I'm from Belgium, not far from Antwerpen and my grandfather loved the music coming out of these organs. And actually me too but as a technician I admire most of the mechanics behind it. Serious engineering...
At the begining of May 1996 my wife and I were on our last stop of our tour of Eureka Springs Arkansas honeymoon. Before we left town we visited a musical museum whose name I cannot remember. It was the first day they opened that year however the original owner had recently passed. His daughter instead gave us the tour which was amazing. It featured many of these wonderful machines most of which still worked. I was astounded by the size of the collection, and the condition each one was in.... They had a warehouse full of them.... it was amazing.
There is a fantastic organ museum in St. Albans Hertfordshire England,UK, it has at least 6 of these organs plus a wurlitzer full pipe organ and other treasures
I've been to the MIM and don't recall seeing it -- or any band organs, for that matter. I was only there for part of a day and I suspect even a full day might not be enough time to do it justice.
We made a special trip down to AZ specifically to see the MIM for two days. Amazing place - top drawer. This instrument is very loud. We were always there at around 3pm to hear it play. Sounds wonderful; you'd need a high-end recording rig to capture the sound well.
Quite true. Six years ago all I had was my iPhone 7+ and no USB mic. I have a 13+ these days and a Sure USB mic that would probably produce better results.
I also have some vids from the Musical Cabinet Museum in Rüdesheim am Rhein from last June that I will have to post at some point. Wanted to do a bit of editing first, though.
@@thedogesl Fitting a MIDI absolutely ruins the authenticity of these organs. The keyframes and card music 'books' are remarkably robust and (I don't know about the US) here is the UK there are several businesses who make new books and repair old ones. You COULD eliminate wear and tear on the whole of the organ mechanism by putting some sort of digital i-thingy and speakers inside the organ. It just depends whether you're bothered about it being authentic or not. We seem to be obsessed with putting computers into everything nowadays!
Most of these machines belonged to a circus and traveled east coast to west coast 100 times in a bumpy trailer. No climate control either. That's why they sound off kilter
We have the national music museum which is in vermillion south dakota the largest collection of instruments in the country and one of the largest in the world. There is thousands of musical instruments. Google national music museum
Wow, too bad they don’t make player organs or player purses anymore, now you can just press a demo button on a keyboard and it will do the same thing, without the paper roll that is.
NO NO NO ~ It's a mechanical DANCE ORGAN very popular in BELGIUM ~ see also GAVIOLI MARENGHI VERBEEK CHIAPPA etc... agree should be on its key frame and book system not midi as is my 36 key Dutch street organ built in 1927!
A mono Pod could have helped wt your filming. It was too shaky. YOU QUIT THE RECORDING TOO SOON! LEARN your camera to make better, earthquake free videos.
I'm sorry, but that woman just ruins the entire presentation! it's bad enough that she blathers on, but then she stands there CONDUCTING the machine!!! GIVE ME A BREAK! No wonder this vid only got 162 likes in over 5 years!
I just thought some folks might find it interesting, especially if they have never seen one of these remarkable machines in action. I wasn't particularly interested in how many "likes" it got.
