Who is the MVP of the best baseball teams? The ballpark organist! Our guest on this episode, Steve Hogan, is musically responsible for three World Series championships with the San Francisco Giants. We talk with Steve about the way music plays an important role in sporting events and, of course, we have to get deep into the details. Celebrate this year’s Fall Classic with a fun conversation on the unique blend of tradition and newness that is ballpark music. Next week: a regular episode!
Music heard in this episode: Steve Hogan - “Woodson by Night” from ‘Elements’ by Mark Popeney, Steve Hogan - “Take Me Out to the Ballgame”, Rihanna and Calvin Harris - “We Found Love”, Europe - “The Final Countdown”, Steve Hogan - “The Star-Spangled Banner”
Send us your thoughts at NeverMusicPod@gmail.com
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00:00 --> 00:02 [SPEAKER_00]: What are the fans like in your stadium number one?
00:02 --> 00:09 [SPEAKER_00]: And if they do ever get out of control, do you feel like it's somehow your social responsibility to melal them out with the songs that you play?
00:10 --> 00:12 [SPEAKER_02]: Short answer is no way.
00:12 --> 00:14 [SPEAKER_02]: Routy or the better for my point of view.
00:14 --> 00:15 [SPEAKER_02]: For bud.
00:30 --> 00:34 [SPEAKER_00]: Sure, uh, hey, I'm Nicole and I'm Mark and this is Nevermind the Music.
00:34 --> 00:36 [SPEAKER_00]: Who are we talking to today, Mark?
00:37 --> 00:38 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm glad you asked Nicole.
00:38 --> 00:40 [SPEAKER_01]: We are talking to Steve Hogan.
00:41 --> 00:48 [SPEAKER_01]: Steve Hogan, a man who wears many hats, one, the organist of the San Francisco Giants baseball organization.
00:49 --> 00:56 [SPEAKER_01]: That's right, the organist, but also senior director of music analysis at Pandora, the streaming app.
00:56 --> 00:58 [SPEAKER_01]: So maybe we'll talk about that a little bit.
00:58 --> 00:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome Steve.
00:59 --> 01:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to Nevermind Music.
01:01 --> 01:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Hey, thank you for having me.
01:02 --> 01:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Good to see you again, Mark, and nice to meet you, Nicole.
01:05 --> 01:05 [SPEAKER_00]: You too.
01:05 --> 01:08 [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's cool that Pandora's like your side gig, you know.
01:08 --> 01:11 [SPEAKER_00]: It's kind of the other way around.
01:11 --> 01:14 [SPEAKER_01]: I actually want to ask about exactly that.
01:14 --> 01:32 [SPEAKER_01]: But this is one of those moments where there is a history listeners have already heard the girl I knew in high school who grew up to be a woman working for all the major bands and stuff we already heard her and there was a history there when she was crazy Mariah Carey girl that I went to high school with.
01:33 --> 01:40 [SPEAKER_01]: Steve is a slightly different thing because he was my boss in my first gig outside of college.
01:40 --> 01:46 [SPEAKER_01]: I have mentioned before that I used to be a music analyst for savage beast technologies.
01:46 --> 01:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Am I allowed to say that?
01:48 --> 01:49 [SPEAKER_01]: Or has that been buried?
01:49 --> 01:50 [SPEAKER_01]: Is that being scrubbed by the internet?
01:51 --> 01:51 [SPEAKER_01]: The name.
01:51 --> 02:04 [SPEAKER_02]: I think you're allowed to say it, there's not too much evidence of the startup version of this company, but yes, say it, probably this is the, this is the, the one piece of evidence on the internet that Pandora used to be called Savage Beast.
02:04 --> 02:18 [SPEAKER_01]: And I, I don't know what I mentioned it, but I mentioned it on one of our mail bag episodes or something that that I was somebody listening to music and turning that music into data that the algorithm would eventually use to match to other songs.
02:19 --> 02:20 [SPEAKER_01]: I did though learn a lot of cool music.
02:21 --> 02:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I worked for then Savage Beast for about a year, and it was an awesome part-time gig, as I was getting some teaching experience also, and then I left for grad school down in Southern California.
02:31 --> 02:31 [SPEAKER_01]: But
02:32 --> 02:43 [SPEAKER_01]: Steve, I was lucky enough to have you literally send me a way to Southern California by playing one of my pieces that I used for my portfolio to get into grad school.
02:43 --> 02:55 [SPEAKER_01]: Do you remember meeting me at a university coral rehearsal room sitting down on their grand piano and then playing some Debussy rip off music that I had composed?
02:55 --> 02:56 [SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
02:56 --> 02:58 [SPEAKER_01]: What a fun experience that was.
02:58 --> 03:08 [SPEAKER_02]: And we had other piano players at the office that had a little more classical chop, so I was an odd pick, but happy to assist in that endeavor.
03:08 --> 03:09 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm glad I worked out Mark.
03:28 --> 03:41 [SPEAKER_01]: It's not a piece I've had played in a while, but I got a good recording of it, and then to help me get into grad school, whereas having a community choir sight-read my choir piece wasn't exactly the best grad school portfolio piece.
03:41 --> 03:47 [SPEAKER_01]: But for me, Nicole, when you and I have been bouncing ideas off of each other of who we could have as guests.
03:47 --> 03:48 [SPEAKER_01]: For me, it's often like
03:49 --> 03:53 [SPEAKER_01]: What's an intersection with music and psychology that kind of nobody ever hears about?
03:54 --> 03:54 [SPEAKER_01]: Right?
03:54 --> 04:03 [SPEAKER_01]: There's something so special and iconic about music at sports that I thought of Steve as being somebody we had to talk to.
04:04 --> 04:19 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not famously not a sports person, but I do love how crowds work together and when a lot of people are in one space together how they can feel instantly connected to each other and I think of a lot of that comes with the music that you hear in these spaces.
04:20 --> 04:33 [SPEAKER_00]: And I have a lot of questions for Steve about how much of that is his manipulation, how much does the feed off of the crowd to decide what music to play, where who's kind of driving the bus in terms of setting the vibe,
04:34 --> 04:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, I mean, do you want me to speak about that or do you want to... Let me ask you specifically.
04:39 --> 04:42 [SPEAKER_00]: Do you get to write your own setlist?
04:43 --> 04:46 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, do you play what you want is that our things vetted in advance?
04:47 --> 04:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, how does that work?
04:48 --> 04:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, the picking of the music?
04:49 --> 04:50 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, yeah.
04:50 --> 04:54 [SPEAKER_02]: Um, right off the bat, yes, I get to pick whatever songs I want.
04:54 --> 04:55 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I try to...
04:57 --> 05:02 [SPEAKER_02]: make it family friend, nothing too controversial, but in general, because it's instrumental.
05:04 --> 05:04 [SPEAKER_02]: They don't care.
05:04 --> 05:05 [SPEAKER_02]: They trust me now.
05:05 --> 05:07 [SPEAKER_02]: I've been doing this for 15 years.
05:08 --> 05:09 [SPEAKER_02]: There are no limitations placed on me.
05:09 --> 05:11 [SPEAKER_02]: I can basically pick whatever songs I want.
05:12 --> 05:15 [SPEAKER_02]: But the job has kind of two sides to it.
05:15 --> 05:18 [SPEAKER_02]: One is playing actual songs at different points.
05:19 --> 05:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Like between innings, I might get three to six
05:26 --> 05:35 [SPEAKER_02]: And that's playing a proper song, I have to arrange it so it fits into that ining break time and try to tie it up with a bow, you know, when the batter's coming up to the plate.
05:35 --> 05:36 [SPEAKER_02]: So I got to keep my eye on the game.
05:37 --> 05:49 [SPEAKER_02]: But then, for example, when the giants are batting, I have kind of a repertoire of what we call crowd prompts that are the classic little bits you'll hear that gets the crowd clapping along.
05:49 --> 05:49 [SPEAKER_02]: Sure.
05:49 --> 05:51 [SPEAKER_02]: And that's kind of a more narrow repertoire.
05:51 --> 05:52 [SPEAKER_02]: I've maybe.
05:53 --> 05:56 [SPEAKER_02]: a dozen different things that I'll play in different situations.
05:57 --> 06:22 [SPEAKER_02]: But you're talking not even like songs, more like bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump bump
06:22 --> 06:36 [SPEAKER_02]: The repertoire, I think, I'm always looking for new ones because I get kind of bored with the same narrow set, but there are certain bread and butter prompts that just work every time, that sometimes you just got to pile those on because it's appropriate.
