Green, Samuel

1740-1796

The most celebrated organ-builder of his time; was for a while in partnership with a man named Byfield, under whose father and others he had learned organ-building. He later carried on the business alone. His organs were famous, not only in England but elsewhere, for their superior quality of tone and the important improvement in their mechanism, introduced by Green. This is known as the Venetian swell, and though crude in comparison with the modern means of securing a real crescendo, the basic principle is the same; and the organ tone was for the first time relieved from monotony, and made more expressive. One writer states that Green erected more organs for cathedrals than any other builder before or since, and mentions seven cathedrals, including Canterbury and Salisbury, twelve London churches and chapels, and more than twenty provincial towns in which they stand. He also exported some instruments, notably, one to St. Petersburg, and one to Kingston, Jamaica.