Big Bertha is back! Alabama Theater’s Mighty Wurlitzer is ready to rock after repairs

The Alabama Theater The Mighty Wurlitzer pipe organ is back in Birmingham and ready to rock.

The beloved instrument, affectionately known as “Big Bertha,” was reinstalled at the downtown theater on Tuesday, October 22, after an eight-month absence for repairs and maintenance. The elaborately decorated console of the Mighty Wurlitzer – that is, the part that the public sees, with the keyboards and pedals – left the building on February 18 and went to the AE Schlueter Pipe Organ Co. in Lithonia, Georgia.

“I wasn’t worried at all,” he said Gary W Joneshouse organist of the Alabama Theater. “I was really looking forward to it, because I knew what the end result would be. I knew it would make my job of playing so much better and easier.

“That said, I was a little nervous when the people from Schlueter Pipe Organ arrived and took her out of the building,” Jones added. “But it literally took me about three minutes to figure out that this team knew what they were doing. They had done this before. They were very respectful and very careful. After about three minutes I thought, “Hey, let’s go get coffee.” I stayed out of the way and let them do their job because they were consummate professionals. We were very lucky to have that team involved.”

READ: Alabama Theater’s Mighty Wurlitzer Is Ready for Repair: ‘It’s Not Goodbye, It’s See You!’

Maintenance on the vintage instrument is meticulous and fastidious, as you would expect, and the theater has raised money for a Organ console renovation projecthoping to reach a goal of $160,000 and posting information for potential donors through its website. The Alabama Theater is owned by Birmingham Landmarks Inc., a nonprofit organization that also owns the nearby theater Lyrical Theatre.

There was also a specific timetable to take into account. Organizers of the Alabama had promised that Big Bertha would be back in action for an Oct. 27 screening of the 1925 silent film version of “The Phantom of the Opera.” And indeed, Tom Helms will play the organ on Sunday, with a score he composed for the classic horror film. (More about the ‘Phantom’ screening here.)

“Everything is fine. Everything is working,” Jones told AL.com this week. “We have a lot of confidence in it at the moment.”

He was the first official organist to play Big Bertha upon its return, ensuring that the repairs were successful and that nothing was damaged in transit. The past few days have been busy at the theater, Jones said, as he and the organ crew chief: theater volunteer Larry Donaldsongot Big Bertha to settle down and work out a few kinks.

“When you do a project like this — with something I like to initially call mechanical chaos — there’s always going to be something we didn’t expect,” Jones said. “A few people said, ‘Oh, you know what, you roll her back in, plug her in and you’re good to go.’ And I’m like, ‘That’s not the real world.’

The organ’s console, while extremely important, is really just one part of the Mighty Wurlitzer, which also has three chambers hidden in the bowels of the theater. These rooms contain pipes of various sizes that produce specific sounds – violins, tubas, oboes, sleigh bells, bird whistles and more – and real instruments, such as a piano keyboard, drums, cymbals and a xylophone, that play when activated by an organist .

The rooms are cramped, asymmetrical spaces in the theater that most people will never see, accessible only by climbing narrow ladders, maneuvering through narrow crevices, and walking across wooden planks over steep slopes.

READ: The magical ways of a long-time volunteer keep the Alabama Theater (and its Mighty Wurlitzer) running smoothly

Big Bertha’s console, on the other hand, is well known to theatergoers who have seen the majestic pipe organ slowly emerge from its hiding place beneath the stage, with musicians like Jones at the keyboards.

“The most exciting ride you’ll ever take is riding that thing up while you’re playing,” Jones said. “And of course it’s the best place in the house once you reach the top, because you’re in control of such a powerful instrument. Then you turn around and there are 2,000 people watching you. So you are now the ears, the eyes, the connection that people have to Alabama.

Jones arranged for Big Bertha to get a public test run this weekend, taking a seat at the organ for a sing-along session Friday in Alabama as a prelude to that evening’s screening of “Hocus Pocus.” He has been the house organist since 2009 and says that performing on this historic instrument is never boring.

“It’s exciting, adrenaline,” Jones said. “You fascinate a group of people. You have people who have heard that organ a hundred times, and they will listen to everything you do. And you have people who have never heard of that organ. This is their first time, their first exposure. You always want that experience to be just as good, so I am always very conscious. When people leave, I better have done my job, and I better have done my job well.

READ: Meet the man who makes Christmas merry at the Alabama Theater

The Wurlitzer Organ (technically known as the Wurlitzer Opus 1783, Style Publix 1) was built in 1927 and has been a key feature of the Alabama Theater for almost a century. The theater opened on December 25, 1927 and the Mighty Wurlitzer was a dazzling part of the show.

“It is not my intention to take away from the beauty of the architecture of the Alabama Theater because it is a beautiful building,” Jones said. “But the one thing that makes the Alabama so unique and memorable is the organ. When that big red, gold and black console emerges from the well, you have changed. It’s very emotional. You know, it’s a living, breathing instrument. And it connects with the human soul because there is a presence there. So you don’t just have that console visually, that’s what the audience sees. But hearing that living, breathing instrument is simply a mind-blowing experience. It is the most talked-about feature and part of the theater.

In case you’re wondering, three things were important in the organ’s recent repairs: “New SAM (stop-action magnet) assemblies, refurbished stop tab rails and reconfigured stop tabs – all things that make the organ work,” February said posts on social media from the theater.

And this won’t be the only time the Mighty Wurlitzer leaves the building for renovations. According to Jones, the organ is scheduled for “a cosmetic repaint, the nice stuff” in the coming years. That will probably also happen outside the city.

“As a very complex, living, breathing machine, Bertha always requires routine and regular maintenance,” said Jones. “Every few decades major maintenance and upgrades are needed to keep her in top shape. Our last major overhaul was in the summer of 1998, so it was her turn.”