06:36 --> 06:41 [SPEAKER_02]: And then you look for ones like a situation where the batter hits.
06:42 --> 06:58 [SPEAKER_02]: five, six foul balls in a row and it's just keeping alive and I'll play stay in a live, you know, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk, Bunk,
07:05 --> 07:31 [SPEAKER_01]: the word you need them to grab so like you're doing I don't know if you're improvising or if you write out an arrangement but you have to draw out the thing that causes that association right like you can't do the bund about bump bump bump bump bump like baseline that everybody knows from that you need to do the vocal line right and obviously that you usually would do the vocal line but like you're arranging or improvising with that in mind right that there's one little nugget or else the song you're playing is just totally random and makes no sense right
07:31 --> 07:32 [SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
07:32 --> 07:37 [SPEAKER_02]: And in that situation, I have exactly five seconds to play.
07:37 --> 07:39 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, so I can't mess around with the verse.
07:40 --> 07:41 [SPEAKER_02]: It's cut right to the chase.
07:41 --> 07:51 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, that's it's got to be so iconic like that that there's even even young people recognize staying alive, you know, totally.
07:51 --> 08:06 [SPEAKER_00]: You said that you get bored playing the same music over a note where I'm putting words into your mouth, but what I'm hearing is that you must play the same music over and over again, so it must get a little bit boring and you might have to iterate and try new things.
08:06 --> 08:12 [SPEAKER_00]: Have you ever tried to play a song that you thought was going to be awesome and really hit it out of the park?
08:14 --> 08:14 [SPEAKER_00]: get it.
08:14 --> 08:19 [SPEAKER_00]: It's funny because the baseball, but like it didn't work and it was just a complete miss.
08:19 --> 08:20 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know about a complete miss.
08:21 --> 08:24 [SPEAKER_02]: That's more on the, you know, the actual songs.
08:24 --> 08:30 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll play also before the game for about a half hour while people are coming into the park to kind of
08:31 --> 08:34 [SPEAKER_02]: set the tone and provide that atmosphere.
08:34 --> 08:41 [SPEAKER_02]: And sure, I'll bring songs in there that I'll try exactly one time and afterwards, be like, that didn't sound good.
08:42 --> 08:48 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll learn it at home, you know, and then to play it on the ballpark organ, it's just sometimes a little different and just doesn't work.
08:49 --> 08:57 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm sure there have been occasions where I tried out a new crowd prompt and they just did not get on board with it and I felt discouraged and abandoned it.
08:58 --> 09:01 [SPEAKER_02]: But the last few years, I've had a pretty set repertoire.
09:01 --> 09:17 [SPEAKER_02]: It really changed actually just a couple of years ago because when the pitch clock, I don't know if you know this Nicole, the major league baseball introduced a pitch clock where they only have 15 seconds after the pitch to get to throw the next pitch.
09:18 --> 09:19 [SPEAKER_00]: and so really controversial.
09:21 --> 09:25 [SPEAKER_02]: I love it overall because it's short and the game automatically.
09:25 --> 09:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, the four hour game is the thing in the past.
09:27 --> 09:29 [SPEAKER_02]: And so it really tightened it up.
09:29 --> 09:33 [SPEAKER_02]: It's good for the fans, but it also squeezed my time to play.
09:34 --> 09:44 [SPEAKER_02]: Because it used to be the batter would take as long as he pleased, get out of the batter spots between pitches, adjust the batting gloves, whatever drop
09:46 --> 09:50 [SPEAKER_02]: whatever they want to do, you know, and the pitcher would do laps around the mound.
09:51 --> 09:52 [SPEAKER_02]: It got ridiculous.
09:53 --> 09:56 [SPEAKER_02]: But in that case, you know, I could develop a little prompt more.
09:56 --> 09:59 [SPEAKER_02]: And now they've had to shorten up.
10:00 --> 10:01 [SPEAKER_02]: So that's, that's been a challenge.
10:01 --> 10:11 [SPEAKER_00]: I can see how it would be kind of liberating, too, because you know that you have, if you just can, a bunch of 15 second musical interludes, you just like have them ready to go.
10:12 --> 10:16 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, sure, but I have to be able to pull it out at a moment's notice.
10:16 --> 10:22 [SPEAKER_02]: I guess that's the challenge, like not to be too repetitive to mix it up and pitch after pitch.
10:23 --> 10:33 [SPEAKER_02]: You kind of develop this intuition of which one's fit in what situation like summer appropriate for a two strike thing summer appropriate to get the at bat started.
10:33 --> 10:38 [SPEAKER_01]: This is the equivalent like of being in a cover band and having to do like a 19 hour set because you've got
10:40 --> 10:46 [SPEAKER_01]: 54 batters minimum, right, and each one could be anywhere between one and like 10 pitches.
10:46 --> 10:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And so it's not like you can do the stay in a live thing 17 times in the same game.
10:51 --> 10:53 [SPEAKER_01]: So you have to have such a massive one off.
10:54 --> 10:55 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you've got to have a massive one.
10:56 --> 10:58 [SPEAKER_01]: And I do feel like we've buried the lead a little bit here.
10:58 --> 10:58 [SPEAKER_01]: I did.
10:59 --> 11:05 [SPEAKER_01]: In my introduction, I should have said, this is coming out right as the world series is upon us by the way.
11:05 --> 11:08 [SPEAKER_01]: And that's a we recording this a couple of weeks before that.
11:08 --> 11:14 [SPEAKER_01]: So we do not yet know who's in the world series, but I have to ask, are you, do you grow up or are you a giants fan?
11:14 --> 11:17 [SPEAKER_01]: I know you didn't grow up near the Bay Area, but you and I met at East Bay.
11:18 --> 11:22 [SPEAKER_01]: Were you an athletics guy or a giant sky or East Coast teams?
11:23 --> 11:28 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, I mean, growing up outside of Boston, I'm a lifelong Red Sox fan, full disclosure.
11:28 --> 11:29 [SPEAKER_00]: That's the right answer.
11:30 --> 11:43 [SPEAKER_02]: In the, when I moved to California in 1996, I immediately adopted the Giants, because I really preferred their announcers on the TV and the radio.
11:43 --> 11:48 [SPEAKER_02]: They had John Miller amazing, former announcer for the Red Sox actually 1980 to 82.
11:51 --> 11:57 [SPEAKER_02]: and then they have two long-time TV personalities, Mike Crucco and Flynn Kuiper, who are totally amazing.
11:57 --> 12:05 [SPEAKER_02]: And a younger guy who's now a veteran as well, Dave Fleming, they have a great crew who call the games on both the radio and the TV.
12:05 --> 12:08 [SPEAKER_02]: So it was just more entertaining for me and
12:09 --> 12:10 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, they had a nicer ballpark too.
12:11 --> 12:15 [SPEAKER_02]: I would say they had a nice new ballpark was pack bell in those days.
12:15 --> 12:17 [SPEAKER_02]: Just got built when I moved here.
12:17 --> 12:19 [SPEAKER_02]: So it's exciting to go to those games.
12:19 --> 12:26 [SPEAKER_02]: That generation of kind of old-timey themed ballpark, getting away from the big football stadium style like the A's played in.
12:27 --> 12:36 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, so I'm from San Diego and so Padre's Red Sox fan here and they both by the way got eliminated from the playoffs in the same day, which was a real bummer for my
12:37 --> 12:41 [SPEAKER_01]: My family, especially my son, yeah, they built the San Diego stadium.
12:41 --> 12:51 [SPEAKER_01]: I think right around the same time as Pac Bel, and they feel like the same to me, like little old school except San Francisco, you were looking out on the bay instead of the gas lamp district of San Diego.
12:51 --> 12:55 [SPEAKER_01]: So they're like similar just a different view, but yeah, so didn't want to bury the lead.
12:55 --> 12:58 [SPEAKER_01]: This is a world series episode.
12:59 --> 13:04 [SPEAKER_01]: Go, whoever is in the world series, we don't yet know, but I have my suspicions.
13:04 --> 13:05 [SPEAKER_00]: Go team.
13:05 --> 13:06 [SPEAKER_01]: Go team, yeah.
13:06 --> 13:08 [SPEAKER_00]: I just glad they're all having a good time, you know?
13:08 --> 13:09 [SPEAKER_01]: You don't want to make a prediction?
13:10 --> 13:11 [SPEAKER_01]: Who's it going to be?
13:11 --> 13:13 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, right now we're still, we're recording this.
