SKRABL IN THE UK
December 2007
It was inevitable that with the accession of the ten new member states into the EEC in 2004 that some would bring with them a fresh outlook, attitude and new skills in their approach to organ building. Many of the new entrant countries enjoy more than their fair share of new church building and the requirement for new organs in all of the new member states is substantial and covers every denomination and every shade of approach towards choral and congregational music.

Each country unquestionably follows its own traditions and whilst it is dangerous to generalize, the nearer the new entrants are to the old Soviet zone, the less enlightened seem to be their outlook towards contemporary organ building. Some of the old J S Bach stomping grounds indeed seem to be the most backward looking and some of the larger and more prestigious names who had dominated organ building in the Czech Republic for instance were very evidently still living in the past. Huge factories are still in operation but part closed off and with very few staff in evidence. Certainly there is nothing spectacular to show of their current work.

Slovenia however becomes the oyster. There is no shortage of imaginative new and impressive church building and the one organ builder who has almost monopolized Slovenian organ building was the pearl and the enterprise of just one man. Anton Skrabl. He had entered organ building in the traditional way with a Meister Brief from the Organ Building School in Ludwigsburg and an apprenticeship from a significant German Organ Builder. Skrabl is progressive, enthusiastic, conscientious and has robustly defended all the historical traditions that accompany the best modern development.

In the past ten years he has rebuilt and enlarged an already sizeable factory three times and now, with fifty five employees, a six acre site and an assembly shop that can accommodate around three substantial organs at a time, the Skrabl factory must surely rank amongst the largest factories in Europe, if not in the world. Every aspect of this huge factory is impressive. His machine shop is equipped with the very latest CNC controlled and newly acquired equipment. His metal casting shop has what must be the largest planing machine in the world with a diameter of nearly three metres. He casts pipe metal seven metres in length with thicknessing controlled at every stage and with CNC equipment specially designed for the job. The material is vacuum lifted, rolled and stored with its tin content and its thickness regulated and noted at every stage. Most is for their own consumption but some is sold on to the trade. His timber store is brand new, huge, and fully stocked with woods from every quarter of the globe.

Last year they completed seventeen major new organs. They do not even count the smaller ones or the ones they make as a series, box organs etc. and a visit last September with a party from England saw three major organs being assembled prior to delivery in a few weeks time. One had over a hundred Stops.

The soundboards are entirely traditional but a high degree of CNC planning goes into the layout and the entire construction is supervised by what must be the highest degree of computer design and control imaginable. Visitors to the factory take with them drawings and photographs of their own Church and leave with a selection of suggested designs superimposed on their drawings any of which could be used as a basis for their own scheme.

Add to all this the economies that flow from large scale production and their enthusiasm to compete competitively in any new market place means they have become a force to be reckoned with and it is hardly surprising therefore, given that their current costs are substantially less than elsewhere in Europe, that visitors leave impressed. This is traditional organ building at a fraction of the cost that is usually expected from a quality organ builder. No wonder they are busy.