Piano/keyboard to organ transfer

[berbie]

I have learned to play the keyboard fairly well,(but by no means great) by means of courses that I purchased from various and sundry sources, Ex. Jermaine Griggs,
Ethel Austin, etc. I also learned a GREAT DEAL on this site.

There is an organ in my church that no one plays.  It is an old and simple drawbar organ, but it plays well. It has two sets of keys and one octave of pedals.    

I play songs on the organ(in private)but they don't sound good to me. Apparently, it is difficult to go from a keyboard to an organ. (I can play fair organ on my keyboard)

My question is this: If you were going to try to learn to play a drawbar organ, where would you begin, considering that you could already play good enough to conduct a basic church service using a piano or keyboard?  Do you play treble on one set of keys and chords on the other while playing the pedals? Or do you use one or the other of the sets of keys, playing chords and treble as well as the pedals?   What about sustain?  And the drawbars? Would it be best to stop playing the keyboard and just concentrate on the organ?  On a scale of one to ten, how difficult is it to make the change? In other words, how long would the average person sound terrible while making the change.  Any advice will be very much appreciated.

Berbie

[diverse379]

the first thing to getting the organ to sound like something is getting the drawbars configured to make good music

second you wont have great success if you play the organ like you play a piano

now if you have jermaines videos there is a section where he shows you how to play piano with a bass player well that is how you have to play organ as if you already have a bass player

because the feet are your bass player

you say you play fair organ on your keyboard
well you can start with playing bass with your left hand
and double the bass with your foot

first press the white Bb keys on the left

and pull out the first four draw bars
then pull out all the nine drawbars but push the second one in halfway on the set on the othe side of the two drawbars that are by itself

if you say you hae one octave you probably have a spinet

with this combination you will have a pretty aggressive sound

which is better then having a lame sound

the four draw bar set up gives you a good bass line hand and good melody and not to bad chordal moves

the one with all the drawbars pulled out except for the second brown one
gives you a very edgey sound for your left hand to do some work

make sure you play high enough so your chords dont sound muddy

there are three stages you need to get to
i will give it to you like i was told when i first started

you wont learn it over night so i will show you how to cheat first then how to get good sound


cheat method one
play bass with your left hand and follow bass with your foot or keep time by playing half notes or quarter notes on the root or root fifth with your foot
right hand playss chordal melody

cheat method two
foot plays root
left hand duplicates right hand

real method one
play thrd and seventh of every chord in lefth hand
right hand plays melody either in chords or single note
left foot pedals roots
or walks simple lines

real method two
lefthand plays 3rd fifthe 9th and sevent
righ hand plays single note melody or chrdal melody
foot plays roots or simplle bass lines


rhythm
your foot and your left hand are tied together they either land at the same time or they land in a rhythm
if you dont do this you will always sound like you dont know what you are doing

some possible rhythms are every quarter note

every eithth note

left hand on 2 and four
foot on1 and 2
 
left hand on 2 and 4
foot on 1

i dont know what videos of jermaines you have but
\
but i have both of ethel caffie austins videos

you can play oh when the saints piano style using cheat method one

you can try what a friend using cheat method two
and try using the stride method but use your foot for the oomp
and the same left hand structure she showed for the stride paterns
you just use them on the organ

on video two
when she does amazing grace
try using method three and four
she was in f
so
AE for the first f chord
AEb for the second f chord

AD foir the Bb chord
AbB for the Diminished chord
etc



as far as the jermaine videos
and getting good on the pedals

practice tapping with your left foot but tap first a little right then a little left
to imitate the pedal work

i dont have 101 by jermaine so i dont know what he taught

but pretty musch i would say to start with duplicate the right hand chord in your left hand chord


later on try to vary it a little

take a note out add a note like maybe take out the root or the fifth

add a nint or a 11

I hope this helps

[MikaSue]

Great reply Diverse!

[berbie]

Hey Diverse, thanks for the post.  I saw later where you also posted info on some courses relative to the same subject.  That too was very informative. 

