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Daily Event Details: Tuesday, July 1
Board meeting starting in the morning for Board members. Registration opened all day, and Hospitality room open most of the day into the evening. You need to arrive today or sooner, as the tours on Wednesday start early. Optional tour: The first stop on Tuesday is Descanso Gardens, voted “The Most Romantic Place in Southern California”. Manchester Boddy, publisher of the Los Angeles Daily News purchased 160 acres of undeveloped land in 1937. He cleared the land and built an elegant two-story mansion of 22 rooms. This mansion overlooks 25 acres of live oak forest and a camellia garden you won’t find anywhere else, with tens of thousands of plants of all varieties. (Yes, that is tens of thousands..it’s incredible. He bought an additional 440 acres north of the original property, and mountain springs supply fresh spring water for the gardens. The gardens also include a lovely rose garden, a bird preserve, a lilac garden, and areas which are kept full of the flowers that are blooming in that particular season. You can tour the Boddy Mansion and get a sense of what a beautiful home the Boddys built, really elegant, especially for the time period when it was built. We had several band organ rallies here, and it is truly a wonderful place. Lunch will be on your own at Descanso. The tour will then take you to the Gene Autry Museum, which opened in 1988. It was co-founded by Gene and Jackie Autry to realize his dream of a museum which would exhibit the heritage of the West and show how it influenced America and the world. Gene Autry was known as “the Singing Cowboy”, and his career spanned 60 years in the entertainment industry. In 1940 the theater exhibitors voted him the fourth largest box office attraction, behind only Mickey Rooney, Clark Gable and Spencer Tracy. He also became a broadcast executive and major league baseball owner. The museum is a fascinating place, with displays having to do with Western movies, television, and all the cowboy (and cowgirl) things we grew up with, as well as the history and lore of the Old West. Their rotating displays have been really interesting. At this time we don’t know what the display will be in July, but you can bet it will be worth seeing. There is often entertainment going on, too, in the various parts of the museum. You will also visit the Griffith Park Carousel. This lovely Merry-Go-Round was built in 1928 by the Spillman Engineering Company, it was brought to Griffith Park in 1937. The Merry-Go-Round features 68 horses, each one a jumper. Each horse is finely carved with jewel-encrusted bridles, detailed draped blankets and decorated with sunflowers and lion’s heads. A Stinson 175 Military band Organ, reputed to be the largest band organ accompanying a carousel on the West Coast, plays over 1500 selections. This carousel has entertained generations of Californians over the years, including many AMICAns. Back at the Hotel after dinner on your own the Hospitality room will be open, with special entertainment and fun. Wednesday, July 2 Official opening day, with tours starting at 8:00 a.m. Wednesday and Thursdays tours are collection tours, and what collections you will see! The North tour includes the perennial favorite, San Sylmar, where you will see the Nethercutt collection of mechanical music, cars, furniture, radiator mascots and more. The ground floor of the main museum is known as the “Grand Salon”, and grand is the right word. It is a beautiful room, if something of this size and scope can be called a room, full of the crown jewels of the Automobile collection. The collection consists of some 200 American and European automobiles from 1898 to 1982, all in perfect condition and drivable. As you can imagine, prizes from all the major auto shows are in abundance. The fourth floor, “Cloud 99”, houses the fine