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Finding a real organ to practice can be cumbersome: it can be located quite far from your home and not always be available. Are there alternatives that allow one to practice at home (especially the pedals)? I was thinking of a keyboard with MIDI pedals: does it exist and is it expensive?

Edit: In particular, I am interested in a 2-octave pedal range, little DIY, and compact (apartment).

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    Googling for "midi organ pedals" will turn up alternatives from Hammond, Nord, and others.
    – Bruce Fields
    Commented Feb 21, 2017 at 17:02
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    Short compass (1 or 2 octave) straight "electronic organ" pedal boards are relatively cheap - even free if you salvage one from a scrapped instrument. But a standard 30 or 32 note radial board isn't cheap, and is also quite big and heavy (some weigh close to 50 Kg or 100 pounds), won't necessarily fit under your existing manual keyboards at home, and you will probably need a proper bench as well. But most "traditional" organ builders now supply keyboards and pedal boards wired for MIDI, so that is the easiest part of the problem to deal with.
    – user19146
    Commented Feb 21, 2017 at 17:30

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I've seen organ pedalboards attached to a piano. Thank goodness we now have electric keyboards which can easily emulate a multi-manual organ and its pedals. If you want a 'RCO spec radiating & concave' pedalboard, it's going to cost you, I'm afraid. But for a real enthusiast, a full organ console with pedalboard is not THAT expensive. Here's Viscount Organs. You probably paid more for your car. And it's difficult to kill anyone with an organ. Get one instead!

http://viscountorgans.net/

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It'll depend on whether you need to play one octave pedals,straight, or more, radials. Some time ago, I used the pedalboard from an oldish Hammond two manual + 1 octave pedals, and re-wired them to make a separate pedal 'manual'. This was then MIDId through whatever synth I fancy, and works well. I guess you could find a two octave pedalboard if needed, and do the same. Got to say, it was a nice little project, and works well - there's also a Nanobass synth that fits with it, for a plethora of bass sounds.And a darn sight cheaper than those advertised...

Any synth or workstation will do the manual job for you, as they generally have the organ touch, so for not a lot, you could set yourself up with one/two manuals and the pedals below. And loads and loads of other sounds, apart from the inevitable (and gorgeous) Hammond sounds.

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  • Does it always involve DIY electronics etc? I am more looking for a quick, compact solution.
    – Karlo
    Commented Feb 21, 2017 at 17:55
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    Hardly elecronics - more a soldering exercise. The cheapest cheerful way would be to find two manual with pedals, pre-loved. Virtually being given away these days. Plug and play!
    – Tim
    Commented Feb 22, 2017 at 7:12
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There is a man called jan veen in the Netherlands who made a churchorgan system which is very capable of replacing a real organ for a fraction of the money.

Youtube Jan Veen organ

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    We prefer to have answers that have some detail in them. Can you add in some of the details of what components Jan Veen used to make his system?
    – Todd Wilcox
    Commented Feb 22, 2017 at 15:55

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