More than 200 people attended a birthday party in Kilwinning Old Parish Church – for the church organ.

The pipe organ in the Ayrshire church, which is 120 years old this year, has been given Grade 1 status by the British Institute of Organ Studies, which rates it as “important to national heritage and deserving of careful preservation for the benefit of future generations”.

Organist Jim Walsingham said: “The best present we can give this organ is to ensure it continues to be played, to ensure it continues to be heard and to ensure it continues to bring people together for another 120 years”.

Janey Grier, a member of what is known locally at the Abbey Church, said the birthday party on October 1 was a “fantastic” event.

“Our message on the night was about how we are brought together by the music our organ produces, the singing it energises, in happy and sad times,” she added.

“We had people in the audience who were married with this organ playing and many of us had been consoled by it at the funerals of loved ones.”

The party featured a choir, string quartet, a Name that Tune feature and an organ shaped cake.

The organ was built by Forster and Andrews of Hull in 1897, and cost £750 – the equivalent of £100,000 today.