Gulbransen Rialto III - The Eddie Dunstedter Special

[Doddy]

Gulbransen Rialto III - The Eddie Dunstedter Special

This thread is intended to document my new build Digital Theatre Organ. As a big fan of Eddie Dunstedter's commercial recordings I wanted an instrument that encompassed the principle organs that Eddie played, built into new virtual (digitally sampled) and physical console based in principle on the Gulbransen Rialto II with a more pronounced WurliTzer theatre organ stop tab layout rather than the flat stop tab layout of the Rialto II.

Eddie Dunstedter made many commercial recordings, recorded on the Lorin Whitney Studio Organ, a 4 manual Robert-Morton pipe organ with many components from Morton, WurliTzer, Skinner and Gottfried. A customised three manual Hammond Organ and the two manual Gulbransen Rialto II.

Having acquired Neil Jensons 3/35 WurliTzer Theatre Organ digital samples this year, and a copy of Hauptwerk to run them on, the build moved towards the Gulbransen Rialto voices. Two technical manuals covering the Gulbransen models Rialto 'K' and Rialto II were acquired after contacting as many Rialto owners as possible to see about sampling the organs digitally. Unfortunately in following up the various leads it became quite apparent that many owners did not have the Leslie 102/103 speakers and did not have fully serviceable instruments either, almost all requiring repairs of some sort or another that prevented sampling taking place. Although I took away some good advice for extending the voices digitally within each division and rank of voices, thereby creating a larger instrument than that built by Gulbransen and in the process extending the musical playing capability of the new instrument, particularly with regard to the pedal division and increasing the number of notes per rank thereby creating more stop footages for some of the voicing.


The first Gulbransen tone generator and voicing circuits built since the 1980's? - well you tell me!

The artwork for my first Rialto II voice printed circuit board has almost been finished and will be sent for etching soon. The idea is that the new Rialto voicing boards once completed will be fed by an independent tone generator or 'free-phase' set of tone generators, thereby creating a link between the established and well regarded 'free-phase' Rialto 'K' and the enhanced voicing of the Rialto II, but without the 'divider' tone generation system of that organ.

Isomonic sound generation:
The newly designed voicing circiut boards will retain Gulbransen's Isomonic split note features of the two Rialto's. Indeed Hauptwerk allows this feature to be activated in note by note and rank by rank across as many audio channels as you require, so I can feed directly to a Leslie 102/103 speaker set or over the entire audio channels used.

Specification:
3 x 61 note Hammond Elegante keyboards (rather than the two manuals of the original Rialto organs.)
1 x 32 note AGO pedalboard
Gulbransen Rialto II general console design with a full set of Hammond Elegante drawbars
WurliTzer style stop layout - not the flat profile of the Gulbransen Rialto II
Gulbransen Rialto II Independant Tibia's and Isomonic general voicing
Neil Jenson WurliTzer 3/35 digital Theatre Organ samples
HOAX (Hammond B3 emulator)
4 x GM MIDI expanders
1 x PC (digital samples on Hauptwerk)
2 x touchscreen monitors
Artisan MIDI switching
12 channel audio (expandable to 36)
HOAX valve based pre-amps
Optional:
2 x Leslie 122 speakers
1 x Leslie 102 Isomonic speaker
1 x Leslie 103 Isomonic speaker

Once the sampling from either an existing instrument or my own design PCB's is completed, the next step will be to edit the new Rialto III samples for use in Hauptwerk and apply it's own internal low frequency tremulant modelling to see what the new instrument sounds like - then a decision on whether to proceed obtaining the Isomonic Leslie speakers sets or not.


to be continued -

[paulj0557]

Have to say I admire anyone who would build an organ from scratch only to sample it.

I have a direct link to a woman in Cincinnati who wants to sell a pristine fully operational pair of Leslie's- 102 & 103 for $1,000.
Shipping to UK would be astronomical

I look forward to fixing my Rialto II, but right now I'm fixing a Wurlitzer 4300 and finally getting my Thomas Palace III together. Rebuilt the power supply and am installing Playmate and nicer Bandbox ( old one letters worn off and PS out). At least I do know where the fault is at on my Rialto II it's just getting to it. BTW I don't have a 102 & 103, but I do have the 705 & 2 540's which are the Leslie Isomonic set-up for that build.

