The tortured, sentimental warbling of slightly warped, century-old, pipe organ records is really the reason I started this blog, but I wanted to make it seem as though I had other interests. Plus, I just can't bring myself to write the masterpiece such music deserves at this point in time, so I'll just tease a little until I'm ready to give these records the full Nick Tosches treatment.
While this post features Organlogues -- one-reel, theatre organ-driven singalongs played before films in the 1930s -- the first video is not technically one of those. It features Jesse Crawford & his wife Helen, ostensibly at home, ditzing around with "Tea for Two" from No, No Nanette. Crawford was the premier theater organist of the late-1920s/early-1930s & recorded some amazing records. Though, as is the danger with old organ records, he also recorded hundreds of upbeat, Shakey's Pizza-style ditties that will make you want to rip the ears off your head. There will be much more about Jesse Crawford in future posts, but this seemed like a fine place to make introductions.
There were thirty or so Organlogues made by Master Art Products & they manage to perfectly illustrate the point where sentimentality & artifice float ethereally past being heart-warming into the realm of the eerie. The images rise from some oneiric theater apron, fold out like a funeral fan & then resolve in a mother's tears, while the theater organ's tremulant creates that airy, disembodied vibrato that tingles the tiny hairs on the back of the neck. These are truly spectral little memento mori from our collective gloaming.