array of mechanical music, from small musical watches and lovely music boxes to huge orchestrions, reproducing pianos, nickelodeons, and the grand theater organ. This instrument has four manuals and over 5000 pipes. One of the latest acquisitions is the 1912 Pullman Railcar and 1937 Canadian Pacific Hudson locomotive. This is interesting to go through, as it is outfitted just as it would have been when it was in service. The other collection on the North tour is the Nix collection. It is housed in the “musik haus” out back, with other areas for music boxes and street organs. Frank started collecting music boxes in 1983, and what a time it has been since then. The Nix collection seemed to take on a life of its own, and includes reproducing pianos, automata, clocks, a Weber Unika, a Weber Styria, a Hupfeld C131, a Link, an Imhof-Mukel, and a few street organs. There are also monkey organs and other “goodies”. In another room are the street organs, including a 1905 Ruth 35-A, a Carl Frei Dutch Street organ and a Limonaire. Lunch will be at the Nix home. The South tour is a long bus ride, but oh, so worth it. You will leave early in the morning with a stop at either the Ralph and Gloria Schack collection or the Mike and Kathy Choate collection. Ralph and Gloria have a wonderful collection, everything top of the line and in perfect condition. Their lovely home is filled with such goodies as a Weber Otero, a Welte organ which is as beautiful to look at as it is to listen to, a Mills Violano, a super Cremona J, some really fantastic music boxes and clocks, and so much more, including three or four extraordinary monkey organs. Actually, the whole collection is extraordinary. Mike and Kathy Choate have, also, a marvelous collection. This one includes American machines. He has one of the nicest Links you will ever see, a Coinola Midget, a Violano, a Seeburg style 8, Coinola X, Wurlitzer 105 and 146 band organs, and a piano which has been in Kathy’s family since the mid 1800’s that Mike had an electronic system added to, since no one in the family played. He has jukeboxes of all types, including a Scopotone, to name a few of the many items you will enjoy here. They have a lovely home with custom tile work throughout, and are very gracious hosts. You will eat lunch and enjoy movies on the bus on the way further south to the Solana Beach site of Mike and Marilyn Ames magnificent collection. Here you will see a huge, beautiful Mortier organ fitted with Mike’s Midi System, which allows a wide range of music, and this organ can play anything, from sweet waltzes to stirring marches,. You’ll also hear beautiful music coming from the recently restored Weber Solea, and you will want to just sit, listen and dream to this one. Other fine instruments include a Steinway reproducing piano, harpsichord and Violano playing in tandem through his midi system. This is really fascinating to hear, and you won’t hear it anywhere but at this collection. There is a Rainey BanjoOrchestra, an Arburo dance organ, a large DeCap Dutch street organ, Wurlitzer Pianorchestra style 30, a Phonoliszt, Model B, and several other great instruments. For the scientists in the group, if asked nicely Mike might demonstrate his Tesla coil straight out of Frankenstein’s laboratory. A tower clock, and a huge single-stroke engine are also housed in this museum to end all museums, and as you look around you will find other interesting things. When you get back to the Hotel there will be a “welcome Dinner” with some special entertainment from Germany and our Pumper contest. . .see who will go home with “Footsie” this year. Thursday, July 3
Thursdays tours are the same…you will go on the one you missed on Wednesday. Dinner will be on your own, followed by a true nickelodeon ... and evening of silent movies using a 1909 projector with piano accompaniment. Click here to see the Official Judging Guidelines.
