A day or two ago I had an interesting memory come up. I remembered that from time to time while shopping with my family in department stores as a child, we saw organs for sale, and the store would have someone there playing one. I’m not sure if it was a store clerk who also played, or someone brought in to play it, probably the latter. I think they even had a sign saying when the person would arrive to play. It was like a mini-concert right there in the store. I don’t remember thinking of it as something particularly special at the time, but I must have enjoyed it, because when I was telling a friend about it today it felt like a really cool memory. I also remember they would say what type of organ it was, for example, “This is a Hammond organ,” and they would demonstrate the cool things it could do.
While thinking of the above, I thought I would like to check out some organ music and of course, once I started, I was struck with the idea that “I could totally blog about that!” So here are some organ links for your enjoyment:
Let’s start off with some jazz from the 1992 Leverkusen Jazz Festival:
Barbara Dennerlein Group – Hammond B3 Organ
Something a little different:
Baldwin Organ Favorites by Eddy Osborn-Muskrat Ramble
This fascinating video includes an interesting description of how organs work:
Pipe Organ at Macy’s in Philadelphia:
Very nice organ playing by a 14 – year old:
Toccata in D Minor played on organ by 14-year-old
The Hammond Organ Website
Do you have an interesting organ story or link to share? I’d love to see it in the comments! Thank you!