Bringing the Music Home

Music is Bill Gregory’s hobby, but admittedly, he’s not your average amateur musician.

As a child, his favorite book was about repairing musical instruments. As a student, he took a string bass to college and played with friends every chance he got. In the 1960s, he started accordion lessons, and still recalls with gratitude the Rodgers staffers who sent him some gold contacts he wanted for experimental sound modifications using then-new transistor technology. Today the retired businessman has a grand piano, a collection of more than 300 guitars, an Allegiant organ in his home at the Oregon coast, and a brand-new Roland C-330 organ in his downtown Portland condo.

Bill credits his growing interest in the organ to the lessons he’s taken with Dr. Jeannine Jordan in her studio at the Oregon coast as well as the diligent use of organ study books published by Wayne Leupold.

Learning to play the organ takes work, he says, but he’s sometimes surprised at the progress he makes by simply staying with it.

‘When I’m working through the books, I’ll move on from a piece that is too challenging. Then, when I come back to it later, I don’t remember what was giving me trouble.”

He jokes that his secret weapon is a pair of organ glasses - “they magnify the music and engravings so I can see better when I get nervous.”

In reality, though, the key to his satisfaction is having 24-hour access to a great-sounding practice instrument. “I’ve been to the church where Jeannine plays, but I couldn’t handle traveling back and forth to the church all the time,” said Bill, who also owns a Roland C-190 organ keyboard. “I need to have the organ right there, calling to me to really play it.”

Two years ago, he purchased the three-manual Allegiant organ from Tim. But when he and wife Marie started spending more time in their Portland condo, he got interested in hearing more from Tim about the compact C-330.

The new organ fits perfectly next to a wall in the condo’s living room, with the two satellite speakers mounted about five feet above the console. It was a simple job to run the wires down inside the wall because there’s a closet behind the console.

As a lifelong music student, Bill is a strong believer in having the right tools at hand to take advantage of the mind’s most teachable moments. “When you’re learning, at some times you’re more receptive to new things than others,” he explains. “You may have seen something 20 times, then you’ll really see it for the first time, and then it gets through.”