Brett Valliant in Concert | Organ Stop Pizza

Los Angeles Theatre Organ Society (LATOS) is proud to present a virtual concert featuring the incomparable Brett Valliant at the mammoth 4/82 theatre pipe organ installed at Organ Stop Pizza in Mesa, Arizona.
We would like to thank the owners and management of Organ Stop Pizza for graciously making their venue available for this concert at no cost to LATOS.
To join or support LATOS in our mission to present the theatre organ to the general public, visit "www.latos.org"

[@gramurspel]

Wow this Organ is amazing. I love this Typen of Sound. Mode the 80 pipe Arrays! Amazing!

[@MrGbutter]

I could sit and listen to you play all day, you are a true artist of the organ. You are so relaxed while playing and magical of the different stops available.

[@mmingredients]

Wonderful concert Brett. You are an incredible performer and what mastery of that beast of an instrument!!!

[@jonathankleefield5520]

Last night, I watched this amazing You Tube production on my big screen TV. Despite having had the privilege to visit OSP several times, Mark Herman’s fantastic videography allowed me for the first time to have a really close up view of the console, not easily achieved when at the facility, and in the very capable hands of Brett Valliant. As a dedicated amateur organist, I relish the opportunity to see a virtuoso like Brett in action. His use of the sostenuto function was exemplary, registrations colorful and diverse, and sensitivity to the nuances of his program exemplary. The organ console and illuminated pipe chambers are a thing of visual splendor, for sure. But, I urge any viewer of this video to put on a pair of really good headphones or listen via a top quality music system to truly appreciate the beauty of Brett’s playing, particularly his registrations. Those who have been to OSP know the room into which the organ speaks is enormous, and being empty for the purposes of this recording, is rather reverberant, almost cathedral-like in its acoustics. I believe Mark beautifully captured Brett’s performance using that reverberation to great advantage, particularly in lush ballads like “Bali Hai.” I am sure the late Charlie Balogh would be very happy to know that a musician as fine as Brett has succeeded him. All in all, a five star production, thanks to Mark, Brett, LATOS, and the folks at OSP who permitted this recording to be made. Much appreciated!

[@reptileman75]

Wow, this version of Bali Ha'i is waaayyy better than the original from the movie! Beautifully performed...haunting, even.

[@donaldauguston9740]

Absolutely fabulous! Thank you for posting this wonderful concert. DA

[@manuelrosales5136]

Enjoyable concert! Lots of variety and colors. Congratulations Brett!

[@WannesVanderhoeven]

Excellent!

[@HenrikBergpianorganist]

So nice to hear the instrument without noise from visitors, but also - what complete mastery of all tonal capacities of the organ, not to mention all the percussions! Never heard this instrument sound so beautiful, diverse, and swinging!

[@kingjames8283]

Lovely, Lovely, Wunderful, Wunderful. Sorry if I somehow missed the Pink Panther Theme, William Tell Overture, Starwars, and M.J.'s BAD to name a few. Have to build me a list for the next time I'm at OSP which I hope is soon once the price of gasoline drops back below $10 a gallon. I'm just so glad Brett is keeping the classical side of the pipe organ alive and well. Thank you Mark for putting all of this together and to Brett for the fine playing.

[@praestant8]

Where is it $10 a gallon, or was that hyperbole?

[@buddyburden3744]

I enjoyed the entire concert immensely ..... Your mastery of the Wurlitzer is evident, and your arranging skills are stellar... Kudos to you from an old professional..... bb

[@johnferguson4089]

Thanks Brett, a great and varied program. The organ sounded wonderful!

[@philipmarlowe8763]

I should preface this comment by saying the Organ Stop instrument is one of my all time favorites, that being said, this is one of the few times I have every described her as “lush,” “beautiful,” “nuanced,” and “soft!” In addition to all the usual ways we’d describe this glorious instrument. Brett really can bring out the different colors and complexities. Thank you to LATOS, Brett and Organ Stop!

[@wizardofodds8239]

Wonderful. Wonderful!! Thanks for playing that Johnny Mathis tune, Brett. I hadn't heard it for years, and it took me back to that time. It's very lyrical, and when it builds to the final crescendo, my spine shivers. (Which is the only thing that still shivers!) I could hear Mathis' voice singing it. Thanks to everyone who fill our souls with Music!

[@jeffsnyder6878]

Great concert! Brett's playing and arrangements are incredible. If you've never been to hear him at Organ Stop, you are missing out.

[@alexanderw6309]

I am very fortunate to reside only two miles from Organ Stop Pizza and make it a point to visit it regularly. I can assure you this instrument sounds even better live than on a recording. It is well worth making a visit to listen to. One gets the best listening experience on the upstairs balcony center.