I think I like Cheat method 2, or real method 1 as a way to start.  I will try them both when I next play the organ at church.  I am still undecided , though, as to whether to attempt the project as a whole.  It seems to be difficult, and might take away from my keyboard playing.  I am 69, and would not be comfortable embarking on a long term learning project.(I have been playing the keyboard about 8 years). 

One question, though.  How about the use of the two keyboards.  (upper and lower) You called them manuals.  Are they played together, right hand on one, left hand on the other?  Or are they played as two separate sets of keys.  Or used in both ways? 

I gather from your information that this cannot be done lightly with the expectation of being successful. 

When playing the organ on the keyboard, I run bass with my left hand, and chord melody or comp with my right hand. It will not be hard to play the bass with my feet. The rest will take some doing. 

Thanks for getting me started.

Berbie

[diverse379]

Hey Diverse, thanks for the post.  I saw later where you also posted info on some courses relative to the same subject.  That too was very informative. 

I think I like Cheat method 2, or real method 1 as a way to start.  I will try them both when I next play the organ at church.  I am still undecided , though, as to whether to attempt the project as a whole.  It seems to be difficult, and might take away from my keyboard playing.  I am 69, and would not be comfortable embarking on a long term learning project.(I have been playing the keyboard about 8 years). 

One question, though.  How about the use of the two keyboards.  (upper and lower) You called them manuals.  Are they played together, right hand on one, left hand on the other?  Or are they played as two separate sets of keys.  Or used in both ways? 

I gather from your information that this cannot be done lightly with the expectation of being successful. 

When playing the organ on the keyboard, I run bass with my left hand, and chord melody or comp with my right hand. It will not be hard to play the bass with my feet. The rest will take some doing. 

Thanks for getting me started.

Berbie

I didnt know you were 69 well good for you for continuing to pursue knowledge

to answere your question if you follow the draw bar settings i showed you
you could play bass on the manual with the first four pulled out
and play right hand on either manual



that way you could pretty much treat the hammond the same way you did your keyboard


this is by not the onlysetting there is there are millions of combinatioms

true there is a lot to learn but at the same time it is not realy as hard all that either so just play to the glory of God you will be fine

[berbie]

Hey Diverse:

I tried playing the organ at my church using the info that you provided.  I was able to do much better.  I discovered that I had to let my left hand be much less active, and to just pump the pedals.  I had to consciously withhold movement in my left hand, and just play chords or part of chords.  With only one octave of pedals, it was somewhat easy to work the bass.  You have to change your way of thinking to incorporate three things instead of two.  Left, right, and bass. 

You have much more control over your sound than on the keyboard.
I played with the drawbars, varying from the basic settings that you gave.  Small adjustments had a great effect on the sound. One would just have to learn what works better by trying small adjustments to the drawbars( I guess).  Or are there settings that always work( like the one you recommended)?

I believe I can learn the organ. It might not be as difficult as first thought (on this simple organ)  There is some nagging concern that it might change my keyboard style, though. 

I appreciate your help,

Berbie

[diverse379]

great news i like to hear good news

you should have a concern with whether is will change your keyboard playing

but only if you stop playing keyboard

the truth is whatever you spend most of your time on that is going to become your comfort zone

there are things that you get away with on the organ that you wont get away with on the piano


I have an organ at home but i rarely play it almost never the only time i really get to play organ is at church

but i will put the organ setting on and work on my left hand chords tritones etc

like i said whatever you spend your time on will become comrfortable if you spend time on both
then you will be comfortable on both

since your organ is at church if you have a keyboard at home you most likely will be spending more time on keyboard stuff

and you will make a concsious effort to play organ

in that case there will be no disintegration of your piano skills

but the bright side of the coin is learning how to chord with your left hand will add to your piano playing sometimes you can play small sections of a song with just left hand voicings

i know piano players who play all left hand voicings even though there is no bass player