I imagine you could achieve just about any set of quality voices with your Wurlitzer 625t and a nice Rialto K. If you added a Wurlitzer 4500 I believe that would cover some territory. The 4500's probably show up in the UK often? Rialto K's are rare anywhere.

[andyg]

I doubt that there are that many 4500's around in the UK, Paul. I've played maybe one (?) a long time ago and a couple of 4520's. If there are some left, they're likely to be found in Yorkshire or Lancashire, or Manchester. Back in the day, the majority of organ sales were in what we call the 'M62 corridor' running from Liverpool to Hull. Organ stores? You couldn't move for them, one or two (or more) in most towns and the largest UK chains. For UK historians, that's E D Brown, Dawsons, Organ Loft. Only Dawsons remains, in a rather different form, today.

[tobeycat2007]

The organ loft now thats blast from past, got our dx900 from them, did hear that Kawai never got paid for it not sure if its true.

Yes we had massive choice of dealers back then, but also massive choice of organs sadly most out of price reach, can remember being impressed by large gulbransens, but could buy house for less money in those days.

[andyg]

You may well be right, TC!

It was during one of their 'extravaganzas' that I heard a tip-off that they were about to go under. A phone call to HQ soon got the trucks rolling to reclaim what we could. We were not the only company doing that.

[Guest]

I wish I had the knowledge to build my own custom organ. Someday I will, but I am not there yet. :)

[Doddy]

Hammond hardware arrives and Sound sampling to begin!!!

With many thanks to various suppliers in the UK and the USA, my Hammond Elegante/Concorde Keyboards arrived together with a 25-note Pedalboard and several sets of Hammond 'smooth' drawbars.

Having confirmed with the manufacturer that the sampling software I have chosen allows for the input from digitised Hammond drawbars to allow the individual footages to be volume controlled, I am now looking for assistance in sampling key organ types.

In progress are plans to sample these sample sets for the following organs:
Gulbransen Rialto
Devtronix Theatre Organ
WurliTzer 625T
Vickery Classic/Theatre
WurliTzer 4300

I also need help to access to or for third parties to sample the following organs:
Hammond Elegante
Hammond X-66
Hammond X-77
Rodgers 340

Why so many? In response to the emails I have been sent, it became apparent that many organs are being scrapped and dumped in the skip due to issues of maintenance of the organs concerned. With 2 Concordes, an Elegante and a Gulbransen Rialto II all going to the skip in the last 2 weeks alone! Many of these guys have realised the value of retaining the original console and adding a VEO (Virtual Electronic Organ) to it containing samples of the original organ.

Whilst it is possible to recreate the original tones and tremulant modulation, it is not possible to re-create some of the sound modifying techniques that electronic organs employ. Particularly with regard to vibrato, celesting and rotary speakers. In the instance of the Rialto, electric motor driven Light Dependant Resistor banks are used for some of the tone modifiers. It has therefore become apparent that these types of circuits should be considered to be added to the sampled sounds in order to get close the organs original specification. This will become apparent once I get the new Rialto voicing up and running.

So, if you are in a position to help sample or have sampled various analogue organs for posterity I'd like to hear from you. Sampling is very labour intensive but hopefully a few guys will come forward with some assistance.

I am based in the UK, but planning to fly to the USA once some of the forums members get their stored instruments up and running.

Many thanks in advance.

[Kurzweil]

I'm rather impressed of the desire to sample all of these electronic models when the virtual pipes you have are the very thing that most of them were doing a barely adequate job of emulating. Even the stop names on most electronics are clearly TPO based: tibia, vox humana, etc. And they didn't get very close. I can see wanting drawbars for the Hammond stuff, but their XB-3 series was extremely close to the real thing, especially the Leslie effect where the XB-3c brought it to. Your plan to get actual Leslie's makes that of less importance. B-3 Hammond samples are all pretty decent these days. I guess you'd want the European organ sound, since it is known for itself. (My Hammond background makes it sound too "sweet" for my taste.)

