Nitsua American Vox Seraphique French? Voix Seraphique French?

The Nitsua was invented by the Austin firm of Hartford, Connecticut, USA, and first used in their opus 481 in the Strand Theatre, New York City in 1914. As the story goes, it was invented as a joke by Basile G. Austin: “Nitsua” is “Austin” spelled backwards. It is made of small-scaled inverted conical open metal pipes. Its tone has been described as soft, broad, warm, and slightly keen, similar to the Dolcan but more string-like.

According to Allen Miller, Austin also used the name Vox Seraphique for this stop. This name has also been used by Moller and Pilcher; it is not known whether they are similar to Austin's stop.

Examples

All known examples are given below.

Nitsua 8'?, String Division; Irvine Auditorium, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA; Austin 1926.

Nitsua 8'?; Bethesda-by-the-Sea, Palm Beach, Florida, USA; Austin 1999?

Nitsua II 8', Antiphonal Great; Christ Church of Oak Brook, Oak Brook, Illinois, USA; Austin. (This citation has not been confirmed.)

Nitsua 8'; John M. Green Hall, Smith College, Northampton, Massachusetts, USA; Austin.

Voix Seraphique 8', Orchestral; Portland City Hall, Portland, Maine, USA; Austin 1912.

Voix Seraphique II 8', Swell; St. Matthew's Lutheran Church, Hanover, Pennsylvania, USA; Austin 1925.

Vox Seraphique 8', Echo; St. Mary's Cathedral Basilica, Galveston, Texas, USA; Pilcher 1928.

Voix Seraphique II 8', Celestial; Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Buffalo, New York, USA; Moller 1986.

Bibliography