The Wurlitzer scales are musically deficient. Compare with the European scales of Bruder and Ruth and you'll see who can play the best music. It's all about the arrangement and you need a good scale for a good arrangement.
Wurlitzer organs can sound great with good musical arrangements, but Gavioli on the whole did build more larger-sized fairground organs with larger note scales and more musical capability than Wurlitzer did. Wurlitzer basically bought out DeKleist who had been building barrel organs since 1892 and started making paper roll organs in 1904, on a semi-experimental basis, with only one or two large organ models using rolls until 1906 when the 125 and 150 roll formats (and several others) were also introduced. But nearly all of these roll formats were based on early cylinder-organ chassis types for smaller organs with more limited scales, and thus these paper roll scales ended up being as limited even though the arrangements were no longer limited in length to the circumference of the cylinder, and could be made much longer. European organbuilders usually introduced new scales along with the new format of cardboard books, and also new tonal idioms, but Wurlitzer were a bit slower to change to fashion (or maybe USA organ fashions were different than European ones), still building brass trumpet organs (along with others) almost to the end, decades after European organbuilders had abandoned the brass trumpet organ EXCEPT for special models, special order organs, and for very large organs with both brass and wood trumpets for volume. In 1906 they introduced the 135/140 models with wood trumpets but they were not popular; not counting the year 1907 (missing in the factory records), only about 12 of this chassis-type (using its own unique roll scale) were ever built. Finally in 1910 they started building some wood-trumpet (not just brass trumpet) paper roll organs using the popular 150 and 125 roll scales, such as the rare model 147 and the now super rare model 126, and then later introduced more models that were much more popular (like the 103; the 104/105/106; the 145/146, and the 153). In 1914 someone at Wurlitzer decided they needed to build an orchestral organ with automatic pipe registers, so the 165 was born, copied from a c. 1912 Gebruder Bruder model which in turn was Gebruder Bruder's own idea introduced to remain competitive with the 65-key Gaviolis (such as this one), which Gavioli themselves were introduced in 1902 (this particular one was built about 1909) so in fact, the Wurlitzer 165 is sort of a descendant of this organ type! Gavioli's quality of construction and pipe construction and voicing was first rate and extremely fine; indeed, they set the standard for mechanical organs. Between the construction of the organ case itself, windchest, and of course the pipework (the most important part) as well as their glorious facades, the entire instruments were works of art. Wurlitzer, by contrast, were more interested in producing organs in large quantities that could be sold at competitive prices. That being said, they also had a very large factory (as did Gavioli) which allowed them each to produce large numbers of organs (Gavioli were producing about 80-90 or so new street/fairground organs per year, many of those large instruments with either non-standard or at any rate custom-painted, heavily carved facades; Wurlitzer's peak was ~160 new band organs per year, although most of those were smaller than most of the Gaviolis and so could be built more quickly, plus had simpler flat-panel facades). Wurlitzer's large factory also allowed them to keep quality of construction up. I know of CERTAIN European organs (not going to name names) that weren't actually built as well as Wurlitzer's generally were. However, most of the 'name' (well known) European makers (as well as many of the smaller builders) indeed made quality instruments: Gavioli et cie, A. Ruth & Sohn, Louis Hooghuys, Th. Mortier, Arthur Bursens, Gebruder Bruder, Ch. Marenghi et cie, Limonaire Freres, Gebroders Decap, and certain others, will certainly echo throughout history as some of the finest builders, as well as Wurlitzer, North Tonawanda Musical Instrument Works, and Artizan Factories in the USA.