13:13 --> 13:18 [SPEAKER_01]: They're still in the, I think I know, divisional round, what's going to happen?
13:18 --> 13:24 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm thinking probably Blue Jays Brewers, which is the dumbest thing because it's first seed versus first seed.
13:25 --> 13:34 [SPEAKER_01]: And I think the brewer is win it, but I just really don't want the Dodgers to win, so it's kind of in the Yankees have already been eliminated, so, you know, that's just me, sorry Dodgers fans.
13:35 --> 13:37 [SPEAKER_01]: Is it lame for me to go with your seed versus first seed?
13:37 --> 13:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely no Dodgers.
13:39 --> 13:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, they're great team, but they are the arch rival of the Giants.
13:43 --> 13:45 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if you can hear this.
13:45 --> 13:47 [SPEAKER_02]: I got my melodic up here.
13:47 --> 13:48 [SPEAKER_00]: So cool.
13:48 --> 13:49 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh my god.
13:49 --> 13:51 [SPEAKER_02]: This is a prompt I play.
13:51 --> 13:54 [SPEAKER_02]: You've heard it a million times in San Francisco.
13:54 --> 13:56 [SPEAKER_02]: It's known affectionately as Dodger's suck.
14:07 --> 14:09 [SPEAKER_02]: Sorry, I messed it up a little Dodgers.
14:09 --> 14:09 [SPEAKER_02]: So good.
14:09 --> 14:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Nice, yeah.
14:10 --> 14:11 [SPEAKER_01]: You have that Boston key for sure.
14:11 --> 14:12 [SPEAKER_01]: I love it.
14:12 --> 14:19 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I generally just think of beat LA, but that's got the sophistication, you know, a little bit of adicky notes.
14:20 --> 14:29 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's actually, we do that with a drum prompt, the like DJ up in the studio, just a simple drum beat.
14:30 --> 14:35 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm wondering, like, how is your setup here in the stadium?
14:35 --> 14:36 [SPEAKER_02]: What are you playing?
14:37 --> 14:38 [SPEAKER_01]: It's not a pipe organ, obviously.
14:38 --> 14:38 [SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
14:38 --> 14:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Getting down to the nitty gritty.
14:40 --> 14:44 [SPEAKER_02]: It's my own instrument that I bring in every season and just leave at the park.
14:44 --> 14:47 [SPEAKER_02]: It is a Hammond XK3.
14:47 --> 14:51 [SPEAKER_02]: It's basically a digital clone of a Hammond B3 organ.
14:51 --> 14:52 [SPEAKER_02]: Nice.
14:52 --> 14:58 [SPEAKER_01]: The kind of the draw bars, you know, the Leslie and everything attached to it, like you get the, or it's just since the size of that.
14:58 --> 14:59 [SPEAKER_01]: That's an effect.
14:59 --> 15:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it does have it.
15:00 --> 15:05 [SPEAKER_02]: It has that Leslie sound, which I can switch slower fast while everybody.
15:05 --> 15:12 [SPEAKER_02]: I just kind of set it up to the ballpark sound that's almost all the draw bars have big, brush sounding.
15:12 --> 15:16 [SPEAKER_02]: It reminds me of like kind of a carnival organ or something.
15:16 --> 15:19 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know, just fell into that particular sound.
15:22 --> 15:23 [UNKNOWN]: Thank you for watching.
15:43 --> 15:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Like one thing I wanted to ask about that, like this is all about tradition.
15:46 --> 15:58 [SPEAKER_01]: I think we can talk about the convergence of you playing these sometimes very old songs, like take me off the ball games, got to be over a hundred years old, but also you'll have like something playing, that's like,
15:59 --> 16:03 [SPEAKER_01]: you know Kendrick Lamar will show up or whatever as in between the innings pipes into the PA.
16:04 --> 16:09 [SPEAKER_01]: So there's this convergence of tradition and and new and I'm I'm assuming tell me if I'm wrong.
16:09 --> 16:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Am I right?
16:10 --> 16:16 [SPEAKER_01]: Nassuming that the organ goes back like all the way before they even had PA's like they chose the organ.
16:16 --> 16:20 [SPEAKER_01]: We use the organ because pipes would be make it really loud enough for a stadium.
16:21 --> 16:22 [SPEAKER_01]: Does that sound right to you?
16:22 --> 16:28 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, I feel like this, this is before we even had speakers, loud speakers in the, you know, 1920s and 30s.
16:28 --> 16:32 [SPEAKER_01]: I think that we probably had organs over a hundred years ago in baseball parks, right?
16:32 --> 16:33 [SPEAKER_02]: You're exposing me.
16:33 --> 16:36 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm, I'm not the ballpark organ historian.
16:36 --> 16:37 [SPEAKER_02]: You might think I am.
16:38 --> 16:47 [SPEAKER_02]: I did grow up listening to John Kylie at Fenway Park and he was the organist for the Red Sox and the Celtics and the Bruins, you know, from like the 40s through the 80s.
16:49 --> 17:11 [SPEAKER_01]: uh... but i don't know how far back it goes you know but like there's something about it that is this thing that hopefully won't die but it like i associate it like organ outside of like you know certain styles of like music you might hear it like you know gospel music or you know the doors of whatever it's sort of like in pop culture it's church and it's baseball
17:12 --> 17:17 [SPEAKER_01]: like those are the two kind of things and those are both very much related to traditions, right?
17:17 --> 17:18 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, yes.
17:19 --> 17:22 [SPEAKER_02]: It certainly has earned that association over the years.
17:22 --> 17:28 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, this makes me want to look back and see what is the first example of a ballpark organized.
17:28 --> 17:35 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, baseball goes back to the late 1800s and I'm sure they did not have instruments that would work back then.
17:35 --> 17:39 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if it would work before electrification
17:39 --> 17:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's what I think I think there must have been pipes like old school like a cathedral organ, those things are 500 years old.
17:46 --> 17:50 [SPEAKER_01]: They don't need electricity, there's some kids like squeezing the bellows, right?
17:50 --> 17:54 [SPEAKER_01]: So was there, this is findable information, yeah, it is.
17:54 --> 17:57 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, guess what, guys, I have it right here at my finger too.
17:57 --> 17:57 [SPEAKER_00]: What do you got?
17:57 --> 18:03 [SPEAKER_00]: So Ray Nelson, Ray Nelson is credited as the first example of a ballpark organized.
18:03 --> 18:09 [SPEAKER_00]: He played for the Chicago clubs at Rigglyfield on April 26, 1941.
18:09 --> 18:09 [SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
18:10 --> 18:16 [SPEAKER_00]: But because of copyright issues on the radio broadcast, his music was only played for two days, which is unfortunate.
18:16 --> 18:17 [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, early 40s.
18:17 --> 18:23 [SPEAKER_01]: So it's not that old, but it's not like before they had microphones or anything like that.
18:24 --> 18:28 [SPEAKER_00]: And it was the Hammond Electric Organ in 1934, yeah.
18:29 --> 18:30 [SPEAKER_00]: It was a Hammond Organ.
18:30 --> 18:37 [SPEAKER_00]: A Hammond through a PA system that was in like the 30s, the late 30s, late 1930s.
18:37 --> 18:41 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, those early Hammond organs are just marvels of engineering.
18:42 --> 18:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I love them.
18:42 --> 18:43 [SPEAKER_02]: I actually have one at home.
18:44 --> 18:47 [SPEAKER_02]: That's another story which I acquired through the ballpark gig.
18:48 --> 18:54 [SPEAKER_02]: I was just at a ball game one day and playing in this, this older woman came up and approached me.
18:55 --> 18:57 [SPEAKER_02]: Man, I wish I could remember her name off the top of my head.
18:57 --> 18:58 [SPEAKER_02]: I didn't prepare for this.
18:59 --> 19:02 [SPEAKER_02]: But she lived up in Vacaville in the Bay Area.
19:02 --> 19:06 [SPEAKER_02]: That's up like Sonoma County, Giants fan.
19:06 --> 19:16 [SPEAKER_02]: She had been in a game previously and saw on the scoreboard, probably while I played, take me out to the ballgame, a camera shot, the back of the instrument, where it says Hammond across the back.
19:17 --> 19:21 [SPEAKER_02]: And she got excited because her mom was a church organist.
19:21 --> 19:44 [SPEAKER_02]: When she was growing up, her mom had died 25 years earlier, and she lived in this ranch house up in Vacaville, and had this Hammond B3 organ that her mom had played through her career that had just sat there under a blanket for 25 years, completely untouched, and taking up space, and she had been thinking about, I want to find a good home for this instrument.
