This is a digital restoration of the original. 100 pages.
The Jesse Crawford Intermediate Organ Course has been unavailable for years and deserves to be used by
today’s teachers who desire the fastest path to imparting to their students solid theory of music and organ performance
in the popular style of the American theatre organ tradition. This book is written “for pianists, amateur or professional,”
to be used with a teacher, though a consciencous student may glean knowledge and improvement through self study. Though written
with special emphasis for the Hammond organ (the only one available to most people in 1949), his course works well for any organ.
Size of original book was 9" x 12" but I cropped it to fit on the more common 8.5" x 11" size. Some of the content barely
fits into this space, so if you use larger paper you will have a more realistic margin. It is available through MMS as a PDF,
and this is the only way it is available. I hope that you will enjoy looking at some sample pages from Crawford’s Intermediate Organ Course and consider
using it with pianists who want to play or improve in this style.
Made possible by the generous loan of Crawford’s personal
copy by Jeff Weiler. $5.00
Jesse Crawford (1895-1962) was
the organist who brought popular organ music to the people through the medium
of recordings, beginning with 78 rpm records. He was known for his playing
of the great IV/36 Wurlitzer in the Paramount Theatre, Times Square, New York
City. George Gershwin heard him there, and Crawford’s organ arrangement
of
Rhapsody in Blue was
the result. If you would enjoy a sample of several pages (in full resolution)
from the
Advanced Course, you may
get
it here, free for you, as a PDF. The bound copy of the Advanced
Course that you may buy restores the original full 9 x 12 inch paper with a coil binding that allows for easy display on the music rack.
It is my hope that these reissues will stimulate better playing in the theatre organ style and garner more of the respect that Crawford
richly deserves from all organists.
