VINTAGE KEYBOARDS, ANYONE?

[woodyng]

i really at best only noodle with keyboards,but have always been fascinated by them,as well as keyboard players. i currently have an alesis that may be considered vintage in the sense that it is more than 15 minutes old ....but i have owned a farfisa combo with the key colors-reversed,and a single deck orchestron,which worked properly only on 2 occasions. both purchases were because of being influenced by steve nieve,and patrick moraz,respectively.....

[jingle_jangle]

That Farfisa was probably a Professional (grey keys with white accidentals sound familiar?)...

It's easy to get a perfectly acceptable siren sound with a Fender Jaguar (guitar), with no pedals and only an outboard reverb. No special settings either. You can hear it on our CD, on the song "Squad Car".

I have two VOXes, a '66 "Hayvenhurst" wooden=keyed Continental (one of 300 made in Van Nuys, between UK and Italian production), and a '67 Italian Jaguar. Both are in 100% functional condition, but needing minor cosmetics. You can see the bass end of the Connie in this photo:



The S-6 Hammond Chord Organ is one of two Hammonds I have; neither is a tonewheel model. The other is an X-5, Japanese-made "portable" (185 pounds!) with ICs to digitally reproduce the B-3 sound, including percussion and key click. Full set of drawbars and tilt tabs, too. Plugs into a full-sized Leslie portable 760.





It will shake your booties off, and to me at least, sounds about 95% like a B-3. Perfectly acceptable when I channel Chris Montez.

[scotty]

I know nothing about Keyboards but that '67 Baldwin is just beautiful to look at.Very nice indeed!

[digam11]

I have a `68 or `69 Thomas organ w/ the Leslie built in that I have to move soon. this is when Thomas owned Vox which was a big plus for me in grabbing it. I got it for free from a Craigslist ad. The old couple who owned had a divorced child w/ 2 kids of her own returning the nest so the room they had it in was being transformed to a bedroom for those kids. This couple was not happy about losing the organ.

I`ve had it for about 6 or 7 months and just have not found the time to put into it. I have a Vox Berkeley rig and Cambridge Reverb on the way and my wife says something has to go. Sounds cool and looks great.

I`ve been asking a few friends w/ have keyboard buddies if they want it so I hope it goes to a good home.

If anyone here is in MA / RI area of New England and are interested send me a note. Free to me... free to you.

Mike

[jingle_jangle]

Chop it!!!

[sloop_john_b]

I use a pair of Yamaha Motifs - not vintage, but the choice of many a pro. I started using them because they had the best organ and Rhodes sounds out of the "big three" (Motif, Korg Triton, and Roland Fantom - YMMV).

I had a Minimoog for a little while; the fact that it was monophonic basically made it useless to me, considering I don't listen to much Rick Wakeman.

I always keep my eyes open for a good, reasonably priced chopped Hammond (It'd be for gigs, remember), but the Yamahas really do a great job in the interim and are extremely reliable.

Very cool stuff, PW!

[soundmasterg]

I've got a 1975 Fender Rhodes Mark 1 88 key suitcase, which needs a little work but still sounds great. No pics yet though.

I have a line on a 1957 B3 in perfect shape with all the original covers, sales receipts, etc., and a 1963 22R Leslie. Just trying to save money for it.....I've never seen one in this nice of shape before, and can probably get it cheaper than market value because it is a relation who owns it.

I'd really love to find a Vox Continental that didn't cost huge money.

The Roland VR-760 (since discontinued) is a very nice modern keyboard that can emulate all the vintage keyboard sounds quite well. I paid a guy to work on a recording of mine, and he used one of these and a Leslie to do a B3 sound, and it sounds just like a real B3, and I've got really good ears and usually don't settle for emulations or copies.

Nice keyboards Paul!

Greg

[sloop_john_b]

Any Mellotron/Chamberlain owners here?

[jingle_jangle]

VOX Continentals have nearly tripled in price in the last three years. Back in '03, $600.00 would get you an average one. Prices went to about $1200.00 in 2007 and have been rising steadily since. I waited patiently and got one from craigslist in KC, Kansas, exactly 47 minutes after it was listed, very late at night. My Jaguar came from an Ebay auction for a bit over $600 last year, and just spent several months at my tech's. It came back absolutely perfect mechanically, and both VOXes will get a recovering in vintage correct Tolex sometime this summer.

