Truncated "W"

[altivo]

But still tiring. Took the afternoon to go investigate an old electronic theatre organ that may be available and then sit in on Gary's regular Wednesday group session. I played flute and was a bit non-plused when folks started referring to me as "James Galway" about halfway through the session. Mind, I'm probably above average for an amateur, and I've played that instrument for over 50 years, but I'm certainly no professional.

Then to work where I was frustrated to find that swapping out the power supply did not revive the machine that failed last week due to what seemed to be a fan freeze-up. It still doesn't even try to boot. The power LED just blinks yellow instead of turning green, and that's all that happens. Either it really is toast, though I'm quite sure it never overheated, or it's only good for parts.

The organ turned out to be a bit of a mixed bag thing. It's a good instrument, and the price is right. It will cost me more to have it moved than it will to acquire it. Unfortunately, it weighs enough that I think professional movers should be called. It has some issues, but none appear to be showstoppers. The worst is a whole arc of apparently dead stop tablets in the solo division, but for a whole group to have completely failed at once suggests a fairly simple problem that can be resolved if I can get a service manual.

The real fly in the soup though is the relative of the present owner who showed up while I was there and suggested that he might want to take the organ. Of course he gets precedence if he decides he wants it, which is fair enough I guess. But it was obvious that the guy does not play keyboards, knows nothing about pianos and organs, and was either just looking to pre-empt me for his own reasons or else was looking for a prestigious piece of furniture (which this one is not, at least to anyone in the know.) He was debating between the upright piano and the organ, saying he wanted one of them for his kids, who are apparently quite young. I wanted to tell him that kids who are seven or eight years old right now are not going to be interested in theatre organ, or probably even piano. That the music they want to play lends itself to guitars and maybe an occasional wind instrument, rather than to pianos or organs. I refrained from that and just pointed out to him a couple of the major flaws that are going to require repair. If, as I suspect, he's really just looking for furniture to fit in a specific place in his house, then he'll still take it. Oh well.

Comments

[baphnedia.livejournal.com]

I wouldn't put bets on what kids want to play. I'm still kind of 'meh' that my sister wouldn't let her daughter start playing the violin - heck, I even gave up one of mine so there'd be an instrument in the house.

But, I never realized, after all this time, that you play the flute! O.O

[equusmaximus.livejournal.com]

I love theatre organs, I just wish I knew how to play them! Back in Calgary, one of the smaller local theatres used to have "Silent Movie Mondays" in February, and they'd borrow this massive white theatre organ from Mount Royal College and have this incredible organist come up from the USA to play it. I don't remember his name off-hand, but I have the progams from the shows so I'm sure I could find out.

I have a little two-manual Lowrey organ that someone was giving away a few years ago. I can piddle around with it, and I can do a half-decent rendition of "The Saints Go Marching In" (which is the first and easiest lesson in the book that came with it) but not much more. It's a little depressing, given that in my youth I played Piano, French Horn, and the Bagpipes!

I wish my parents had been a little more insistant on my practicing and playing. It seems that kids don't really appreciate music until they're older, and they hate having to practice. I suppose it helps if one is brought up in a "musical" family, but that seems to be a rarity these days. The kidling is taking lessons on acoustic guitar, and he appears to be enjoying the lessons themsevles, but getting him to practice is like pulling hen's teeth.

[bladehorse.livejournal.com]

Usually the lack of sound from keys, or slidebars,stops is just a matter of opening the stack of keys up and taking an eraser to the copper strips, and key wires, Same goes for the stops. If a whole section went out , most likely its a chewed thru wire from a mouse, or it rubbing on the tremmelo/lesle drum. At least if its a bad component, there easilly replaced 1/4 watt units. I have a 3 tier at my dads house that I used to play great. Im sure its alittle stiff these days having not been touched in 15 years. It sorta sucks, being I want to play, but my right hand is soo screwed up, I cant anymore. Im still trying to talk colty into wanting it.
On other notes, we do have a pump organ at the house, yet it needs a reed for I believe middle 'c' :p the rest works great, tho the pedalling is a real workout to run it.

[keeganfox.livejournal.com]

I can usually get the CD in the player correctly.

[flamekist.livejournal.com]

I can't help but wonder if that relative conveniently showed up when he did in order to try to get you to offer more money for the organ.

We used to have a pizza place called the Excelsior Mill, so named because that's what it used to be. Still had a lot of the old machinery in it. But with the conversion to a pizza place, the owner had installed a gigantic organ that took up an entire wall. I forget the name of the organ, but it was impressive as hell. Friday and Saturdays nights the place was packed while an organist played for hours.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Admittedly, there are exceptions and I could be wrong. Theirs is a musical family to some extent and the parents operated a folk music venue out of their house, coffee house style, for decades. Now the widowed patriarch wants to sell the place, and it's loaded to the gills with musical instruments. He's selling some, giving some away. It's conceivable that the grandkids have wider tastes in music than I guessed, but I think it unlikely from my experience. In any case, I'd start an 8-year-old on the piano, not the organ. Not just because that's what I had to do myself, but because the more demanding keyboard technique of the piano builds better habits and discipline.