19:45 --> 19:47 [SPEAKER_02]: because I'm not making use of it here.
19:47 --> 19:50 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I want to get it in the hands of somebody that would enjoy it.
19:50 --> 20:00 [SPEAKER_02]: And she saw that I was playing a ham, and she thought I was playing a real ham in Oregon, and maybe there was a little note of disappointment on her face, as she approached me, and it was just like a little keyboard.
20:01 --> 20:06 [SPEAKER_02]: But she had a letter written to me and spoke to me for just a minute and gave me this letter.
20:07 --> 20:18 [SPEAKER_02]: It was this very nice, long letter and said, you know, I would like to figure out how to get this instrument to you, you know, you play very nicely and it would mean a lot to me to find a good home for this instrument.
20:19 --> 20:19 [SPEAKER_02]: So
20:19 --> 20:24 [SPEAKER_02]: I went up to visit her in Vacaville and take a look at this thing and she had homemade ice cream.
20:24 --> 20:29 [SPEAKER_02]: She made for me up there and peaches from a ranch that I got to take home.
20:29 --> 20:35 [SPEAKER_02]: Anyway, the instrument was absolutely immaculate on the outside, but because it hadn't been played in 25 years.
20:37 --> 20:43 [SPEAKER_02]: there are a million moving parts in these things and they really need to be oiled at least once a year.
20:44 --> 20:48 [SPEAKER_02]: So that the internal workings were very seized up.
20:48 --> 20:55 [SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't really playable at that time, but I took it off her hands for very, very inexpensive and had to sink some money into it.
20:56 --> 20:57 [SPEAKER_02]: to get it restored.
20:58 --> 20:59 [SPEAKER_02]: They had to take all the guts out of it.
21:00 --> 21:07 [SPEAKER_02]: And these things like when I say a Marvel of engineering, I mean, it's just the most amazing looking contraption when you take it out.
21:08 --> 21:12 [SPEAKER_02]: Every pitch has its own tone wheel there called it that spins around and
21:13 --> 21:15 [SPEAKER_02]: it's just a crazy looking device anyway.
21:15 --> 21:24 [SPEAKER_02]: I had an organ technician bring it back and repair a few things get it nice and oiled up and now plays wonderfully and I've got it downstairs.
21:24 --> 21:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Foot pedals, the whole thing, Leslie Speaker.
21:27 --> 21:27 [SPEAKER_02]: It's awesome.
21:28 --> 21:29 [SPEAKER_01]: And that does not live at the ballpark.
21:29 --> 21:30 [SPEAKER_01]: That's yours.
21:30 --> 21:36 [SPEAKER_02]: Perhaps to my wife's sugar in taking up about half of our family room downstairs.
21:49 --> 21:56 [SPEAKER_01]: On that idea of this sort of traditional sound, like associated with baseball, you are not playing a real organ, right?
21:56 --> 22:00 [SPEAKER_01]: You are playing a modern thing that is essentially a synthesizer, right?
22:00 --> 22:08 [SPEAKER_01]: And you could just change the sound to be like, you could sound like a du Aleppo tune or like a house tune immediately.
22:09 --> 22:11 [SPEAKER_01]: What do you think would happen if you did that?
22:11 --> 22:13 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm not talking about your playing stay in a live.
22:13 --> 22:24 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm talking about your playing, Buna-na-na-na-na-na-na, or like one of the taking me out to the ball game, if you just played it and it sounded like a Taylor Swift song off of folklore or something, right?
22:25 --> 22:29 [SPEAKER_01]: Like with all the reverb and this beautiful piano tone, or you did, did a sin sound.
22:29 --> 22:33 [SPEAKER_01]: What do you think would happen in the audience if you did that?
22:33 --> 22:34 [SPEAKER_01]: They would be confused.
22:35 --> 22:41 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, to be honest, the instrument I play really only does one thing, it doesn't actually have a variety of sense.
22:41 --> 22:48 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, you can only manipulate it the way you manipulate a real hand organ as a clone of that.
22:49 --> 22:51 [SPEAKER_01]: It's not even a MIDI device, like you couldn't hook it up to.
22:51 --> 22:53 [SPEAKER_01]: It does have MIDI.
22:53 --> 22:58 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I could connect it and use it to control other things if I wanted to get fancy.
22:58 --> 23:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I would never do that, though.
23:00 --> 23:06 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going for a super classic nostalgic sound for sure.
23:06 --> 23:14 [SPEAKER_02]: And I hear a variety of different organ sounds when I watch when the Giants play other teams at a town and I'm always listening to see
23:15 --> 23:17 [SPEAKER_02]: What is the organ sound like?
23:17 --> 23:18 [SPEAKER_02]: Do they have one?
23:18 --> 23:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Is it can?
23:19 --> 23:20 [SPEAKER_02]: Is it live?
23:20 --> 23:23 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I'm always my ear is keen to pick up on that.
23:23 --> 23:33 [SPEAKER_02]: And yeah, there's quite a variety of different sounds and tones people choose to use some more kind of modern and synthetic sounding that I don't personally prefer.
23:33 --> 23:37 [SPEAKER_02]: I, you know, I'm going for the nostalgia all the way.
23:37 --> 23:46 [SPEAKER_00]: I have an interesting question for you and it's getting kind of gossipy, but is there a hierarchy amongst organists?
23:46 --> 23:56 [SPEAKER_00]: You're having a vibe against people that are a little bit unconventional and I can understand why and I'm wondering, is there beef between other organists?
23:56 --> 23:56 [SPEAKER_00]: Like,
23:57 --> 23:58 [SPEAKER_01]: Dodge your stuff.
23:59 --> 24:08 [SPEAKER_00]: Right, no, if someone's playing like that reverbed folk lore of New Taylor's version of taking me out to the ball game, are you like, get out of the organist union or something?
24:08 --> 24:13 [SPEAKER_01]: Or like, even an organ like, like, if it was what's that Calvin Harris reanna song, we found love.
24:13 --> 24:17 [SPEAKER_01]: That's an organ at the beginning, but it sounds like a 2010s house song, right?
24:25 --> 24:44 [SPEAKER_04]: I was standing inside my sight As it shattered across the sky What it takes to form a lie It's still an organ but very different from what you're probably playing Yeah, like what's the hierarchy amongst organists?
24:44 --> 24:45 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, hmmm
24:46 --> 24:51 [SPEAKER_02]: I think I'm going to disappoint you to call there's not really this guild of organists.
24:51 --> 25:04 [SPEAKER_02]: I have communicated with a couple with a couple actually, a guy named Matt from the Washington Nat Nationals has come to visit me, super nice guy, so I got to know him a little bit.
25:04 --> 25:11 [SPEAKER_02]: We exchanged text messages, also the organists from the Atlanta Braves have been in touch with he is excellent.
25:12 --> 25:14 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, you know, you just like everybody.
25:15 --> 25:16 [SPEAKER_00]: I need to know the gossip.
25:16 --> 25:20 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, who's the one who, like, got like, got this going on here.
25:20 --> 25:21 [SPEAKER_01]: You're not going to date me on that.
25:21 --> 25:31 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a gut-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-short-
25:38 --> 25:42 [SPEAKER_01]: like, is there, is that just a club thing?
25:42 --> 25:43 [SPEAKER_01]: Is that a tradition thing?
25:43 --> 25:44 [SPEAKER_01]: Is it a money thing?
25:44 --> 25:45 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, you mentioned some people can it?
25:46 --> 25:50 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I assume there are some, whether there isn't a person at all, they're just playing it.
25:50 --> 25:54 [SPEAKER_02]: So maybe that's not a high enough to trigger those sounds off a laptop.
25:54 --> 26:00 [SPEAKER_02]: If that's what you want to do, a lot of parks do that or lean more heavily on recorded music and sound effects.
26:01 --> 26:03 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, there are some full timers out there.
26:05 --> 26:08 [SPEAKER_02]: I would probably do more games if it weren't for this pesky day job.
26:08 --> 26:09 [SPEAKER_02]: Right.
26:09 --> 26:11 [SPEAKER_02]: But right now I do all the day games.
26:11 --> 26:13 [SPEAKER_02]: I do most Friday night games.
26:13 --> 26:17 [SPEAKER_02]: And I do Saturday Sunday regardless of where they fall day or night.
26:18 --> 26:20 [SPEAKER_00]: Is there someone else that doesn't when you don't?
26:20 --> 26:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, they play recording.
