An Automatic Organ for the Pope: Mechanized Music and the Catholic Church in Twentieth-Century Italy.

A letter by Don Celso Morassi, pastor of Cleulis of Paluzza (Udine), to Barbieri from 22 November 1941 confirms the growth: "you talked to me about the need to increase your factory of pipe organs and automatic organs, to increase staff and machines, given the increase in orders in recent times."[62] Assuming average sales of fifteen automatic organs per year, as stated earlier, an estimated 150 Barbieri machines were sold between 1931 and 1941. Reprinted in Barbieri, I Auto-organo Barbieri 1931-1933 i , 12, 29-34 and 38; and I Auto-organo Barbieri 1933-1934 i , 2. 50 Nidasio, "L'autoorgano nella liturgia e una prova sorprendente", 14. 51 I La Diocesi di San Bassiano - Bollettino Diocesano i 7, 1940, 114-15. Information on the characteristics and merits of the automatic organ Barbieri created for the Pope can be gleaned from a signed letter by Armando Antonelli to Barbieri of 8 November 1947, the day after the inauguration of the I auto-organo i at Saint Anne. This part of the automatic organ is identical for all types of organs and can be accommodated in a small mobile case or in the console.... The organ interface consists of devices which are different for each type of organ played.[19] Barbieri had chosen a difficult market for his machines. [Extracted from the article]