Henry Willis & Sons

Henry Willis & Sons is a British firm of pipe organ builders founded in 1845 in London at 2 & 1/2 Foundling Terrace, Gray's Inn Road. Although most of their installations have been in the UK, examples can be found in other countries. Five generations of the Willis family served as principals of the firm until 1997 when Henry Willis 4 appointed David Wyld as Managing Director, who subsequently became the majority shareholder. From London, the firm had moved to a purpose-built works, designed by Henry Willis III, at Petersfield. After acquisition by David Wyld, the firm re-located to its present base and head office in Liverpool.

The founder of the company, the eponymous Henry Willis, was nicknamed "Father Willis" because of his contribution to the art and science of organ building and to distinguish him from his younger relatives working in the firm.

He was a friend of Samuel Sebastian Wesley whom he met at Cheltenham, and who was instrumental in gaining for Willis the contract for his first work on a cathedral organ, at Gloucester, in 1847. This was largely restoration of an existing instrument, but Willis always claimed that it was the success of this early work which established his reputation.

The Willis firm is regarded as the leading organ builder of the Victorian era, itself a time when both civic and religious commitment led to the construction of a large number of impressive buildings and other public works. During the Industrial Revolution many towns equipped themselves with imposing town halls, preferably with a Willis instrument of the symphonic organ style, and a substantial (and similarly equipped) church. Industrialists competed to endow the most lavish halls and instruments. The result was a convergence of both a very fine and technically proficient organ builder, and a substantial number of commissions for really exceptional instruments. This heritage continues with recent new instruments in Florence (Italy) and Auckland (New Zealand).

Famous "Father" Willis organs include those installed at St Paul's Cathedral in London, Lincoln Cathedral, Salisbury Cathedral, Truro Cathedral and Glasgow Metropolitan Cathedral, but there are many more including those at the cathedrals in Aberdeen (St Machar's Cathedral), Calcutta, Canterbury, Carlisle, Coventry (destroyed in the WW II bombing of the original Cathedral), Durham, Edinburgh (St Mary's Episcopal Cathedral), Exeter, Glasgow Cathedral (the High Kirk of Glasgow), Gloucester, Hereford, St Davids (Pembrokeshire, Wales), Wells and Winchester, as well as examples at St George's church, Gateshead,St Peter's, Brighton, St Mary's Church, Southampton, Giggleswick School, Felsted School and the Old High Church in Inverness. St Michael and all Angels, Croydon boasts a "Father" Willis built and installed in 1882 with additions by Noel Mander in 1955. The 1887 "Father" Willis pipe organ at Beckwithshaw Church is still in use.

...
Wikipedia