Christ Lutheran Church established an Organ Task Force in March of 2004, to determine what could be done with our 65 year old pipe organ, which was beginning to show its age. Members included Dick Faust, Diane Houck, Derrick Houck, Marg Mason, Joan Murphy, John Murphy, Charles Orner, Minister of Music Joseph DiCindio, and Chairman Rich Maurer.

We had our first meeting in June 2004 and discussed 4 options:  1) to refurbish and repair the existing organ, 2) replace the existing organ with a new pipe organ, 3) replace the existing organ with an all digital organ or 4) replace our existing organ, refurbish our existing pipes and add some additional pipes and digital components to give us a combination of pipe and digital.

During the above process, we met with several organ companies and visited churches to see and hear various installations and speak with those involved with the organ installation.  As we listened to these instruments we began to narrow our choices and ruled out repairing our old organ or purchasing a new pipe organ because in our opinion, these were not practical choices.

We retained the services of a consultant, Rudy Lucente to help us finalize our decision.  Rudy is the organist at Corpus Christi Church in Lansdale in addition to a concert organist.  Upon further discussion of the Task Force and Rudy, it was decided that a digital instrument met our needs and the Walker Technical Company of Zionsville, Pa would be the builder.  Walker has traveled extensively recording sounds from the world’s best pipe organs.  These recordings are then transferred onto micro chips which are used to produce the sound rather than an actual pipe.  The proposed all digital organ will have 3 manuals, pedals and contain 63 ranks and cost approximately $105,000.  The console will be movable and match the existing wood finish in the sanctuary.

On June 3, 2007 at a special congregational meeting, our above proposal was unanimously agreed upon and we were directed to move forward with this project as follows: