People around the world watched in horror as the iconic Notre Dame Cathedral burns in Paris.
One of the items inside the cathedral that musical community worried about was the historic 8,000-pipe organ, which was built in the 1730s by François Thierry and expanded in the 1860s by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll.
Following fears over the fate of Notre-Dame’s iconic instrument, Emmanuel Gregoire, deputy mayor of Paris, said that the historic organ of Notre Dame has survived the conflagration. But the level of damage, due to the intense heat inside the cathedral, needed to be evaluated.
Organ builder Bertrand Cattiaux told the New York Times that damaged portions of the organ appeared restorable and that none of the pipes had collapsed.
The news is a relief for music lovers in mourning around the world, as the organ is one of the world’s most famous and biggest organs. we can thankfully look forward to hearing the angelic music created on such an extraordinary instrument in the future.
This instrument had survived two world wars, including a couple of bombs that hit the cathedral during the first.
Here, One of the finest concert organists in the world “Olivier Latry” playing the great Notre Dame organ.