Friday, July 4 Breakfast on your own, open time with entertainment in the Hospitality room. Buses will take you to the Reagan Library for a tour with lunch in the shadow of Air Force One. The Library features tours taking you back to another era.. The displays are phenomenal, showing the eras of Reagan’s movie career, his days as Governor of California and his time as President, plus a tour of Air Force One. There are displays of gifts he and Nancy received from visiting dignitaries, gowns Nancy wore to State affairs, newspaper clippings, and much, much, more. It really is a fascinating place. You will return to the Hotel, have dinner on your own, and again board the bus for a trip to the Hollywood Bowl with music by the L.A. Philharmonic Orchestra, capped off with a rousing fireworks display. One note of caution: We are trying to obtain plenty of tickets, but we must have your registration by May 20th to guarantee a ticket for the Bowl…..PLEASE REGISTER EARLY Saturday, July 5 This is the day for the Mart, which will be larger than usual by far. Anything pertaining to Mechanical Music is welcome, and we urge you to bring the things you want to sell. Workshops, too, are on the agenda for today, and we have some wonderful ones. Our workshops this year will cover a large range of musical topics for novice to advanced restorers, but especially focused on subjects for the beginning collector/restorer. “Techniques, tools and materials for repair of automatic musical instruments” by Richard Ingram. “Restoring a Pumper Piano”. This will cover rebuilding a pumper piano from start to finish, presented by Diane DeTar and Wayne Johnston, player piano technicians since 1975. “Introduction to Organettes”, a comprehensive look at the organette with open discussion by Leslie Hoffman. “Building a Monkey Organ” by Bill Klinger. Bill has been involved with restoration of organs and pianos for over 50 years and has built several monkey organs from scratch. “Roll Scanning and Production, Plus Music of the 30’s” by David Saul, a roll reproducer and noted author. David wrote the section on reproducing pianos in the “Encyclopedia of Automatic Musical Instruments”by Q. David Bowers. “Midi Systems for Automatic Music” by Mike Ames the pioneer in this field and developer of the most popular system for Mills Violanos. “Automatic Musical Instrument’s Musical Partners”. The simultaneous development of Ragtime and the Mechanical Music Industry in America presented by Stephen Kent Goodman. “So You Want To Own a Band Organ” by Tim Trager. Tim was playing band organs when he was still in his crib. “Stories of the Good Old Days and the Mills Violano” presented by Don Barr. Don always draws a crowd for his programs. (First Session) “Mills Violano Workshop” with open discussion led by Don Barr. (Second Session) “The Differences Between Reproducing Systems” by Josh Rapier. Josh is the new star in the restoration field. “A Biography of Dave Ramey, Sr. plus the development and production of the Ramey BanjoOrchestra. Presented by Dave Ramey, Jr. “Cross Stitch With Liz Barnhart”. Always a favorite with the ladies. As you can see, some of these workshops are for those who feel they can’t afford the larger instruments but would like to start with a more reasonably priced item and repair it themselves. Saturday evening is the banquet, with entertainment suitable for dancing or just enjoying the Dan Comins’ “Titanic Jazz Band”, with Robbie Rhodes as pianist. Many of you know Robbie, either for his piano virtuosity – he plays at most of the jazz festivals around California – or through his well-known and much appreciated “Mechanical Music Digest” on the net, which features all kinds of articles regarding instruments and the care of them. The table favor will be presented tonight, and the chapter is rightfully proud of this one. It has been in the works for about a year and a half and it’s going to be a favorite with collectors. Sunday, July 6 Today starts off with the farewell breakfast and business meeting, including a presentation for the next convention in 2009. Following the breakfast there will be many open houses with wonderful instruments to see and enjoy within about a 50-mile radius. We are planning a bus tour of three collections (NO PRIVATE CARS…BUS TOUR ONLY) you probably haven’t seen before, and we’re working on a fourth. They will feature mechanical music, automata, arcade and prize-winning classic American sports cars, all in fabulous settings. This is dependent on filling a bus. Sandy Lechtick is a nationally known collector of penny arcade machines, electrified advertising automatons and amusement park memorabilia. The 2,000 sq. ft. arcade is an eclectic and unusual display of coin-operated machines from the turn of the century to the 1970’s. This unique collection includes: fortune tellers, lung testers, boxing and strength machines, gambling devices, mutoscopes and peep shows, shooting galleries, games of skill and chance and much, much more. Dana Bashor lives in a gated community in a wonderful home. He collects music boxes, animated pictures, automata, and his latest addition is a truly super Welte Organ, which suits the grandeur of the home, and fills the house with music. (He also has a dance floor) Fred and Deanne Roth are collectors of Classic American sports cars, and what a collection it is. There are several prize-winning cars on display. He has cars you may remember from your “childhood”…or maybe not. Do you remember the Muntz cars made by “Madman Muntz”?…You can see a gorgeous one at the Roths. Fred, his son, and Deanne do almost all of the restoration themselves, and you will be impressed. There is a band organ, and a few other musical items, including a juke box that is really rare. Lunch will be included. |
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