[@ginnystokes2013]

Amazing performance! Such skill on a difficult instrument!

[@christopherforster6555]

Wonderful organ and wonderful playing thanks so much.

[@matthewtbraden4349]

Brett - hard to believe how you keep getting better and better! Good to see you again. Like, we've always known you were awesome; now looks like you're in a GREAT place performing the BEST EVER! Good for you! We hope to see you in person one of these days. Chuck & Connie B

[@slimjim1872]

Brett - Thanks for the great concert. I am eating pizza while watching the KZbin video since there are no longer any Pizza and Pipes restaurants in WA. Jim

[@garymahon1955]

Sad. I remember those great Pizza and Pipes places! I last went to one in 1988.

[@utahrusty7555]

Man, Finally a recording that almost captures the shear magnificence of sound these incredible installations are capable of, it is almost as good as being there, Almost! Wonderful performance Brett, cant wait to hear more!

[@larryfenner2239]

Wonderful concert Brett! Thank you!!

[@jgdmlw]

We had a place that I think was called organ grinder pizza here in Denver back in the early 80s. They had a similar place in San Diego that we went to. I know the Denver one closed along time ago. It was pretty fun to go to.

[@johanbrand8601]

Immensely enjoyable! Bravo!

[@user-qg2md9fl3h]

Incredible concert on an amazing machine. I have always dreamed of playing an organ like that. Gonna have to see it someday.

[@lesterwakefield6419]

Wonderful! Can't wait to go to OSP for a live show! Wonderful use of so many special effects! Great registrations and excellent execution! Thanks so much!👏👏!

[@daviddiffenderfer3836]

Looking forward to seeing you at Blackwood. I enjoyed your Foxburg concert last year.

[@keyplayer123]

Bravo Brett!

[@jimchallender4616]

if you are going to be at Organ Stop Pizza, please let me know. I'll fly there from Raleigh. I took mt Uncle to Organ Stop in his later years two times. He was an accomplished musician, I'm not sure who enjoyed it more. I grew up with a Hamond Spinet and played our high school B3. Organ Stop is my fav "Bucket List Trip".

[@shastaaguilar4111]

Wish I lived closer.

[@joespeciale5875]

Outstanding presentation and performance. I regret to say I lived in Mesa Arizona area for nearly 20 years and never knew what a fabulous combination theatre-and-other-pipe work instrument was at Organ Stop Pizza

[@daviddiffenderfer3836]

It is with great anticipation that I look forward to your performance at Blackwood in a few weeks.

[@Foxybiker72]

1 day I would love to go and see this organ for myself. It's a lifetime ambition. Its ok Blackpool im not ditching you yet lol

[@Jeo-fq1zw]

That organ LOVES YOU!

[@astropythagoras]

I was impressed with how casually Brett responded to the the auto page turning feature of the Wurlitzer. ;)

[@adrianmlridgewayarcmlramll1965]

Absolutely totally incredibly wonderful, what an amazing performance! Anyone missing this is going to be sorely disappointed, I’ve never heard a more varied program so brilliantly played, just superb. Everything from Rossini to Glen Miller, all played stylistically correctly and immaculately. As for the organ, what can be said, it’s a vast beast with stops ranging from a mighty 32 bombarde to singing ducks, to every percussion known to man, with 86 ranks it can outplay any organ on earth, and it’s in a pizza restaurant!!!! I’m so jealous!!!! Fantastic Performance Brett, FANTASTIC!!!!!!!! 😀😀😀😀😀😀❤️❤️❤️❤️ Adrian in Bermuda!!

[@garymcwithey980]

What a thoroughly enjoyable concert. Your mastery over this complex, elaborate instrument is nothing short of breathtaking. 🤓💜🙌🏳‍🌈

[@klemensbrumann3952]

Solche Theater Orgeln haben einfach einen tollen klang, das hört sich an als wenn man einen Film aus den 30 gern hört.Auch die Register klingen oftmals anders als bei Kirchenorgeln. Vielen Dank für diese interessante und sehr schöne Orgelmusik 😃😃😃👍👍👍

[@xXFe_LixXx]

Viel macht glaube ich auch die die Nutzung des Tremulanten.

[@daviddiffenderfer3836]

The dinner concert at Blackwood was wonderful. I look forward to seeing you again next year at Foxburg.

[@Jeo-fq1zw]

That organ LOVES YOU❤

[@user-nq4mk5kp7b]

Theater organs can only carry a label of magnificent along with their players

[@rdgrf3527]

Brett your awsome 😍

[@trainiacvideos3832]

Love the performance on this very impressive organ stop pizza wurlitzer. A truly superb instrument and a great sound. One day I will get there.........

