Illustration by Danny Elchert
Thanks to young fellers like Michael Bublé, organ music is cool again. But for these two members of the organ old guard, it never went out of style.
ERNIE HAYS
SLM: What first drew you to the organ?
EH: I started playing the organ in my small-town Baptist church when I was 13. They said, "Hey, we need an organist." It was like forced labor.
SLM: Do you miss performing with a band?
EH: Yes, because I had a big band for a while. I also miss the camaraderie of piano bars. You see so many people that are down in the mouth, and with a little humor and a little music, they start smiling again.
SLM: You've played with a lot of cool cats.
EH: I liked Regis Philbin. He's a wild man. He's mellowed a lot lately. I worked with him back in the '60s. I think the most fun person I ever worked with was Johnny Mathis. He was so genteel and made you really feel at ease.
SLM: What are some of your more vivid memories of working with the Cardinals?
EH: I would say associating with Gussie Busch and playing parties at his house and with his band down in St. Pete. My wife and I used to go to spring training every year. He's the only guy I've ever seen who could sit down before dinner and start with some Scotch and before the evening was over finish it and still walk and talk. When I would do singalongs at parties, I'd have to play a song twice. Once for everybody else's key and once again for Gussie's key.
SLM: Stan Kann is known for his hobby of collecting vintage vacuum cleaners. Do you have any collections?
EH: [Laughs.] When Anheuser-Busch owned the Cardinals, every year at Christmas I got a beer stein. I have a humongous rack of them.
STAN KANN
SLM: How'd you get your start at the Fox?
SK: They let me help restore their organ. When it got repaired, I got a job for five weeks playing between pictures to see what the public thought of it. Those five weeks became 22 years, four times a day, seven days a week.
SLM: You appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson 77 times—a record.
SK: I first got on the show through Phyllis Diller. She arranged it. They called me and said I was recommended on her say-so. They didn't even see me. They went ahead and booked me. Interestingly, on the Carson show I never played the organ.
SLM: You must have some terrific stories and memories.
SK: One time I blew out all the lights on Grand. There was a startup motor on the organ, and I turned it on, and the thing blew out. We thought we had just blown out the Fox lights … When Union Electric came by, we found out we had to have a new starter built for the organ. After that, whenever I went across the street to the dime store, they would say, "Hey, Stan, let us know when you're going to turn the organ on again so we can get our candles out." That was 1958 or 1959.
SLM: Pianists are notoriously finicky in selecting their instruments. Are organists as selective?
SK: More so.
Ernie Hays can be heard at most Cardinals home games. Stan Kann can be heard every Thursday and Saturday at 10 a.m. during tours of the Fox Theatre. He also has a weekly residency at the Lincoln Jug in Belleville every Sunday night.
