Wurlitzer

Trademark for a large pipe organ that was often installed in the huge cinemas of the 1930s (Compton was another make). Such organs were equipped with percussive and other special effects, and had many keyboards, pedals, and stops. A musician would play before the start of the film or between films.

In the early 1960s the US manufacturer Wurlitzer introduced an electric piano in which vibrating metal reeds produced the note or signal sent to the amplifier.