Did you know that the Las Piñas Bamboo Organ was declared to be a National Cultural Treasure?
Yes that is right! This was declared dated March 11, 2004 that is because of its uniqueness and significance.
Yes that is right! This was declared dated March 11, 2004 that is because of its uniqueness and significance.
The Bamboo organ can be found in Las Piñas at St. Joseph Parish Church. The organ is of a 19th century kind which is entirely made of bamboo. This musical instrument was made of 1,031 pipes, 902 of which are made out of bamboo and the rest are of metal.
The man behind this great invention is Fray Diego Cera Dela Virgen Del Carmel. He is a catholic parish priest of the Augustinian Recollects. He is a native of Spain and served as the priest of Las Piñas dated 1795 until 1830. As historians say Fr. Cera is a man gifted with a lot of talent, he is a natural scientist, architect, chemist, a great community leader and most of all an organist and builder.
He had chosen Bamboo for the organ since Bamboo is practically abundant and can be use for a lot of things. He had encountered a problem with the trumpet part of the organ that is why he had to use some metals for it which the trumpet stops are made of.
He began to work on the organ at the year of 1816 in which that time the church was also on construction. By the time the church was completely done it was also the time when the organ is playable at the year 1821. Since Fr. Cera had some problems with the trumpet stops because he used metal for it the bamboo organ was completed at the year 1824.
Disasters, earthquakes and typhoons were the main reason why the organ and the church was damaged. Fr. Cera himself was also the first to do some restoration of the organ but for the passing years the organ ended up no longer working as natural disasters take its toll on the church and the instrument. Some partial restoration was made from time to time to the church until the World War II. There were a lot of attempts made to restore the organ but everything seemed to failed until the year 1972 when a contract was granted to Johannes Klais Orgelbau KG for total restoration. He is from Bonn, Germany and later the organ was also shipped there in the year 1973.
While the organ was undergoing restoration in Germany a massive change is also being done in Las Piñas Church. With the help of the community and its neighboring area the grounds and structure of the church was restored to its original state. To help them is architect Francisco ”Bobby” Manosa and partner Ludwig Alvarez at the year 1971 until 1975.
The Bamboo organ at the year 1975 safely returned to its homeland. People from the Philippines were happy and welcomed the most treasured instrument. Since then a lot of concerts and festivals in the church has been made. The bamboo organ as international organ masters noted that it is the finest old organs in the world.
As of today the organ has under gone overhaul in the year 2003 of September until 2004 of November. The European trained organ builders “Diego Cera Organbuilders, Inc. is tasked for the future maintenance that will be done to the organ so that future generations will still be able to hear this one of a kind unique musical instrument.