[@garymahon1955]

When i lived in the Seattle area, there were two "Pizza and Pipes" restaurants. One in Tacoma and one in Seattle. What neat places!! I left that area in 2010, and don't know if they still exist.

[@miroirdusonge]

This is awesome! Thank you so much 🙏

[@jackraves7363]

🎼 now that’s quite some time ago since I saw and heard YOU, we met in Hamburg! This one is quite different! 😉 🙏 🎹

[@robertsmith-sj6ib]

Great to hear..would love to go fly with you

[@AL-ns1jm]

Fantastic organist !!

[@TheBaritoneCrooner]

A simply sublime concert Brett! Absolutely loved his rendition of Love In Bloom. 28:35 😉❤️🎶🎹

[@Jeo-fq1zw]

Mission impossible in 4!

[@gels1922]

Fantastic Playing

[@SpitzPrincipal4]

MOST ENJOYED- but WOW this organ has one of the creamiest, smoothest, richest Vox Humana Choruses EVER. The Vox Humana and Strings were and still are the first love for me of the Theatre organ. I've probably played 13:40 to 15:00 over MANY times lately. MANY songs come to mind which I wouldn't mind hearing with that ensemble! Regards, Nigel

[@robstockton911]

That was fun, I love a good theater organist. Thank you, Brett & LATOS!

[@AL-ns1jm]

one of the most beautifull intonated wurlitzers I have ever heard.

[@michaelalberson126]

I love your incredibly amazing playing and ability to play so many genres. And you obviously know this instrument very well. Wurlitzer and kimball are my 2 favorite theater organs. I am a HAMMOND PLAYER. However a HAMMOND cannot do all these wonderful registrations. That instrument is incredible and seemingly very responsive. The little mermaid 🧜‍♀️ song and missing impossible were absolutely incredible. Again you are a incredibly accomplished organist.

[@Jeo-fq1zw]

It's always fun to hear Mission Impossible played in 4/4 time.

[@johniacono3725]

Bravo, i have been at Organ Stop Pizza and it is great. I highly recommend attending a concert there it is a wonderful experience. Brett you are fabulous. Keep the music coming!

[@dad675]

South Africa here ex UK and a member of the Theatre Organ Society in 1960's. What a superb performance and a selection of pieces to show off the brilliance of the instrument not forgetting the musician. I may add the sound recordist as well. All kept me up into the night with my headphones on so I don't keep the neighbours up. Is there a link to this instrument? I'd love to know the history and the "backstage" bits.

[@daviddiffenderfer3836]

See you at ARCA Foxburg, Pa. 10/1/2023

[@garymahon1955]

Fantastic sound. Thank you so very much!!

[@gary1705]

I wondered while watching this how many kids thought that one day I’m going to play one of those 👀🎶 as did The famous Robert Wolf did .

[@robertsmith-sj6ib]

Such a good looking guy

[@jameswest8280]

Only 493 payments left till it's payed off.

[@davwht9]

St Louis FOX theater organ is also very majestic 🎹👩‍❤️‍💋‍👩🌈💞🌄😇😍💟

[@garywhite4678]

FAB U LOUS!!!!!!!!!

[@mj6962]

Wonderfully talented and gifted musician. Always beautiful and entertaining songs, and arrangements. Quick question though… First song, very last note… I heard a nice crash and bass drum. However, I didn’t see hand nor foot press a button to strike that. Where and what button or piston did you used for that last crash at the end? Just being nosy! lol. Thanks for the concert. And thanks in advance for the answer. 👍🏼

[@brettvalliant9930]

There are actually several ways to get the crash cymbal. A stop in the pedal, 2 different thumb buttons on the left, and piano pedal levers for the feet. In the case of the first tune I reached up and turned on all the bass drum and crash cymbal stops for the pedal so when I hit the final pedal note it played them.

[@marktruman2842]

my cousin was Bill Langford, i so miss hearing the organ. My aunts, grandma and all played. what happened to his organ in San Leandro?

[@melchizedek1552]

George Wright was my cousin.

[@jaredini]

What's the registrations for Bali Hai? So smooth and ethereal.

[@davidprince8811]

Is this a Moller organ? It has the sound of one to me. Hope I'm not just sounding dumb!! Mollers , at least to me, have a mellow depth of sound, which this beauty does.

[@praestant8]

No, it is a mongrel of many different sources, Wurlitzer, Kimball, etc. etc. etc.

