Cebu’s Pipe Organs

Unknowingly, Cebu is home to priceless treasures just waiting to be restored - pipe organs. The Philippines inherited from the Spaniards quite a number of pipe organs, located in churches all over the country. In Cebu, churches with pipe organs include the Church of San Miguel in Argao (which is said to be older than the 180-year-old Bamboo Organ) and the Church of Patrocinio de Maria in Boljoon (built during the 18th century). However, both pipe organs badly need restoration

The pipe organ based at the Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral is Cebu’s latest and biggest one so far, with 1,200 tin alloy and wood pipes encased in narra, calantas, and tanguile wood from the Philippines and almaciga wood from Brazil. It has two keyboards (called manuals) with 56 keys each, 21 stops (knobs controlling the passage of air to a particular set of pipes), and one blower (the air source).

First presented to the Cebuanos in 1996, it was built by the Diego Cera Organbuilders, the first Filipino pipe organbuilding company which designs, constructs, and maintains pipe organs in the tradition of Fray Diego Cera of the 1800s who built the famous Bamboo Organ of Las Piñas.

As a cathedral, or the seat of the Archbishop, the Cebu Metropolitan Cathedral deserves no less than a good organ, the instrument proper for liturgical celebrations. However, the pipe organ is rarely heard as it is only played during masses celebrated by the Archbishop himself.

There already was an old organ at the Cebu Cathedral (date unknown), inaugurated by a foreigner, Fr. Bacalcoa. The old organ was, however, not maintained and was even more damaged when the organ was improperly dismantled during the renovation of the cathedral in 1992. What was left of the old organ was a stop (a knob controlling the air to a particular set of pipes), which is being incorporated to the new one.