Listen: An artist resurrected Mount Auburn Cemetery's defunct pipe organ

A decommissioned pipe organ has been given a second life at Mount Auburn Cemetery by artist-in-residence Eden Rayz.

It all started back in 2022, when a friend told her the cemetery's massive, once-majestic instrument was being deaccessioned. He asked the composer if she wanted it.

"At a drop of a hat, I said, yes," Rayz recalled. "And I had not the foggiest of what I was going to do with hundreds of pieces of what was the Bigelow Chapel's Hook and Hastings 1924 pipe organ in my living room."

A revelation came after Rayz, who's also a cellist, began to ponder: "'What if I created a new instrument from these pipes that sounded nothing like a pipe organ?'" She said she was not initially entirely clear on what it would sound like. "But what I did know is that it would be new to anyone who heard it."

She described coming up with "a bit of a Franken instrument," using several nearly 8-foot long pipes, electronics and amplification. Rayz named her creation "Argent and Sable." She will premiere a 30-minute work with it on Saturday, May 18th titled "Lux Aeterna."

In addition to the new instrument's ethereal, sometimes harsh sounds, Rayz will play live cello along with percussionist Austin Birdy. The piece is part of "Reborn," a program celebrating what would've been the historic organ's 100th anniversary.

The two concerts take place 1 p.m. and 6 p.m. inside Mount Auburn Cemetery's Bigelow Chapel.