I really can't complain if this falls through. I was offered the instrument for free if I'd pay moving costs to get it out of there. Apparently he has made similar offers several times and no one has followed through, so for the son to suddenly show up and want an option on it is, well, a bit odd. I'm an unrelated outsider and received the offer just because I know the regular caretaker of the place. I have an organ at home already, but it's in rough shape due to electrical problems and doesn't sound as good as this one.

Yep. I flute, among other things. The flute was my second instrument, after piano, but I'm probably better on flute with keyboards coming second. I can also play the accordion, acoustic guitar to some extent, and (for the Baroque purist) the recorders. I failed at brass, but could do clarinet and oboe if I worked on them. I wouldn't let you hear me play the violin, though I did take lessons with aspirations toward country and Irish style fiddling.

The theatre organ is my real love, and I'm only approaching the level where I'd feel worthy to touch a real one in a real auditorium, though I've aspired to that since I was about ten years old. Obviously I have something of a passion for the music of the big bands and the 20th century movie palaces.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

You can't make them practice. It just doesn't work. Either they want to play or they don't. Keep an ear on what the teacher says. Even when I was skipping practice sessions, I got through the lessons and kept the teachers happy. As long as that's happening, it's good.

With any instrument, there's a steep learning curve at the beginning. Somewhere, though, you pass a threshold and it becomes a joyful experience instead of drudgery. Until you reach that point, things go by fits and starts usually.

The same rules apply to you, yourself. You're not too old to play that organ or whatever instrument you choose, but you have to push through that wall of resistance. XD

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Playing a keyboard could be excellent therapy for regaining more use of those fingers.

Yeah, I suspect that the stoprail problem is something like that. My Wurlitzer has tabs that push a contact against a grounding bus to activate the desired stop. For an entire row to be dead, it seems most likely that the grounding bus is broken, dislocated, or disconnected. But I'll have to get into the cabinet to find that out. One organ tech has already told me that in these old Gulbransens there are daughter boards that plug into a mother board and they have a tendency to pop out or develop unreliable contacts. All boards need to be reseated and possibly have contacts cleaned. I can certainly do that.

Key and pedal contacts do need cleaning, that was clear as well. It hasn't been played much for at least ten years, I guess.

So which make is that three manual? I hunted for months for a three manual instrument years ago, and couldn't find one I could afford to buy. The Wurlitzer 950 I have now is two full manuals and 25 pedals, with a miniature third manual of only 25 notes. When it's working right, it sounds OK but the feel of playing it is never what you want. Everything is in odd places. There is a solo division that creates a virtual overlay on the upper full manual, so in the sound you get the illusion of a full third manual, but using that means crunching pistons all the time and those are in odd places rather than where they belong, forcing you to lift your hand from the keys to get to them.

I'd love to have the use of an Allen or a Rodgers with real sampled sound and full console, but those are just too expensive. The Conn Trio line is more my price range, but apparently has electronics that aren't surviving the test of time (which is the problem with the Wurlitzer as well.)

[altivo.livejournal.com]

It's never too late to improve on that if you want to. XD

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Nope, that's not the game. The organ was offered to me for nothing as long as I'd take care of moving it. Market value of electronic organs has hit rock bottom now. This one is apparently going for $100 to $250 on Craigslist and Ebay. I'd pay a couple hundred for it if they asked, but the owner is just trying to find a home for it. He wants to sell the house and move out in a year or so. His wife played it, and she passed away years ago.

Pizza places with pipe organs were quite the rage 15 or 20 years ago. Alas, most of them are gone now. The expense of maintaining a real pipe organ is a big cost item even if you're wealthy and passionate about it. That's why almost all the instruments have been removed from the theatres they belonged in. In the US, most of the organs remaining are Wurlitzers, with Kimball and Barton following at a distance. The other makers, like Page or Kilgen, never made a lot of instruments and intact examples are extremely rare. In truth, most places where an organ is installed and working, the name on the console doesn't necessarily tell you who made the majority of the actual instrument. Most have been assembled and reassembled from scrounged and scattered parts, and typically include bits from all the big three makers. The console is most often a Wurlitzer or Kimball, though, because together those two makers accounted for the vast majority of original installations. In England, you find Comptons instead, but Compton never made much inroad in the US.

A decade or two back, the black market in stolen pipe organ parts was going strong. Entire organs stored in warehouses were disappearing mysteriously either as a single loss or piece by piece. Mysterious fires kept claiming them too, and I know perfectly well that the good stuff was being removed before the fire somehow got started. The whole field is a conservationist's nightmare, rather like trying to protect and catalog archeological artifacts before they get nabbed and sold by antique dealers.

[flamekist.livejournal.com]

You play the accordian as well? *swoons*

Sorry, but I do love some good accordian music! :)

[flamekist.livejournal.com]

A Wurlitzer, that's what it was! And now that you mention it, I remember a convenient small fire in the place just before it was sold to become a nightclub.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Heh. I play "at" the accordion. I was good enough to provide accompaniment for Gary's Morris dancers when we lived in Chicago, but I've hardly touched any of my accordions (I have three) since moving out here.

