John Compton

John Haywood Compton (1876–1957) was an English pipe organ builder. His business based in Nottingham and London flourished between 1902 and 1965.

Life John Compton was born in Newton Burgoland, Leicestershire, England on 20 June 1876. He was an apprentice with Halmshaw & Sons in Birmingham. In 1898, he joined Brindley and Foster in Sheffield. Then he joined Charles Lloyd in Nottingham.

He set up the business of Musson & Compton in 1902 in Nottingham with James Frederick Musson. The partnership was dissolved in 1904. In 1919, the business moved to workshops at Turnham Green Terrace in Chiswick, London, which had been vacated by August Gern. He occupied a new factory at Chase Road in Park Royal, North Acton, London in 1930.

Compton worked primarily on electric-action pipe organs and electronic organs. His first electronic instrument was the Melotone, a solo voice added to theatre organs, followed by the Theatrone. The Electrone, an electrostatic tonewheel instrument introduced in 1938, evolved out of research by Leslie Bourn, an association begun in the 1920s. The business continued under the direction of Taylor, who died the next year. The business was wound up around 1965. The pipe organ department was sold to Rushworth and Dreaper and the electronic department became Makin Organs. Elite Picture Theatre, Nottingham, 1930 Chapel Cranleigh School Surrey, 1930. Eight ranks, three manuals. Lasted until 1978. Verifiable on NPOR site. Church of St Osmund, Parkstone, 1931 Downside Abbey, 1931 St. Mary Magdelene's Church, Paddington, 1932 Church of St Edmund the King and Martyr, Lombard Street, London, 1932 BBC Theatre Organ Broadcasting House, London, 1932 Broadway Theatre, Catford, 1932 (contemporaneously, a music hall) Plaza Cinema, Stockport, 1932 O2 Forum Kentish Town, 1934 St Luke's Church, Chelsea, 1932 Odeon Cinema, Weston-super-Mare, 1935 St. Benedict's Priory, Ealing, 1935 East Church of St Nicholas, Aberdeen, 1936 Southampton Guildhall, 1936 Regent Street Cinema, London, 1936 St. George's Hall, London, second BBC Theatre Organ, 1936 Maida Vale Studios, third BBC Theatre Organ, 1936 Odeon Cinema, Leicester Square, 1937 Emmanuel United Reformed Church, Worthing, 1937 (formerly St Columba's Presbyterian Church) Savoy Cinema, Lincoln 1937 Wolverhampton Civic Hall, 1938 Methodist Mission, Great Yarmouth, 1938 St John's Cathedral, Salford, 1938 Church House, Westminster, 1939 Christchurch Priory, 1951 St Eugene's Cathedral, Derry, 1956 St Bride's Church, London, 1957 St George's Cathedral, Southwark, 1958 St Alban's Golders Green, London Bablake School, Coventry Westover (now ABC) Cinema, Bournemouth, c.1937 Astoria Cinema, Pokesdown, c.1930s (The last two organs are unconfirmed, but their existence is attested to by local documentary sources; the Westover instrument is now in private hands at Ryde on the Isle of Wight; the Astoria instrument no longer exists.)

Southern Grammar School for Boys, Portsmouth, c. 1957 Portsmouth Guildhall, 1959 St.Alban's Holborn, 1961

Rebuilds and restorations Holy Trinity Church, Hull, 1938 Holy Trinity Church, Exmouth, 1953 Christ Church Pennington, Leigh, 1953 Kinema in the Woods (formerly at the Super Cinema, Charing Cross Road, London, February 1928) St Catherine, Bearwood, Wokingham, Berkshire ,1952 (NPOR A00449) Tower Hill Methodist Church, Hessle, 2001 (formerly at Oxted United Reformed Church, Surrey) St Mark's, Portsmouth, 1955, later moved to St Edmund's, Southampton in 1969