Just 40 years ago, home organs were a must have item for aspiring homes. They were at the cutting edge of music technology - I worked above an organ shop and every week there were new sounds leaking out. Plus some truly cheesy musical material............
For this track I imagined a combination of home organ and ukulele, producing a more intimate take on the thrilling Hammond/guitar combo of Jimmy Smith and Kenny Burrell.
Sadly most organs in the UK are now faulty; pipe organs have mechanical faults and most electronic ones have mechanical and electrical problems. Finding repairers is hard because these instruments are unfashionable - a contrast with the many skilled repairers of string and wind instruments.
Like the ukulele, home organs can be distressing in the wrong hands but inspiring when well played. Kit Downes has recorded two fine albums exploring the subtleties of faulty pipe organs, so I had the idea of doing something similar for home organs. Each manufacturer has their own signature - Lowrey with early use of pitch bend, Thomas with the mandolin style "note repeat" function, Yamaha with the development of drumboxes - and these are things which the ukulele can do even better. Generally their tones are weedier than Hammond organs but have their own character; the Lowrey plucked sounds of "Lucy in the sky", the Thomas repeat sounds of Zappa's "Hot rats" and the Farfisa sounds of early Pink Floyd make guest appearances on this track. Some models were little more than a piece of chipboard furniture with a crude musical instrument inside but the best could sound excellent. The addition of "auto accompaniment" allowed semi-skilled players to play multi-layered arrangements. With a home organ it only took one to tango.