26:22 --> 26:33 [SPEAKER_02]: They have some recordings of me that they trigger and Jeremy, my man at the soundboard, has some other, you know, package of organ prompts that you can purchase.
26:33 --> 26:37 [SPEAKER_00]: Do you think the crowd knows when it's really you or when it's Jeremy?
26:38 --> 26:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, for sure, for sure.
26:39 --> 26:44 [SPEAKER_02]: I think I've got a small slice of the audience that are really into the live organ music.
26:45 --> 26:47 [SPEAKER_02]: So they notice, yeah, I'm going to come and talk to me.
26:47 --> 26:49 [SPEAKER_02]: And like, man, why don't you come on those other nights?
26:50 --> 26:57 [SPEAKER_00]: And like in the program, like when you see a Broadway show and there's an understudy, does it say like tonight's organ will be performed by Jeremy?
26:57 --> 27:00 [SPEAKER_01]: There's an extra piece of paper with the updated class list.
27:01 --> 27:04 [SPEAKER_01]: Um, no, we're just doing it in store-off.
27:04 --> 27:05 [SPEAKER_01]: Something.
27:05 --> 27:14 [SPEAKER_01]: How much are you communicating with him coordinating with the soundboard operator who presumably is playing the walk on music for the batters and the pitching staff and stuff like that?
27:15 --> 27:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Do you know when it's your, I assume you know when it's your queue versus their queue?
27:21 --> 27:27 [SPEAKER_01]: And how much are you getting a vibe and working on the same page and how much are you just sort of one of you kind of getting direction into the other?
27:28 --> 27:29 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, good question.
27:29 --> 27:35 [SPEAKER_02]: I am on headset, constant contact with Jeremy.
27:35 --> 27:41 [SPEAKER_02]: We don't talk all the time, but he'll, he'll let me know if something special is coming up that he wants me to chime in on.
27:42 --> 27:47 [SPEAKER_02]: When the giants are batting, he just opens me up to the house and leaves it to me to fill in.
27:48 --> 27:55 [SPEAKER_02]: And then there might be times where he thinks of something in particular he wants to play and he'll say, okay Steve, I'm gonna get the next pitch.
27:55 --> 28:02 [SPEAKER_02]: and in that case, he'll mix me out and play like a clap or a drum prompt or something and yeah.
28:02 --> 28:08 [SPEAKER_02]: So we have a real good rapport kind of read each other's mind at this point.
28:08 --> 28:09 [SPEAKER_02]: We've worked together for many years.
28:10 --> 28:11 [SPEAKER_02]: So I know what he's going to do.
28:11 --> 28:13 [SPEAKER_02]: He knows what I'm going to do most of the time.
28:14 --> 28:15 [SPEAKER_02]: It's fun when we surprise each other.
28:16 --> 28:19 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm fascinated by this, you in Jeremy relationship.
28:19 --> 28:20 [SPEAKER_00]: I think it's very interesting.
28:21 --> 28:22 [SPEAKER_02]: But he does make you welcome in Jeremy.
28:22 --> 28:24 [SPEAKER_02]: If you're listening, you're the best man.
28:24 --> 28:25 [SPEAKER_02]: Shout out to Jeremy.
28:25 --> 28:27 [SPEAKER_00]: You know about this podcast, Jeremy.
28:28 --> 28:29 [SPEAKER_01]: So he does makes you out, though.
28:29 --> 28:36 [SPEAKER_01]: So you're not, like, you can't play a long with the Kendrick Lamar tune that's being piped in between the innings.
28:36 --> 28:37 [SPEAKER_02]: No, no.
28:37 --> 28:39 [SPEAKER_02]: It's an either or scenario on that one.
28:39 --> 28:41 [SPEAKER_02]: I have my own little speaker out there.
28:41 --> 28:44 [SPEAKER_02]: So I can keep playing, but I know when I'm not in the house.
28:46 --> 28:59 [SPEAKER_02]: Which is handy sometimes because I can like practice a little bit before I play it to and if I'm not 100% there with it, if I know If you ever give you feedback, just Jeremy ever say you know what Steve like you weren't on it tonight, we need to work hard at the next time
29:00 --> 29:09 [SPEAKER_00]: or not really I'm more critical on myself than he would ever be I'm really eager for the dark underbelly of this world.
29:09 --> 29:12 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not sure it exists It seems like they're awesome.
29:12 --> 29:14 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not involved in any drama.
29:14 --> 29:18 [SPEAKER_02]: There has been drama back in the production booth.
29:18 --> 29:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Let me tell you, but I'm not
29:20 --> 29:22 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm not going to spill any beads here.
29:22 --> 29:25 [SPEAKER_02]: But you won't let, we will let you tell us, but you won't tell us.
29:25 --> 29:26 [SPEAKER_01]: Is that what you're saying?
29:27 --> 29:28 [SPEAKER_01]: No, I won't tell you.
29:28 --> 29:30 [SPEAKER_00]: That's very professional.
29:30 --> 29:32 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that's very smart.
29:32 --> 29:38 [SPEAKER_01]: So what our previous guest did was promise all this dirt to share after we's top recording.
29:39 --> 29:45 [SPEAKER_01]: And then we ran out of time, and she ran away laughing, and we heard no dirt about the chili peppers, no dirt about Mariah Carey.
29:46 --> 29:50 [SPEAKER_01]: So thank you for being honest up front with us, and not giving us the dirt.
29:50 --> 29:54 [SPEAKER_01]: So, okay, would if there wasn't Oregon music, would if there wasn't music at all?
29:54 --> 29:59 [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe this relates kind of to the group psychology, kind of sociological aspects.
30:00 --> 30:06 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm not gonna just say what does music do for us, but like, what would it be if there wasn't music at a game?
30:06 --> 30:08 [SPEAKER_01]: Specifically baseball, I guess.
30:08 --> 30:14 [SPEAKER_02]: I think they'd have to come up with some other way to engage the fans in all that downtime.
30:15 --> 30:18 [SPEAKER_02]: There is a lot of dead air at a ball game.
30:19 --> 30:20 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what the strategy would be.
30:21 --> 30:23 [SPEAKER_02]: I suppose if they just said, you know what?
30:23 --> 30:29 [SPEAKER_02]: The product is baseball and it's just going to be quiet when the game is not being played.
30:29 --> 30:30 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
30:30 --> 30:35 [SPEAKER_02]: In a way, I think the industry is almost gone too far.
30:36 --> 30:57 [SPEAKER_02]: it's almost like a rock concert sometimes at these games every moment of dead air is filled with you know the scoreboards are so huge and bright it's just overwhelming it's like you're watching a giant screen TV at all times and it's really loud in there it keeps the energy up but it's so little exhausting
30:58 --> 31:02 [SPEAKER_02]: My wife came to a game in this, like, whoo, that was, like, almost too much.
31:02 --> 31:10 [SPEAKER_01]: It's like they heard the feedback from my wife that they're basically all kind of boring, and then they're like really overcompensating for it.
31:10 --> 31:20 [SPEAKER_01]: They're like, we're going to fill every second with spectacular visual, special effects on a screen, organ music, modern music, like every possible thing when it is done.
31:20 --> 31:21 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
31:21 --> 31:23 [SPEAKER_01]: You can watch and at least some of us enjoy watching it.
31:23 --> 31:24 [SPEAKER_02]: definitely.
31:24 --> 31:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's like an arms race.
31:26 --> 31:28 [SPEAKER_02]: They've got to put in all the new modern gadgets in there.
31:28 --> 31:35 [SPEAKER_02]: They now have the lights that can do all kinds of lighting effects, especially dramatic at the night games.
31:35 --> 31:38 [SPEAKER_02]: Like if you're one of their relief pitchers comes in and it's dark out.
31:38 --> 31:43 [SPEAKER_02]: They can strobe the lights when they come on or have like spotlights around the field.
31:44 --> 31:45 [SPEAKER_02]: It's cool looking.
31:45 --> 31:45 [SPEAKER_02]: It's cool.
31:46 --> 31:47 [SPEAKER_02]: It's just it's a lot.
31:48 --> 31:49 [SPEAKER_02]: It's sensory overload.
31:49 --> 31:50 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know.
31:50 --> 31:51 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the fans love it.
31:51 --> 31:51 [SPEAKER_02]: It's cool.
31:52 --> 31:52 [SPEAKER_02]: It's entertainment.
31:53 --> 31:57 [SPEAKER_02]: But some days I'm like, let's chill out a little and just watch a baseball game.
