A new revenue generator is born! Sell earplugs for a buck a plug
wherever band organs are publicly played! There's a way to raise money
for ailing band organs!
All kidding aside, I think it depends upon the crowd. I had a Seeburg
"K" on location years ago, with the reserve extra tension screw in the
softest possible position plus the manual soft override on after removing
the external knobs. The management told me the people who complained
about it -- not only it being "too loud" but the music it played --
were senior citizens(!). I guess it must be the crowd.
Also, I remember when I was 14 hearing my first Wurlitzer 125 as it
happily butchered a Sousa march (and at that age my musical hero was
Sousa) in the old Fun Zone in Balboa, Calif., and thinking, "No wonder
Sousa hated those things!" It was years later I actually heard a
relatively "nice" sounding 153 (on the Santa Monica Pier) that I began
enjoying band organs. Maybe it was the musical compromise of the
arrangements one finds on 125 rolls. Oh well..., there's always
stuffing cotton in the trumpets! (Hey -- just kidding, ok?)
S.K. Goodman
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