Paul Gregson plays the organ while Linda dances with organ restorer Roger !

A man whose cat taught him to play the pipe organ has answered the prayers of parishioners at St Luke’s in Torver.

After happening across the broken 1899 organ at a funeral last January, engineer Roger Mallinson has spent the last 9 months contorted behind the console fixing it.

77-year-old Mr Mallinson is a well-known character around Windermere in his 1958 Austin 7 with his Alsatian Whappet riding at this side. He’s restored many steam boats and even built his own pipe organ at home, an organ he credits his cat Mr Moses with teaching him how to play by batting his hand every time he hit a bum note: “It was amazing, he was incredibly accurate!”

Vicar at St Luke’s Tim Harmer said they hadn’t been able to afford to restore the organ so Mr Mallinson’s help was “the answer to their prayers”.

Here’s Mr Mallinson having a celebratory waltz with the church warden as Royalty Cinema organist Paul Gregson breaths life into the pipes.

It’ll be officially launched at a concert this Sunday, Apr 26, with Claire Alsop, a friend of Mr Mallinson’s who usually plays the biggest church organ in Britain at St Mary’s in Bristol.

Tim Harmer, Vicar of St. Luke’s Church with Roger Maillinson who restored the organ

Video and write-up  courtesy of BBC Radio Cumbria and photograph above courtesy of Westmoreland Gazette