviamo mai una riga sui giornali e nelle televisioni.
Ovviamente ci stupiremmo, e molto, se un bel giorno sul maggior quotidiano a tiratura nazionale trovassimo un lungo, dettagliato ed accuratissimo articolo dedicato alla dipartita di un qualche nostro organaro. Pura fantascienza qui in Italia, ma realtà assolutamente "normale" negli Stati Uniti. Ed è infatti sulle pagine del New York Times del 22 Settembre che abbiamo trovato un corposo ed appassionato articolo in cui si celebrava, appunto, la figura di John Peragallo Junior, l'organaro che aveva in carico la manutenzione del grande organo della St. Patrick Cathedral di New York, la Cattedrale Cattolica della Grande Mela. L'articolo è tuttora online sul sito del NYT ma per evitare ai nostri amici lettori l'incombenza della registrazione, ne trascriviamo qui di seguito il testo:

John Peragallo Jr., Who Kept Organs on Key, Dies at 76
By MARGALIT FOX
Published: September 22, 2008


John Peragallo Jr., the curator of the organs at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, who could not go to a church service there or anywhere else without straining to hear if there was anything the least bit amiss with his patient, died on Sept. 12 in Wayne, N.J. He was 76 and lived Paterson, N.J.
The cause was cancer, his son John III said.
One of the country’s most highly regarded organ builders and restorers, Mr. Peragallo was at his death the president of his family business, the Peragallo Pipe Organ Company. His father founded the company in Paterson 90 years ago; it is now in its fourth generation.
In the 1990s, Mr. Peragallo oversaw a complete restoration of the organ at St. Patrick’s, a monumental instrument that actually comprises three separate organs. His other notable restorations in New York include the organ at the Church of St. Paul the Apostle on West 59th Street.
Since its founding in 1918, the Peragallo company has built nearly 700 organs; today, its work can be found in churches along the East Coast from New England to the Carolinas. Each year, the company makes 8 to 10 new organs, which cost from $100,000 to $1 million and are destined for churches, colleges and the rare private home. It also tunes and maintains the organs of almost 400 churches in the metropolitan area.
Maintaining an organ is like being the master of an unstable principality, where anything can go wrong at any time. Along with the clock, the organ is considered the most complex of all machines built before the Industrial Revolution. It is as temperamental as a diva, and a good deal larger.
Day or night, Mr. Peragallo might be called out at a moment’s notice to save a wedding or funeral from acoustical ruin. Seasonal changes of temperature or humidity can throw an organ pipe - and a single organ can have thousands of them - out of tune. A pipe can jam and play on seemingly forever, much like a stuck car horn and about as pleasant to listen to. Arriving at the scene, Mr. Peragallo would yank the offending pipe from its holder like a dentist pulling a tooth.
Building an organ is even more involved. The task, which can take a year or more, combines the skills of a musician (Mr. Peragallo was a good organist himself) with those of a woodworker (organs can have elaborate cabinetry), leatherworker (the valves that let air into the pipes are made of leather), electrical engineer (most organs’ inner workings are now controlled electronically) and game warden (Mr. Peragallo sometimes had to flush nesting birds from the forest of pipes before he could begin his work).
It also entails acrobatics. Organ pipes can range in height from the size of a pencil eraser to that of a three-story building, and even a basic tuning job requires "a lot of ladders, a lot of climbing, a lot of hanging on for dear life off of shelves and platforms," as John Peragallo III explained in an interview on Wednesday.
John Stephen Peragallo Jr. was born on Feb. 11, 1932, in Manhattan and grew up in Paterson. His father, John Sr., had been an apprentice to the renowned organ builder Ernest M. Skinner before starting his own company. John Jr. studied at the Newark College of Engineering before joining his father’s business in 1949. For years, father and son lived two houses apart, with the factory in between.
Besides his son John III, of Wayne, N.J., Mr. Peragallo is survived by his wife, the former Christine Rainey, whom he married in 1956; a sister, Catherine Miller of Hawthorne, N.J.; three other children, Frank, of North Haledon, N.J., Stephen, of Baltimore, and Christine Egan of Pompton Lakes, N.J.; 10 grandchildren; and a great-grandchild.
Mr. Peragallo considered his crowning achievement to be the restoration of the organ at St. Patrick’s, a four-year undertaking. The organ had been built by a St. Louis company from 1928 to 1930; more than six decades later, it was in deep need of repair.
Starting in 1994, Mr. Peragallo and his associates plucked out St. Patrick’s pipes in batches and carted them back to Paterson for cleaning. The organ has so many pipes - more than 9,000 - that listeners were never the wiser. Leather valves were replaced, about four dozen bellows were refurbished, the electrical system was upgraded and much else.
From that year on, Mr. Peragallo’s company has provided St. Patrick’s with weekly maintenance and, for special occasions, an on-site troubleshooter.
For Mr. Peragallo, one particular occasion stood out. On Oct. 7, 1995, Pope John Paul II led prayers at St. Patrick’s while visiting New York.
Mr. Peragallo was there too, perched high in the pipes under the gallery’s rose window, nervous as a cat but ready for anything.


Come si può vedere, l'articolo è corposo ed oltre ad illustrare e celebrare ampiamente la figura di questo organaro fornisce anche molte notizie sia sull'organo della Cattedrale che sul funzionamento dell'organo in generale; tutto questo ci dimostra quanto questo strumento sia tenuto in considerazione nella società statunitense e quanta attenzione ci sia, laggiù, nei confronti del mondo dell'organo.
Non staremo qui a commentare ulteriormente ed a lamentarci ancora del fatto che un simile articolo qui in Italia non lo leggeremo mai; è sintomatico però considerare che la Cattedrale di San Patrizio di New York è una chiesa cattolica e, pertanto, appartenente a quella stessa Chiesa che qui in Italia l'organo lo penalizza in ogni modo, togliendogli spazio, dignità e possibilità di espressione. Ma quello è il "Nuovo Mondo"... e, come si dice, est modus in rebus.



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