IMO: Most of the good or bad arranging for mechanical organs produced by each arranger can be traceable to one of four factors: 1. How much they personally cared for/about the tune they were arranging (liked it); 2. How skilled they were / their level of musical education and aptitude; 3. How much they liked the particular organ/scale for which they were arranging; 4. How much they were paid / company policies. Wurlitzer had some of the worst company policies in the industry in terms of paying their arrangers, something that was almost certainly the fault of Howard Wurlitzer (definitely not Farny or Andrew, both of whom were quite musical). Reportedly, Wurlitzer arrangers were paid something like 5 cents per foot of music churned out! (A foot might work out to maybe 4 bars of music, or 1/4 of a typical chorus to a typical pop song; $0.05 in c. 1919 dollars works out to about $0.79 today). Thus, this did NOT give the arrangers proper inspiration / motivation to do great work, so the quality of the work they DID turn in is still sometimes surprisingly good, but Wurlitzer were usually content to let their band organ arrangers arrange one verse, one chorus, and then have the people in the roll dept. mechanically copy/duplicate each verse and chorus as many times as necessary to fill out the tune on the roll as needed. This also happened with many 88-note piano rolls, as it was cheaper and easier to produce them this way, than contend with multiple choruses (or even multiple verses) that were arranged differently / with variations, even if the end result is usually more pleasing for musician listeners. This copy/pasting of verses and choruses also happened with SOME European fairground organ books (certain companies / arrangers) and also with certain other rolls made by North Tonawanda and Artizan in the USA. So this practice wasn't limited to Wurlitzer. But it is nice to occasionally run across an American band organ roll by any of the companies/arrangers, where they actually gave a darn and arranged and cut variations in the tune and/or where the arrangement is actually super nice. "Nice" is in the ear of the beholder. Many other folks like even 'run of the mill' arrangements as they are. But I do agree that even run of the mill arrangements sound best on organs that have as many of the chromatic notes as possible! This fact was not lost on Gebruder Wellershaus and Wilhelm Bruder Sohne, each company of which tried to make their newer organ book models (post-cylinder-era) as chromatic as possible.
Always wondered what this song was called, thanks so much :)
It's also known as The Lone Ranger's musical theme. Hi-ho, Silver, away!
2:17 best
I even love the Organ's version of the William Tell Overture than I do the version I hear on the Lone Ranger episodes.
Wurlitzer has serious competition. Gavioli sounds a lot more robust.
The Wurlitzer scales are musically deficient. Compare with the European scales of Bruder and Ruth and you'll see who can play the best music. It's all about the arrangement and you need a good scale for a good arrangement.
Wurlitzer organs can sound great with good musical arrangements, but Gavioli on the whole did build more larger-sized fairground organs with larger note scales and more musical capability than Wurlitzer did.
Wurlitzer basically bought out DeKleist who had been building barrel organs since 1892 and started making paper roll organs in 1904, on a semi-experimental basis, with only one or two large organ models using rolls until 1906 when the 125 and 150 roll formats (and several others) were also introduced.
But nearly all of these roll formats were based on early cylinder-organ chassis types for smaller organs with more limited scales, and thus these paper roll scales ended up being as limited even though the arrangements were no longer limited in length to the circumference of the cylinder, and could be made much longer. European organbuilders usually introduced new scales along with the new format of cardboard books, and also new tonal idioms, but Wurlitzer were a bit slower to change to fashion (or maybe USA organ fashions were different than European ones), still building brass trumpet organs (along with others) almost to the end, decades after European organbuilders had abandoned the brass trumpet organ EXCEPT for special models, special order organs, and for very large organs with both brass and wood trumpets for volume.
In 1906 they introduced the 135/140 models with wood trumpets but they were not popular; not counting the year 1907 (missing in the factory records), only about 12 of this chassis-type (using its own unique roll scale) were ever built. Finally in 1910 they started building some wood-trumpet (not just brass trumpet) paper roll organs using the popular 150 and 125 roll scales, such as the rare model 147 and the now super rare model 126, and then later introduced more models that were much more popular (like the 103; the 104/105/106; the 145/146, and the 153).