So many of today's vintage sounds are treasured for their flaws. Wurlitzer and Rhodes electric pianos were a dismal imitation of an acoustic piano but are "go to" sounds of their own today for all of the pop music created on them. And the Yamaha DX-7 FM synthesizer electric piano is a similarly flawed imitation of the Rhodes, now an also-desirable sound for all of the 80's music created on IT. An imitation of an imitation yet! The Hammond itself was a horrible attempt to mimic church pipe organ but is absolute irreplaceable for the rock, pop, gospel, and jazz music subsequently created on it. And it better have the tube distortion, key click, wheel noise, and pitch fold-back which were it's then-flaws and today-essential characteristics. I presume that the Wersi was a Hammond imitator too? At least before decent string and brass synthesis began changing the sound of pop organs? Even Hammond's initial attempts to clone its own organ were initially poor, ala the B-3000 and the X-5 (most everything they made in the '80's).

Still for most music, nothing beats those genuine sounding theater pipe samples. That's what I'd want to hear! Also, couldn't you repair a Rialto cheaper than building a new one?

[Doddy]

The desire is probably all that is going to happen with the Hammonds due to lack of interest in owners having them sampled. A time and effort thing plus many organs are in an unserviceable state anyway.

Myself, amongst others are a firm advocate for the preservation of the sound of old analogue organs, making them in virtual form would allow owners to strip out dysfunctional innards and replace them with virtual organs with switched ranks and extended ranks for greater musicality.

Building my own Rialto PCBs will be much cheaper as there are virtually no Rialtos' in the UK, and shipping from the USA will be $2500 and more.

[indianajo]

Building my own Rialto PCBs will be much cheaper as there are virtually no Rialtos' in the UK,

I'm impressed. I've been trying to work up to a computer that will run free routing software, and am stuck at step one, getting the disk drive to take the Linux operating system. Press on.
Several members have X66 and X77's and Elegante's here, but the only one I know that has been mostly re-e-capped is in Austrailia. The sound of my H100 is so night and day between original and re-e-capped, I wouldn't fool with recording anything that wasn't. Except to show how wimpy an original part unit sounds.

[Doddy]

WurliTzer Orbit type for 625T spinet?

Whilst currently looking into the the integration of Midi keyboard control on my WurliTzer 625T 'testbed' which will control the new Rialto Sounds whilst they are developed, I am wondering which type of Orbit synthesiser I have on the third manual of the organ console, Orbit type I, II or III.?

Any ideas folks?

[andyg]

It's an Orbit III

[Jan Girardot]

I have a 625/630 with Orbit III service manual for sale from my collection @ $10.

. . . Jan
the OrganGrinder

[Doddy]

An organ parts supplier of good repute!

I have a 625/630 with Orbit III service manual for sale from my collection @ $10.

. . . Jan
the OrganGrinder

Jan,

Thank you for the kind reply, I'll be in touch, and at this rate I'll be obtaining your remaining stock of manuals!

For those that do not know, I have purchased a considerable amount of printed organ material from Jan, plus CD's and Organ parts.

Jan, like Bill Greenhill in the UK is one of the last bastions of the organ service and repair suppliers of good repute. Speaking to Bill in the UK, he said that business is slowing down noticeably on a week by week basis, so having these guys around whilst I am rebuilding some organs and building new voicing cards is of considerable assistance that these guys are as helpful as they are.

Bill told me that at least two instruments per week from the old analogue era are being offered to him for spares, for which there is no market and they just end up dumped in the skip.

If anybody knows of anybody scrapping Gulbransen Rialto K's or Rialto II's, I'd like to know as I want the internal tone generation, chorus and filtering (voicing) PCB's.

[Doddy]

Following on from my last post...

Peanut of this parish got his 720+540's and the Gulbransen Rialto II ?

It went to the dump.!!!

FFS - not very happy tonight.

That's two Rialto II's gone to the dump in two and half weeks!!