Edition: U.S. / Global

Building 'Tracker' Organ Is Focus of Film on 13

By John Rockwell
Published: June 5, 1987

''In the 18th century, the tracker organ was the most complex machine assembled by Western man.'' That arresting thought comes from an hourlong documentary to be shown tonight at 10 on Channel 13 entitled ''The Wind at One's Fingertips.'' The subject is a Nebraska organ builder, Gene R. Bedient, and the yearslong process by which he and his crew of craftsmen researched, designed, built and installed an 18th-century, French-style, tracker-action organ at St. Mark's Church in Grand Rapids, Mich.

Tracker organs differ from more modern instruments in being entirely mechanical, with the depression of a key or pedal directly activating a sequence of wires and levers to open the wind-chest and provide air to a particular pipe, thus allowing it to ''speak,'' in organists' parlance.

Since the 18th century, all manner of ''improvements'' have compromised the purity of the tracker-action organs, most of them electrical. But as part of the early-music authenticity movement of this century, organists began a few decades ago to rediscover tracker organs, which they felt provided a more direct and subtle contact with the actual sound of the instrument.

There is an inherent fascination in watching the patient construction of any complex artistic object, capped by the thrill of its final realization.

This documentary, which was produced and written by Gene Bunge, senior producer of the Nebraska ETV Network, operates at an earnest but considerably lower level. The script uses too much organ jargon and fails to provide basic information - above all, just what distinguished French Baroque organs from the more familiar German variety. And with all due respect to Mr. Bedient, the whole program seems an advertisement for his business.

Still, the satisfaction the craftsmen derive from their work is uplifting, and the sound of the result of their labors provides its own justification.