31:58 --> 31:58 [SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
31:58 --> 32:20 [SPEAKER_00]: I get I get really overstimulated environments like that and and I love going to concerts too, but a lot of times we'll go to Fenway and it is it's a lot like the music and won the crowd and all the lights flashing on enough like sometimes I forget that I should just be there watching the game because there's all these other distractions so I hear what you're saying I think that I'm kind of a purist like that too like we don't know about the bells and whistles.
32:21 --> 32:29 [SPEAKER_02]: But as far as, you know, it is exciting even playing the same old bits, it has so much to do with what the team is doing on the field.
32:30 --> 32:36 [SPEAKER_02]: If the giants are losing by 10 runs in the third inning, it's hard to generate any excitement.
32:36 --> 32:47 [SPEAKER_02]: So there's this real interplay with the performance of the team and how competitive the game is, and that gets the crowd amped up, and then what I do can kind of build on that.
32:47 --> 32:51 [SPEAKER_02]: So a lot of it hinges on the game itself, like how effective I'm going to be at,
32:53 --> 32:56 [SPEAKER_02]: kind of getting the crowd involved and interested.
32:56 --> 33:01 [SPEAKER_00]: I have a question about that, that group thing, like the crowd involvement.
33:01 --> 33:02 [SPEAKER_00]: So I'm from Boston.
33:02 --> 33:08 [SPEAKER_00]: Boston fans are notorious, especially if they're playing certain teams, that the crowds can get very, very rowdy.
33:09 --> 33:18 [SPEAKER_00]: And I always wonder how much of a responsibility just someone like you feel to notice that the crowds getting rowdy and to try to regulate them through music.
33:19 --> 33:21 [SPEAKER_00]: What are the fans like in your stadium number one?
33:21 --> 33:28 [SPEAKER_00]: And if they do ever get out of control, do you feel like it's somehow your social responsibility to mellow them out with the songs that you play?
33:30 --> 33:34 [SPEAKER_02]: short answer is no way, right here the better for my point of view.
33:34 --> 33:39 [SPEAKER_02]: But it's true, yeah, I think Red Sox fans go to 11.
33:39 --> 33:43 [SPEAKER_02]: Giant fans are intense.
33:43 --> 33:50 [SPEAKER_02]: If they're playing the Dodgers, especially, you know, it can get rowdy, but I don't feel the responsibility.
33:50 --> 33:58 [SPEAKER_02]: I've never seen it reach a dangerous level, like a fever pitch, like, oh my God, it's gonna turn into a riot out here.
33:59 --> 34:03 [SPEAKER_01]: It's not like the background music during nap time at a preschool or anything like that.
34:03 --> 34:05 [SPEAKER_01]: We're trying to keep everything out.
34:05 --> 34:06 [SPEAKER_00]: Come on guys.
34:07 --> 34:08 [SPEAKER_00]: I will say that.
34:08 --> 34:12 [SPEAKER_01]: So like when you, I guess actually, I know that I think of it.
34:12 --> 34:16 [SPEAKER_01]: I wanted to ask how you got the gig, but I was just going to say quick on this topic.
34:16 --> 34:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Like how you've been about a decade or a little more than that with the giants.
34:20 --> 34:21 [SPEAKER_02]: 2010.
34:21 --> 34:24 [SPEAKER_02]: So just fished the 16th year.
34:24 --> 34:25 [SPEAKER_01]: So cool.
34:25 --> 34:30 [SPEAKER_01]: You haven't ever had to play for like historically bad teams.
34:30 --> 34:31 [SPEAKER_01]: Like they've had a pretty good run.
34:32 --> 34:34 [SPEAKER_01]: They won the world series not long after that, right?
34:34 --> 34:36 [SPEAKER_01]: And I know this year they were, you know, out of the playoffs.
34:36 --> 34:38 [SPEAKER_01]: But you know, they were like a 500 team.
34:38 --> 34:39 [SPEAKER_01]: Like I wonder what it's like.
34:40 --> 34:56 [SPEAKER_01]: doing all this hype if you're the white socks last year, which is the worst record in the history of over 100 years of baseball right or at least the worst record in the modern era right you haven't really have that right you've always had something to go for sort of that's right the giants are never terrible.
34:56 --> 35:00 [SPEAKER_02]: their big market team, they managed to feel the competitive team most every year.
35:01 --> 35:06 [SPEAKER_02]: I started in 2010 and they won the World Series that year, so I was cemented in there.
35:06 --> 35:12 [SPEAKER_02]: And then they won it again two years later in 2012, and then they won it again two years later in 2014.
35:13 --> 35:16 [SPEAKER_02]: So I'm feeling like I'm the lucky charm of that party.
35:16 --> 35:18 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm feeling like they won't get my new.
35:18 --> 35:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, except for the 11 year drought after the 2014,
35:23 --> 35:25 [SPEAKER_00]: Do you get like a bonus if they go to the world series?
35:25 --> 35:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Do get a ring if they go.
35:27 --> 35:27 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm a, yeah.
35:27 --> 35:28 [SPEAKER_00]: Do you get a ring?
35:29 --> 35:39 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh, you know what I get, I am not a friend time employee because I'm, I do it on a part-time basis that nowadays I play about half the home games.
35:40 --> 35:44 [SPEAKER_02]: They, so I'm considered a contractor back in the day when they'd win.
35:44 --> 35:50 [SPEAKER_02]: I'd get a like special contractor rate for the ring, which was still quite expensive.
35:50 --> 35:54 [SPEAKER_02]: Only certain full time employees got the ring for free as like a benefit.
35:55 --> 35:57 [SPEAKER_02]: but they were thousands of dollars.
35:57 --> 36:01 [SPEAKER_02]: I think my cost was maybe a thousand bucks I could get a ring which was like half off.
36:02 --> 36:03 [SPEAKER_02]: And I chose not to.
36:03 --> 36:05 [SPEAKER_02]: I got a plastic replica ring.
36:05 --> 36:07 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, that's probably where.
36:07 --> 36:08 [SPEAKER_01]: That was free.
36:09 --> 36:10 [SPEAKER_01]: It feels a little bit like
36:10 --> 36:22 [SPEAKER_01]: So like I lost my master's degree at some point traveling from house to house and it would cost me over a hundred dollars to get a new one and it feels only like a vanity exercise.
36:22 --> 36:29 [SPEAKER_01]: So I wonder like yeah, you should be proud of hyping that, but if they're not willing to give it to you, it's a little bit like I don't want to have to pay for this.
36:29 --> 36:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I would absolutely pay for judgment.
36:31 --> 36:32 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it is absolutely.
36:32 --> 36:33 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a lot of money though.
36:50 --> 36:52 [SPEAKER_01]: How did you get in the game?
36:52 --> 36:54 [SPEAKER_01]: So 2010, you're a keyboard.
36:54 --> 36:54 [SPEAKER_01]: That's a millionaire.
36:54 --> 36:55 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, scenario.
36:55 --> 37:04 [SPEAKER_02]: It was co-worker, reminette Pandora, a guy named Michael Attacot, who was the stadium DJ from 2003, the 2010 season.
37:05 --> 37:11 [SPEAKER_02]: So it started because he was triggering these organ prompts off his laptop.
37:11 --> 37:13 [SPEAKER_02]: And he just didn't like the sound of them.
37:14 --> 37:15 [SPEAKER_02]: He'd been doing that for several years.
37:16 --> 37:20 [SPEAKER_02]: So I got to talking to him and we decided to, hey, let's go into a recording studio.
37:20 --> 37:24 [SPEAKER_02]: I have a friend who had a Hammond B3 organ at home.
37:24 --> 37:27 [SPEAKER_02]: And so we went in there, he brought a recording rig.
37:27 --> 37:32 [SPEAKER_02]: And we recorded all the prompts that he was using just recreated them on this instrument.
37:32 --> 37:37 [SPEAKER_02]: And so he brought that in and started playing those in place of his previous set of files.
37:38 --> 37:41 [SPEAKER_02]: The powers that be there were like, hey, that sounds really good.
37:41 --> 37:45 [SPEAKER_02]: And so Michael said, let's get Steven here to a Sunday afternoon game.
37:46 --> 37:50 [SPEAKER_02]: And so I went in in June in the middle of that season and played and they liked it.
37:51 --> 37:53 [SPEAKER_02]: And so we just came up with the plan.
37:53 --> 37:54 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll do all the day games.
37:54 --> 37:56 [SPEAKER_02]: We'll make it kind of a day game feature.
37:56 --> 38:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I was really like the day game specialist for many years.
