Fred Hermes' Basement Bijou

Ornate columns, chandeliers, lavishly detailed walls: it's old-time movie palace splendor. The lights dim. A gold curtain silently glides open, and, like Poseidon rising from the sea, up comes the star attraction: an elaborate theater organ console—five keyboards, and nearly countless pedals and switches. This 2,500-pipe Wurlitzer organ from 1926 is the largest five manual organ that the company ever made. It's the largest of the three of its kind still intact and in use.

The organ emerges from deep below stage level, a man seated with his back to us plays a majestic overture. This is Fred Hermes, who salvaged the once-neglected instrument from Detroit's 4,000-seat Michigan Theatre in 1956. Today, he invites groups to visit his "Mighty Wurlitzer," which, he says, "cost $75,000 new. Now, you couldn't get one like this built for $3 million." The organ can mimic the sounds of all the instruments in the orchestra, and then some. Some of the pipes are straight, some flared, some looped in the center. Some are metal, and some are wood.

There's also a full complement of real percussion instruments: cymbals, a marimba, a harp, a glockenspiel—all controlled from the keyboard console. Thirty-five hundred wires connect the organ console to its thousands of voices. A room-sized fifteen horsepower blower powers the organ's air supply. A separate two horsepower motor powers the current to the pipes and other instruments.

Hermes spent 46 years restoring this unique artifact of musical, cinematic, and technological history. His remarkable achievements have been recognized by the American Theatre Organ Society and other groups.

The 90-minute presentation includes a concert, demos, a talk with a question-and-answer period, a sing-along, and more. "School groups love it. I've had all kinds of groups come," he says. The extravaganza takes place in a 150-seat theater set with architectural artifacts from fifty (sadly destroyed) movie palaces throughout the Midwest. Incredibly, it's all installed in the two-story basement of the residential neighborhood dwelling where Hermes and his wife live, and his family was raised. "I built the house for the organ," he says.

BY VESNA VUYNOVICH KOVACH

Shows are presented to groups, and are by reservation only.
Call Eileen Arnold, 262-884-6407, to schedule a group.

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