Organ
When the Alabama was built in 1927, films were silent and required a musical accompaniment. This was typically provided by an orchestra or theater pipe organ. The Alabama's organ is a Crawford Special-Publix One Mighty Wurlitzer. Only 25 of this model of organ were built and the Alabama's is one of only three still installed in their original sites.
Nicknamed Big Bertha, the Alabama's organ is a four-manual (keyboard) organ. It was originally installed with 20 ranks (sets of pipes), but has been expanded to 29. It also features numerous percussion instruments and sound effects to accompany silent movies.
Read more about this topic: Alabama Theatre
Famous quotes containing the word organ:
“In that reconciling of God and Mammon which Mrs. Grantly had carried on so successfully in the education of her daughter, the organ had not been required, and had become withered, if not defunct, through want of use.”
—Anthony Trollope (1815–1882)
“Nature is so perfect that the Trinity couldn’t have fashioned her any more perfect. She is an organ on which our Lord plays and the devil works the bellows.”
—Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749–1832)
“And this mighty master of the organ of language, who knew its every stop and pipe, who could awaken at will the thin silver tones of its slenderest reeds or the solemn cadence of its deepest thunder, who could make it sing like a flute or roar like a cataract, he was born into a country without literature.”
—Willa Cather (1873–1947)