38:00 --> 38:04 [SPEAKER_02]: When they went to the playoffs, then I did all the games which that was intense.
38:05 --> 38:20 [SPEAKER_02]: it's amazing how the atmosphere changes when you get to the postseason and it just steps up that sort of rock star or rock concert kind of energy really builds up as you go move through the rounds of the playoffs and it's probably more camera's more media everything, right?
38:21 --> 38:28 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, tons more cameras, you know, the Fox sports crew were right down on my left, like Alex Rodriguez and Derek Geter.
38:28 --> 38:30 [SPEAKER_02]: Wow, providing comment to that.
38:30 --> 38:31 [SPEAKER_02]: Do you have a groupies?
38:32 --> 38:33 [SPEAKER_02]: Mmm, good question.
38:33 --> 38:33 [SPEAKER_02]: I do.
38:33 --> 38:36 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, there are some people that are really into it.
38:37 --> 38:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, if there's season ticket holders right next to you, right, the closest season ticket holders, that would be the groupies.
38:43 --> 38:45 [SPEAKER_02]: I play out in center field.
38:45 --> 38:50 [SPEAKER_02]: I do like being out amongst the people, which might be unique actually among the organists.
38:50 --> 38:59 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't know if there are others that are kind of exposed out there, but in the San Francisco bar park, there's like a kids area with the coke bottle slide.
38:59 --> 39:04 [SPEAKER_02]: And there's this giant glove that's kind of an iconic, old bar in the ballpark.
39:05 --> 39:09 [SPEAKER_02]: And I play, I play right up there near the slide and there is a little section of seats there.
39:09 --> 39:14 [SPEAKER_02]: So people can come and sit more or less right next to me and come up and just start chatting me up.
39:15 --> 39:16 [SPEAKER_02]: So I give visitors, yeah, I don't know.
39:16 --> 39:25 [SPEAKER_02]: Some days I get more enthusiastic people up like it's rare that somebody comes and wants to be to sign an autograph, but it does happen.
39:26 --> 39:44 [SPEAKER_01]: that's cool is there a moment where you felt really connected to the crowd or to the game can you think of like a moment where it all felt like things are working and like the the role music is playing in this moment was particularly powerful or something like that
39:45 --> 39:52 [SPEAKER_02]: There's kind of a set of prompts that we all play, that go from slow to fast, okay?
39:52 --> 39:57 [SPEAKER_02]: And you're trying to get the crowd to like join in with you and clap along at your same accelerating tempo.
39:58 --> 40:02 [SPEAKER_02]: And so there are moments where that just works like a charm.
40:02 --> 40:05 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I don't know if this will come through, but this class is monica.
40:09 --> 40:11 [SPEAKER_03]: Thanks for watching!
40:20 --> 40:26 [SPEAKER_01]: And with the charge, but I can hear everybody getting out of time in my head when they're clapping, right?
40:26 --> 40:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Because sometimes it comes together and I feel the clap coming in and unison like sometimes it's just a mess and it just doesn't really work people are clapping out of time
40:38 --> 40:42 [SPEAKER_02]: But I don't know, there are some magical moments where the crowd is on board.
40:42 --> 40:52 [SPEAKER_02]: It's like an intense situation and it gets really loud and it kind of takes over the stadium and those claps get more and more in unison and those are always fun.
40:53 --> 40:54 [SPEAKER_00]: My favorite part of baseball.
40:55 --> 41:18 [SPEAKER_02]: the group clap the group clap there was a moment uh i think either the 2012 or 2014 it was the american league championship series against the cardinals i believe and it was like an extra in ingame that whole series i had hatched this plan with our DJ his name was Lee Marrett at the time i was like alright
41:19 --> 41:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Here's the plan.
41:19 --> 41:23 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to come in with the final count down by Europe, you know.
41:24 --> 41:42 [SPEAKER_02]: We're going to find the perfect moment and I'm going to play it up until just the moment when the drums come in and I want you to have the recorded track, queued so that I can it plays this big suspended dramatic chord and then the drums.
42:01 --> 42:05 [SPEAKER_02]: And so we were sitting on that the whole series and didn't find the right spot.
42:05 --> 42:09 [SPEAKER_02]: And finally, I think it might have been game five extra innings.
42:10 --> 42:13 [SPEAKER_02]: The giants were rallying and looking to win the game.
42:13 --> 42:16 [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm like, Lee, it's time for Final Countdown.
42:17 --> 42:40 [SPEAKER_02]: and we played it and it just worked like a charm where he came in and the crowd was getting into it and it got super loud and the drums came in and like kind of took over from from the organist in a seamless way and I'm like yes it worked and then Travis Ishikawa proceeded to hit a three-run home run to walk off and win the game like right after that.
42:42 --> 42:43 [SPEAKER_01]: I felt partially responsible.
42:43 --> 42:44 [SPEAKER_01]: That was quite thrilling.
42:45 --> 42:48 [SPEAKER_01]: I love that you were like thinking about it for five games trying to win.
42:49 --> 42:50 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yeah.
42:50 --> 42:57 [SPEAKER_02]: I was like, man, I was just thinking it would be cool to have the recorded music kind of compliment what I play and sort of.
42:58 --> 43:16 [SPEAKER_02]: pick it up without missing a beat, you know, we made it happen the next day someone forward to me a like a Twitter post from ESPN that said, sorry, Cardinals, Giants Organist is playing the final countdown game over awesome, posted before they actually won.
43:17 --> 43:18 [SPEAKER_01]: Oh, well, funny.
43:18 --> 43:31 [SPEAKER_00]: I don't really know too much about this world, but I've always, honestly, this isn't just blowing smoke, but I have found listening to the organist perform at Red Sox games to be my favorite part.
43:32 --> 43:34 [SPEAKER_00]: I just like music more than sports baseline.
43:35 --> 43:40 [SPEAKER_00]: So it's really cool to hear that there's three-dimensional people with like backstory and history.
43:40 --> 43:43 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm disappointed that there's not enough gossip though.
43:43 --> 43:47 [SPEAKER_00]: I think that you guys need to try harder to be a little bit more like a rambunctious
43:48 --> 43:48 [SPEAKER_00]: Fair enough.
43:49 --> 43:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
43:49 --> 43:53 [SPEAKER_02]: I should talk about teams having incredible history of organists.
43:54 --> 43:58 [SPEAKER_02]: There was one woman that just did it for decades and decades.
43:58 --> 43:59 [SPEAKER_02]: I think just retired.
43:59 --> 44:00 [SPEAKER_02]: I wish I remembered names.
44:01 --> 44:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Dodgers as well, a long history here.
44:04 --> 44:13 [SPEAKER_01]: The rivalry between the organists, the rivalry's got to be between the encroaching possibility of them just using a computer to play it all.
44:13 --> 44:16 [SPEAKER_01]: So like, I feel like the organists have to have to have to have to.
44:17 --> 44:18 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you've got to unite.
44:18 --> 44:19 [SPEAKER_01]: You've got to take over the fun office.
44:20 --> 44:25 [SPEAKER_01]: If they try it because there are, I think some teams that just use piped in organ.
44:25 --> 44:26 [SPEAKER_01]: They do not have an organ.
44:27 --> 44:29 [SPEAKER_02]: So for sure, it's probably at least half the league.
44:29 --> 44:30 [SPEAKER_01]: Right.
44:30 --> 44:30 [SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
44:31 --> 44:31 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
44:32 --> 44:33 [SPEAKER_02]: That's too bad.
44:33 --> 44:35 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, we're going to do a good little ever go away.
44:36 --> 44:39 [SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's people do make that association and teams.
44:40 --> 44:44 [SPEAKER_02]: Pendulum will swing on how much we rely on the live organist.
44:44 --> 44:44 [SPEAKER_02]: But.
44:45 --> 44:47 [SPEAKER_02]: I think it's still alive and well today.
44:47 --> 44:48 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah.
44:48 --> 44:56 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I was going to say I'd be curious to do a correlation to see if teams that have live organized are more successful than teams that use recorded stuff.
44:58 --> 44:59 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm going to come up with a positive result.
45:00 --> 45:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Let me know, as I go into my next contract negotiation.
45:03 --> 45:05 [SPEAKER_00]: As long as you give me a cut, I think it'll be cool.
45:05 --> 45:08 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure it is because it's got it.
45:08 --> 45:12 [SPEAKER_01]: There's got to be because it's and it's not necessarily causation, though I would love to say it is.
45:13 --> 45:24 [SPEAKER_01]: The teams that have an organist are the teams with long histories and those teams have stronger fan bases, those teams have more money to get players, higher expectations, right?
