By Teino Evans, Staff Reporter
McBean, who is currently a substitute organist, has accompanied local choirs such as The Methodist Chorale, The National Chorale and The St. Andrew Singers, among others.
- Contributed
MANY JAMAICANS have pursued studies abroad, but very few would have ventured as far outside of the conventional 'doctor and lawyer'as Dwight McBean. He spent five and a half years in England, learning to tune and repair pianos and pipe organs.
McBean was trained by the prestigious and well-established royal organ builders J.W. Walker and Sons Limited of Brandon Suffolk, England. Upon completion of the course, McBean attained a City and Guilds Certificate in piano tuning and repairs from the London College of Furniture. He also earned a certificate in the servicing and installation of Rodgers Computerised Organs in Oregon, U.S.A.
In 1988, when McBean returned to Jamaica, he established his own small business, offering his services as an organ and piano technician for the Caribbean.
According to McBean, "It was out of sheer frustration" that he was driven to learn about pipe organs and how to fix and maintain them.
When he was 12, McBean, who had been learning to play the piano, attended a concert at the St. Andrew's Scots Kirk United Church (in Kingston), where he first heard the pipe organ being played by Jennifer Bate, a British woman. McBean said he had never heard music sounding so wonderful and when he got home that evening he told his mother that he wanted to take organ lessons.
Having reached grade seven in his organ lessons, McBean said he was required to take an examination set and administered by the Royal School of Music, based in England. However, though the examiner would travel to different Caribbean countries to examine students, McBean was unable to find a pipe organ in Kingston that was in a suitable working condition.
It was at that time, that McBean made the decision to learn how to service and repair pipe organs, as most of those in Jamaica were in deplorable condition. The reason for this, McBean said, was that here was no one in Jamaica who could service and repair the instruments.
"The original builders of pipe organs in the Caribbean, (J.W. Walker and Sons) used to send persons out once per year to the Caribbean to repair and tune pipe organs," McBean said. In the interval between visits, the organs would deteriorate considerably.
NECESSARY SKILLS
With McBean properly trained and in business, he says the representatives from J.W. Walker and Sons only come to the Caribbean to do major repairs and total rebuilding, as he has now taken up the mantle of servicing and repairing pipe organs in Jamaica and the wider Caribbean.
McBean served as Caribbean agent for Walkers for six years and was appointed the Jamaican dealer for Rodgers Instrument Corporation of Oregon, USA, in 1991.
His job requires some basic skills. "You can't be tone deaf to service them (pipe organs)," McBean says. It is also always to your advantage when you already know how to play the instrument. McBean also pointed out that repairing a pipe organ requires "a combination of woodworking and electrical skills".
The job, he says, can become frustrating at times as he gets a lot of hassle from airport security and other security checkpoints when he travels to Caribbean countries to do his job. This is largely because of the type of tools that he has to travel with.
"Many of them (tools) are unusual," McBean says, as he described one of them as being "a long, flat piece of metal called a toning knife that I use to tone the metal pipes in the organ."
MUSIC CAREER
McBean, who is currently a substitute organist, has accompanied local choirs such as The Methodist Chorale, The National Chorale and The St. Andrew Singers, among others. He has also performed as a solo artist at several organ recitals throughout Jamaica and the Caribbean.
He was also the organist for the State funeral of former Prime Minister of Jamaica, The Rt. Hon. Michael Manley, and was the official accompanist at the gala concert held at the Ward Theatre in February 2000, in the presence of His Royal Highness, The Prince of Wales.
McBean says he hopes to see a concert hall built in Jamaica before he dies. "We really need it, as we have a lot of talented classical musicians in Jamaica and most of them have gone abroad because there is nothing here to keep them."
For now, McBean says classical concerts are held in churches and chapel halls and sometimes these places have their own agendas, sometimes resulting in date clashes. Also, McBean points out that the organs used in churches, were not built for concerts or for playing classical organ music, but "mainly just to accompany singing." From a musician's perspective, there is a vast difference.
Currently, McBean plays with the Stella Maris Steel Band and says he may learn how to tune steel pans. "There is no one in Jamaica that can tune steel pans; we would have to get someone from Trinidad," he said.
McBean also hopes to expand his business, tuning most of the important grand pianos throughout Jamaica, such as the Concert Grand Piano at the Ward Theatre, as well as continue to service pipe organs throughout the Caribbean.
So far, Dwight McBean has successfully installed 22 Rodgers computerised organs in Jamaica.
