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As part of the rerelease of the original “At the Organ Grinder” albums on CD, a portion of the net proceeds is directed to the American Theatre Organ Society’s youth programs. Based on CD sales in October, a payment was sent today to the ATOS in the amount of $105.83 – all thanks to your…
Pipe Dreams and Pizza Crusts is a new documentary about the weird and wonderful (and loud!) Organ Grinder restaurants in Portland and Denver. I’ve been working full time all year to cover every angle of this amazing story, and I’ve invested a significant amount of my own money in this project. But now, it’s time…
Don Feely performs The Stars and Stripes Forever by John Philip Sousa at the Organ Grinder restaurant in Portland, Oregon. Includes a special appearance by the mechanical chimp! Originally recorded early February, 1996 by Ted Welty.
Mascots at the Organ Grinder restaurant in Portland, Oregon, dressed in red-white-and-blue garb for the 1976 United States Bicentennial celebration.
This month, we interviewed Ed Zollman at his home in Port Orchard, Washington, as part of our first Washington State Road Trip. Ed told us about his career as an organ technician, and what led him to become associated with the Organ Grinder, and his work with others to combine multiple Wurlitzer organs to create…
When you tally everything up, it’s pretty frightening! But there is much more to do! I simply MUST get to Denver for up to 2 weeks to conduct interviews and do library and TV station research. Your help, as always, is greatly appreciated and greatly needed. If you haven’t already, please consider contributing or purchasing…
This Saturday at 2pm, at the Hollywood Theatre, the Columbia River Theatre Organ Society is presenting “The Phantom of the Opera” (1925) – a classic silent film with live theatre organ accompaniment by Martin Ellis, who will be performing his original score for the film. And the CRTOS has graciously allowed me to have an…
The October issue of Theatre Organ magazine, the journal of the American Theatre Organ Society, has a feature article on the Summer Youth Adventure, an intensive week-long experience to train young theatre organists and expose them to a variety of instruments, with coaching from world-class performers. Multiple events from the week were filmed for the…
(Originally aired Tuesday October 22nd at 6:30pm PDT.) Recently, filmmaker Bob Richardson sat for an extended interview with KXRW’s Steven Glickman to discuss the Organ Grinder, and the new documentary about the much-beloved establishment, “Pipe Dreams and Pizza Crusts”. Listen over-the-air on 99.9FM, or stream live on https://www.kxrw.fm/ The interview will also feature an array…
This week, I traveled to Port Orchard, Washington, to the home of Patti and Ed Zollman, as part of the first Washington State Road Trip for the film (there will likely be more). First, I interviewed Patti, who performed regularly at the Denver Organ Grinder (as Patti Simon), as well as in Portland and at…
As part of the rerelease of the original “At the Organ Grinder” albums on CD, a portion of the net proceeds is directed to the American Theatre Organ Society’s youth programs. Based on CD sales in August and September, a payment was sent today to the ATOS in the amount of $355.50 – all thanks…
Rich Greenland, that’s who! Rich lives near the Wurlitzer Building in North Tonawanda, New York. In 2023, Rich took extensive drone videos of the site, and posted excerpts of the footage to YouTube: Rich has graciously licensed his footage for use in the Organ Grinder documentary. A bit of history: Already an established company making…
We’ve submitted our order for the first run of posters with the print shop today. In order to ensure the best quality, a physical proof has also been ordered. This will add a couple of weeks extra time, but it’s worth it so that there are no problems. We should still be able to ship…
Indiegogo, gone… Our 30-day Indiegogo campaign ended on September 17th. To put things frankly, it didn’t do so well. Here’s the cold truth: The advice I followed said it was best to fully budget your film, and ask for the whole amount, so as not to annoy people by going back again and again for…
On Thursday we interviewed Donna Parker. Donna was one of the original performers at the Paramount Music Palace in Indiana. She later moved to Portland to work at the Rodgers Organ Company in Hillsboro, and later began playing regularly at Organ Grinder Portland, up until it’s closing in 1996. Donna recalled a story of inviting…
This week, we interviewed Bob MacNeur at his home near Oregon City. Bob was the co-founder of the Paramount Music Palace, a gigantic pizza and pipes restaurant in Indianapolis, Indiana. Opened in 1978, it was one of the few establishments that rivaled the Organ Grinder in terms of size and customer traffic! Bob spoke of…
Who knew that you couldn’t buy the exact font used on the Organ Grinder sign? There are a lot of “Old West” fonts out there with a “spurred” style on the letters – you see them a lot on taverns/saloons and country music albums alike. But, as it turns out, the lettering on the original…
I’m pleased to announce that all CD preorders, direct orders, and Indiegogo orders as of this morning have shipped! Depending on how you placed your order, you should have already received a tracking notification email from Indiegogo or PayPal. If you did not, please contact me here and I will look up your order and…
On Tuesday, as part of our island-hopping Hawaii Trip, we interviewed Jerry Forchuk at a location in Waikiki near his home. Jerry and his brother Paul were among the original co-founders of the Organ Grinder. Jerry spoke on many topics, from growing up working closely with his mother and brother in the family’s restaurant business,…
On Saturday, as the first major stop on our whirlwind Hawaii Trip, we interviewed Stan Cadwallader. Stan lives on Maui, along the famous, twisty and mountainous Hana Highway, on a ranch that he and his husband, the late, beloved actor and singer Jim Nabors, purchased in the 1970s. Nestled in the hills of northeastern Maui,…