45:24 --> 45:29 [SPEAKER_01]: The teams with the organists are spending more money and so they, right?
45:29 --> 45:31 [SPEAKER_01]: I would assume they probably get to, you know,
45:32 --> 45:38 [SPEAKER_01]: show haio tani is not probably going to be able to get paid at the ballpark that can't afford a part-time organist.
45:38 --> 45:38 [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
45:39 --> 45:40 [SPEAKER_01]: I maybe there's an exception to that.
45:41 --> 45:46 [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe one of the teams in the world series this year doesn't have one, but I assume the related concepts.
45:46 --> 45:47 [SPEAKER_01]: But like
45:47 --> 45:49 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, the Arizona Diamondbacks, what are they, the late 90s?
45:50 --> 45:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe that's a team.
45:51 --> 45:53 [SPEAKER_01]: I don't know anything about whether they have an organist.
45:53 --> 45:54 [SPEAKER_01]: They're called a Rada Rockies.
45:54 --> 46:00 [SPEAKER_01]: These newer teams that are only 30 years old, maybe they started, and there wasn't a sense of tradition that they had upholed.
46:01 --> 46:09 [SPEAKER_01]: So I think that would be the sort of more, as opposed to them, cutting a cost in the 80s and saying, well, let's just have synth pop instead, right?
46:09 --> 46:13 [SPEAKER_01]: Maybe it's just some of these teams aren't old enough to have the tradition in the first place, I guess.
46:14 --> 46:27 [SPEAKER_02]: So, perhaps perhaps, and I'm sure there's turnover in the people that run the in the park show and come in with different ideas about how they want to appeal to their fan base.
46:28 --> 46:34 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, we've had different managers of the in-park experience at the giants and the philosophy kind of shifts over time.
46:36 --> 46:38 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, like they bought, they've kept me around this far.
46:38 --> 46:39 [SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, all right.
46:39 --> 46:41 [SPEAKER_02]: It's I'm having more fun than ever on the gig.
46:41 --> 46:44 [SPEAKER_01]: So y'all just have to unionize to make sure you keep it.
46:45 --> 46:54 [SPEAKER_00]: No, I feel like we're missing an opportunity to talk about all that Pandora stuff, but I think that we've covered a lot of bases today.
46:54 --> 46:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Wow.
46:57 --> 46:58 [SPEAKER_01]: Well done.
46:58 --> 46:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Collect us and get it.
46:59 --> 47:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
47:00 --> 47:07 [SPEAKER_01]: We've got Pandora conversation that can be had, but we are going to have to have that conversation another time.
47:07 --> 47:11 [SPEAKER_01]: So Steve would be awesome to have you back to talk about Pandora in the future.
47:11 --> 47:12 [SPEAKER_02]: You got it, Mark.
47:12 --> 47:13 [SPEAKER_02]: Let's find a time.
47:13 --> 47:15 [SPEAKER_02]: Be happy to be a repeat customer.
47:15 --> 47:15 [SPEAKER_02]: Sweet.
47:16 --> 47:17 [SPEAKER_02]: So much we can be talking about.
47:17 --> 47:18 [SPEAKER_02]: I just want to let you know.
47:19 --> 47:25 [SPEAKER_02]: I have no social media presence, I don't have a website like at the end of the last ball games.
47:26 --> 47:38 [SPEAKER_02]: Actually, the Saturday of the last weekend for the first time ever, the giants had me come down on the field before the game and play the National Anthem, which weirdly I had never done in 16 seasons.
47:38 --> 47:39 [SPEAKER_00]: That's so cool though.
47:39 --> 47:43 [SPEAKER_02]: So yeah, I'll send all the email you, my wife was there.
47:43 --> 47:44 [SPEAKER_02]: She took a little YouTube video.
47:44 --> 47:48 [SPEAKER_02]: So you can see that the Hammond organ that I play, I'm a super
47:58 --> 47:59 [UNKNOWN]: Thank you.
48:06 --> 48:13 [SPEAKER_02]: But later that day, you know, somebody came up and said, hey, that was awesome, man, like, you got an Instagram account.
48:14 --> 48:18 [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm just like, no, I got a website, no, sorry.
48:18 --> 48:19 [SPEAKER_02]: You got to come talk to me.
48:19 --> 48:22 [SPEAKER_02]: Anyway, I just wanted to let you know that because it might be disappointing.
48:22 --> 48:23 [SPEAKER_02]: Like, where could people find you?
48:23 --> 48:25 [SPEAKER_05]: I think they can.
48:25 --> 48:25 [SPEAKER_01]: The answer.
48:26 --> 48:52 [SPEAKER_01]: The answer is they can listen to Pandora and hear your Pandora and they can wait till April and or late March and they can drive over to Oracle Park and they can listen to the organized right okay great yeah I'll say that but back in the day I remember there was a Beatles cover band you were in do not play out as a keyboardist Is there anything you want to promote for our Bay Area oh folks
48:53 --> 48:55 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, I play a lot of music here at work.
48:55 --> 49:01 [SPEAKER_02]: We have so many great musicians, well, occasionally throw parties here, have like killer bands.
49:01 --> 49:03 [SPEAKER_02]: We just play covers and have a little party here.
49:04 --> 49:12 [SPEAKER_02]: I do play with like a 70s 80s cover band right now, very occasionally, just for fun, kind of yacht rock, all of that.
49:12 --> 49:13 [SPEAKER_02]: Just pop hits of the 70s 80s.
49:14 --> 49:20 [SPEAKER_02]: Just an opportunity for me to sing a little bit, which is the main reason I did it, and also just nice people.
49:20 --> 49:21 [SPEAKER_02]: Do you have a good Michael Lee-Doban?
49:22 --> 49:22 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, super fun.
49:23 --> 49:23 [SPEAKER_02]: That's right.
49:23 --> 49:26 [SPEAKER_02]: I remember you came out to the Starry Cloud one time.
49:26 --> 49:26 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh God.
49:26 --> 49:28 [SPEAKER_02]: For the Pete Best Experience.
49:28 --> 49:29 [SPEAKER_02]: That Pete Best Experience, of course.
49:29 --> 49:32 [SPEAKER_01]: I remember that, but I do not remember the name, Story Cloud.
49:32 --> 49:35 [SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for reminding what's the name of the Yacht Rock band.
49:35 --> 49:38 [SPEAKER_01]: If people are in the area, it's called Sossolido.
49:38 --> 49:39 [SPEAKER_01]: Sossolido.
49:39 --> 49:41 [SPEAKER_01]: Conjure up like a Yacht Rock Files.
49:41 --> 49:41 [SPEAKER_01]: That's right.
49:41 --> 49:42 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, that's right.
49:42 --> 49:43 [SPEAKER_01]: Love it.
49:43 --> 49:46 [SPEAKER_01]: We already heard you do not have social media, so everybody just go to the ballpark.
49:47 --> 49:49 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, to be clear, go Padre's, go Red Sox.
49:50 --> 49:51 [SPEAKER_01]: But go to the Giant's ballpark.
49:51 --> 49:52 [SPEAKER_01]: It's a great one.
49:52 --> 49:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
49:53 --> 50:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, if you're hearing this podcast, and you come back to a Giant's day game, 2026, or some select night games, and I'm there.
50:02 --> 50:06 [SPEAKER_02]: You can look out for me above the bleachers, right next to the Giant glove.
50:06 --> 50:09 [SPEAKER_02]: I'll be up there with my hand and XK3.
50:09 --> 50:10 [SPEAKER_02]: Come on up and say hi.
50:11 --> 50:17 [SPEAKER_01]: mentioned, nevermind the music to get a discount code for 10% off your whole purchase of organic instrument, right?
50:17 --> 50:17 [SPEAKER_01]: All right.
50:18 --> 50:19 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes.
50:19 --> 50:24 [SPEAKER_02]: 10% off your crazy crab sandwich that you get to have in there.
50:24 --> 50:32 [UNKNOWN]: $35.
50:32 --> 50:36 [SPEAKER_00]: Nevermind the music is hosted by Nicole Batcher and hosted and produced by Mark Poppinney.
50:39 --> 50:46 [SPEAKER_00]: You can email us at nevermusicquaditkmail.com and give us a follow on social media.
50:46 --> 50:49 [SPEAKER_00]: Nevermind the music is also part of the Laura Hounds Network.
50:50 --> 50:52 [SPEAKER_00]: Please join the conversation on their Discord server.
50:54 --> 50:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Thanks for listening.