[@bryangl1]

Beautiful strings, tibias etc, a sumptuous sound indeed I would have preferred the "surf" sound to be left back to its silent era genesis. Still, I guess it was used rarely.

[@christopherstinnett1234]

Is the horizontal trumpet a new stop? I don't remember them when I was there last (of course, it's be six years now).

[@richardharrold9736]

Nope, been there since the 1990s at least.

[@praestant8]

Nicely played showing some diversity. Would have been nice to have tuned the chamade.

[@jameswest8280]

Imagine if this was the organ at you church.

[@user-nq4mk5kp7b]

Does Organ Stop Pizza deliver ? I live in New Haven ,Ct .....

[@richardharrold9736]

Ha! You can probably get pizza closer to home... and at least you have that EMS/GDH organ at Woolsey Hall!

[@thespook9808]

"Mission Impossible" theme was written in 5/4 NOT 4/4. You lost me at this one.

[@richardharrold9736]

Yeah, but there's a place for 4/4 interpretations that are easier to dance to. Used to be very common in the old ballroom days.

[@thespook9808]

@@richardharrold9736 4/4 or even cut time destroys the unique "edge" of the piece.. Playing 5/4 is no different than any other time signature except that there are 5 counts to the measure instead of 4 or 3 or 2.

[@davidlane1169]

I get it that this entire 'organ' stickt flew during & up until 1970, but some organists retro us to death. With all the current internet wunders playing in ancient enormous cathedrals across most of Europe on the very best massive/intricate pipe organs ever assembled, were supposed to be entertained by a hocus/pocus theater organ??? You've lost me there...

[@richardharrold9736]

Theatre organs are their own valid art form. One can appreciate and love all forms of organ equally - a great Wurlitzer or Robert-Morton is just as deserving of affection as are the Cavaillé-Colls at Saint Ouen Rouen, Saint Sulpice Paris and Saint Francois de Sales Lyon, the Hildebrandt at the Wenzelkirche, Naumburg-an-der-Saale, the Walckers at the Annenkirche in Annaberg-Buchholz and Riga Dom, the Sauer at the Berlinerdom, the Schnitgers at Hamburg, Groningen, Alkmaar and Zwolle, the Müllers at Haarlem and Leeuwarden, the Schyven at Antwerp Cathedral, etc etc. There are a substantial number of theatre organs in Germany and the Low Countries too, several of them of British origin - their organists by and large have no snobbishness towards them. In London, the 4/25 Wurlitzer at the Troxy, Limehouse ranks up there as one of the best organs in London, alongside the Schmidt/Willis/Mander at St Paul's, the Willis III at Westminster Cathedral, the Harrison & Harrison at the Temple Church, the T. C. Lewis at Southwark Cathedral, etc etc... There have even been some highly successful crossover instruments which do both theatrical and classical, nowhere more successfully than the John Compton at Southampton Guildhall, which is as good a theatre organ as a Wurlitzer and as good a classical organ as the Willis III at St Mary's Southampton or the Willis/Hele/Harrison at Winchester Cathedral...

[@davidlane1169]

@@richardharrold9736 I get what you are saying locally, we have a very local civic theater that has a beauty fully restored & performed on frequently. My point was some cathedral organs like a Polish built Zych leave us staggering in their dust. Have you seen one?

[@richardharrold9736]

@@davidlane1169 I am aware of Zych and am very impressed by their work, but have yet to experience one in the flesh, sadly. I know Skrabl in Slovenia are doing some amazing work - we have a smallish 4-manual one in London now and it's a very fine thing indeed. Eule in Bautzen are turning out some wonderful organs these days too (e.g. Magdalen Oxford, and St Jakob Straubing)! Even Rieger, a firm I derided for many years, is now turning out some seriously impressive instruments - the new Mainz Dom organ is a stunner. In America, Taylor & Boody and Dobson are turning out absolutely first-rate work - the new Dobson at St Thomas Fifth Avenue has what is for my money one of the finest new organ cases of the last century, anywhere in the world. So don't write off your fellow countrymen! We have examples of both those firms' work here in Britain now, and they are very fine indeed. None of those instruments, however, is the slightest use for playing Cole Porter or Rodgers & Hart or any of that stuff! Which a Wurlitzer is perfect for.

[@timothychapman269]

Yes, I was very much entertained. There is a place for all types of music and your snobbery only diminishes your point. Good grief!

[@richardharrold9736]

@@davidlane1169 I haven't seen a Zych in person, but I am aware of the firm's rapidly growing reputation. Equally, I am aware of the excellent work that the likes of Fritts, Dobson, Taylor & Boody and Fisk are doing in the USA. None of which in any way diminishes the value of fine theatre organs or of the repertoire played on them