I'd still like to do more with them, but time is always limiting.

[keeganfox.livejournal.com]

When I was growing up, and after I got over the country stage (don't ask...) there was really only three musical instruments that mattered. Guitars, drums, and Eddie. Then grunge came out, and every high school rock band though they were going to be the next Nirvana. "Idiots with guitars", Gene Simmons of KISS says.
Now I'm older, things are different. I like a lot of electronic music now, and none of it mainstream. I was watching VNV Nation's Pastperfect and Ronan Harris has a bit of how he made the Futureperfect album, and it was all done on a PC (sorry, Mac users) with a controller keyboard, Reaktor synthesizer software, and some plug-ins. But that's more composing than playing, so I doubt it's really any sort of starting point.
So I'm back to heavy metal guitar. *shrug*

VNV Nation "Honour 2003" (live)

[saythename.livejournal.com]

Hopefully its not Keith Emerson and the organ won't be
stabbed.

As for you and the magic flute, lighten up! If they think
you are...then you are, go with it!

*hugs*

[altivo.livejournal.com]

But... but... my flute is only silver, not gold. ;p

Nah, the organ won't get stabbed. If the yuppie son doesn't take it, then I will. That's all. It was offered to me for free if I'd handle moving it out. It sounds good, in spite of needing work, and it feels comfy enough for me to play, so I'll make room for it here somewhere.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I never really did figure out the bash and thrash guitar thing, but if it's what you like, go for it. Better any kind of music than no music at all, I say.

[bladehorse.livejournal.com]

I think its a Thomas 'Trianon' And having the extra board was a nice feature.
Its nearly impossible for me to type correctly without looking these days, as I have no sin (Skin) touch nerves anymore in my right hand. (And at this point most likely never will.)
My dad bought that organ and a Huge oil painting, and somthing else from acoworker for 1500$
And much like the old days, One guy carried it on his back with a head strap(Weighs about 3-400#)

[bladehorse.livejournal.com]

Oh and a heads up . On the wire to post bindings, the lead oxidizes after so long and causes an open circut. easy fix is to run the soldering iron over it, and add som solder to the outside of the bing=d too.

[equattraction.livejournal.com]

I have a Gulbransen Pacemaker at home which I like a lot ... just for fooling around. My real love is theatre, concert or church pipe organ. I almost bought an Allen, but it was $55,000.00 and it probably would have been too big to fit in my little farm house. Caring for two stallions and four mares takes care of my spare change, anyway.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

I've never seen a single mover handle a load like that. It's always been a team of three. I had an upright player piano for many years, and twice paid professionals to move it for me, into and later out of a third floor walk up apartment. It was pretty impressive, and worth the $150 each time. One guy had the strap and used it to steady the thing while the other two heaved it step by step. The piano came through intact, but they nicked the overhead plaster in the stairway... same place both trips.

My Wurlitzer organ weighs 750 lbs. and has also been moved twice but never up or down a tight stairway. The two Leslie cabinets are separate and I think each of them is probably 300 lbs. or so.

I've never seen or heard a Trianon in person. Smaller Thomas organs haven't impressed me with their sound quality, but I know it isn't fair to judge the large ones based on that. Smaller Conns and Gulbransens are disappointing too, but the big brothers sound fine.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

Yes, I'd thought of that possibility. Some of the problems I have with the Wurlitzer right now may be that sort of thing, though in the past I've had to replace a couple of transistors and chips. It probably needs some new capacitors too.

[altivo.livejournal.com]

The Pacemakers are MIDI equipped aren't they? Those are quite a bit later than this one I think. My mom had a Gulbransen for a while at her house in Florida, and the sound was decent but I'm often puzzled by the stop selection that manufacturers provide on smaller instruments. It never adds up to a sensible ensemble in my mind or ear, even when the individual choices are all right. The tibia chorus is of course the heart of a theatre styled instrument, and has to sound like multiple voices in harmony. The quint, nazard, and tierce pitches are essential, and often missing. (Or mislabeled, or offered in diapason rather than tibia, as if it were a church instrument.)

I agree, an Allen is the ultimate aspiration one could have in an electronic theatre organ. I've actually been in a movie theatre with an Allen installation good enough to fool me at first (until I started looking for the organ chambers: there weren't any.) The earlier Allens are probably down enough in price now to be within reach if we could find them. People rarely let go of them though. The Gulbransen Rialto models are darned good too and seem to be selling for somewhere around $3000 now, sometimes less.

[keeganfox.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's the other thing. As much as I like heavy metal, it doesn't cross over into thrash or that new stuff they call "metal" that has the singing like gargling gravel. I like the symphonic and folk metal styles, and most of it seems to be coming out of Scandinavia. Melodic, thoughtful, and alive feeling. Nightwish is a favorite, and song like "Sacrament of Wilderness" are to me everything metal is supposed to be.