Recently, a two-owner, near mint Connie (a Brit-made early one) from the East Bay here, sold for about $3700 on Ebay. A Gibson G101 (similar to Manzarek's) sold a couple of weeks ago for similar money. Things are beginning to catch up to this area of the vintage instrument market.

As I might have mentioned here, Booker T's touring B-3, with two Leslie 147s, was for sale near my home, for $10K. It is cosmetically a "heavy relic", but mechanically good. A good price considering its history and relative to celeb-owned Strats and LPs!

[collin]

I always wanted a Vox organ years ago, but never had the scratch to get one (plus...I was a really horrible keyboard player- still can't play), but I found a Cordovox - 0610 model. Probably early-mid 70s.





It sounded okay. Kind of inbetween a Fender rhodes and a mellow Vox organ. It holds the record as the only instrument to ever physically knock me out. They are heavy as hell, and I had it stored up once on a shelf at shoulder height. While reaching up for something else, the legs of the shelf broke, and all I remember was seeing the side of the Cordovox sliding really really quickly at my head. I woke up on the floor ?? minutes later with a crazy headache. Still laugh about that...

Well, after that the organ broke and never played again. I sold it real cheap on ebay last year, as the circuit boards were too difficult for me to attempt to fix. oh well..

Cheers,
-Collin

[lyle_from_minneapolis]

The two cool keyboards I've had are the Vox Jaguar



and the Moog Rogue

[jingle_jangle]

Cool!

Mark, are you aware that North Coast Music manufactures new chrome "Z" stands that fit both the Jaguar and the Continental? They are actually better quality than the original. I have them on both my VOXes.

[shamustwin]

I remember the Vox plant in Van Nuys. Hayvenhurst is a street nearby, if not the street it was on.

Recently, a friend's mom passed away, and while helping him pack, he showed me the B-3 and Leslie she'd had forever. Beautiful, flawless condition. It now resides with him in Peru. He also has two '30's Martins, one flawless, one with a neck repair but otherwise flawless, his dad passed to him.

In the '70's the keyboardist in our band had a B-3, complete with Leslie as well. He was the smallest guy in the band, but would load those two beasts (via home-made ramps) in the back of his very small Toyota mini-pick-up. Sometimes we'd help. We did Deep Purple covers just for him.

Giving examples of the songs particular organs were used on was very helpful, Paul.

Fun thread!

[jingle_jangle]

I always wanted a Vox organ years ago, but never had the scratch to get one (plus...I was a really horrible keyboard player- still can't play), but I found a Cordovox - 0610 model. Probably early-mid 70s.





It sounded okay. Kind of inbetween a Fender rhodes and a mellow Vox organ. It holds the record as the only instrument to ever physically knock me out. They are heavy as hell, and I had it stored up once on a shelf at shoulder height. While reaching up for something else, the legs of the shelf broke, and all I remember was seeing the side of the Cordovox sliding really really quickly at my head. I woke up on the floor ?? minutes later with a crazy headache. Still laugh about that...

Well, after that the organ broke and never played again. I sold it real cheap on ebay last year, as the circuit boards were too difficult for me to attempt to fix. oh well..

Cheers,
-Collin

Collin, that's an atypical Cordovox organ. Usually, they have white fiberglas cases in a very "Star Trek", curvy style, lke this CDX-0642 dual-manual model:

This style has led to the nickname, "White Elephant" for them. I've missed two of these 0642s on Ebay in the last year, but I'm still looking. These also have illuminated control panels; very space-age.

Cordovox is an interesting case study (pun intended). Originally, they made an accordion with additional Lowrey organ electronics fitted into the squeezebox case, with the tone generators and amplifier unit (very similar to the Gibson and Lowrey combo organ amp unit!) in two separate but externally identical cabinets. All were connected by a large umbilical cable. There was a separate foot volume pedal. The accordion retained its reeds, too, so you could play either or both. I have two of these units; the tone generator is pre-transistor and has 85 tubes!

When somebody at CMI finally realized that there was a market for combo organs, they marketed a line of a half-dozen alongside the accordion Cordovox.

Interestingly, Gibson, Lowrey, and Cordovox were all part of the CMI conglomerate in the late '60s, and all marketed similar combo organs of very different styles to different demographics. The Cordovox accordion was "the" thing for polka band accordionists back then. Of course, the Gibson combo organs were popular and had a unique, sophisticated and very grown-up sound. Lowrey made a line of organs for non-musicians, with all sorts of built-in effects and teaching features.

[byu]

I had a friend that had a CDX similar to the one pictured. If you adjusted it right, you could get it to sound somewhat Hammond like.