In 1914 someone at Wurlitzer decided they needed to build an orchestral organ with automatic pipe registers, so the 165 was born, copied from a c. 1912 Gebruder Bruder model which in turn was Gebruder Bruder's own idea introduced to remain competitive with the 65-key Gaviolis (such as this one), which Gavioli themselves were introduced in 1902 (this particular one was built about 1909) so in fact, the Wurlitzer 165 is sort of a descendant of this organ type!
Gavioli's quality of construction and pipe construction and voicing was first rate and extremely fine; indeed, they set the standard for mechanical organs. Between the construction of the organ case itself, windchest, and of course the pipework (the most important part) as well as their glorious facades, the entire instruments were works of art.
Wurlitzer, by contrast, were more interested in producing organs in large quantities that could be sold at competitive prices.
That being said, they also had a very large factory (as did Gavioli) which allowed them each to produce large numbers of organs (Gavioli were producing about 80-90 or so new street/fairground organs per year, many of those large instruments with either non-standard or at any rate custom-painted, heavily carved facades; Wurlitzer's peak was ~160 new band organs per year, although most of those were smaller than most of the Gaviolis and so could be built more quickly, plus had simpler flat-panel facades). Wurlitzer's large factory also allowed them to keep quality of construction up.
I know of CERTAIN European organs (not going to name names) that weren't actually built as well as Wurlitzer's generally were.
However, most of the 'name' (well known) European makers (as well as many of the smaller builders) indeed made quality instruments: Gavioli et cie, A. Ruth & Sohn, Louis Hooghuys, Th. Mortier, Arthur Bursens, Gebruder Bruder, Ch. Marenghi et cie, Limonaire Freres, Gebroders Decap, and certain others, will certainly echo throughout history as some of the finest builders, as well as Wurlitzer, North Tonawanda Musical Instrument Works, and Artizan Factories in the USA.
IMO: Most of the good or bad arranging for mechanical organs produced by each arranger can be traceable to one of four factors:
1. How much they personally cared for/about the tune they were arranging (liked it);
2. How skilled they were / their level of musical education and aptitude;
3. How much they liked the particular organ/scale
for which they were arranging;
4. How much they were paid / company policies.
Wurlitzer had some of the worst company policies in the industry in terms of paying their arrangers, something that was almost certainly the fault of Howard Wurlitzer (definitely not Farny or Andrew, both of whom were quite musical).
Reportedly, Wurlitzer arrangers were paid something like 5 cents per foot of music churned out! (A foot might work out to maybe 4 bars of music, or 1/4 of a typical chorus to a typical pop song; $0.05 in c. 1919 dollars works out to about $0.79 today). Thus, this did NOT give the arrangers proper inspiration / motivation to do great work, so the quality of the work they DID turn in is still sometimes surprisingly good, but Wurlitzer were usually content to let their band organ arrangers arrange one verse, one chorus, and then have the people in the roll dept. mechanically copy/duplicate each verse and chorus as many times as necessary to fill out the tune on the roll as needed.
This also happened with many 88-note piano rolls, as it was cheaper and easier to produce them this way, than contend with multiple choruses (or even multiple verses) that were arranged differently / with variations, even if the end result is usually more pleasing for musician listeners.
This copy/pasting of verses and choruses also happened with SOME European fairground organ books (certain companies / arrangers) and also with certain other rolls made by North Tonawanda and Artizan in the USA.
So this practice wasn't limited to Wurlitzer.
But it is nice to occasionally run across an American band organ roll by any of the companies/arrangers, where they actually gave a darn and arranged and cut variations in the tune and/or where the arrangement is actually super nice. "Nice" is in the ear of the beholder. Many other folks like even 'run of the mill' arrangements as they are.
But I do agree that even run of the mill arrangements sound best on organs that have as many of the chromatic notes as possible! This fact was not lost on Gebruder Wellershaus and Wilhelm Bruder Sohne, each company of which tried to make their newer organ book models (post-cylinder-era) as chromatic as possible.
‘Ml.