Historic Kenyon Hall Fights to Save Rare Wurlitzer: A Piece of Seattle Music History
Check out the LiveStreamed Event on Kenyon Hall's Youtube Page - FREE!
https://www.youtube.com/@HistoricKenyonHall
Kenyon Hall’s Wurlitzer stands as a wonderful achievement of the pre-digital age but is in need of repairs to ensure it will survive. While many of these organs are “going digital” Kenyon Hall’s Wurlitzer organ remains completely analog, which means there are thousands of wires that need to be kept in good working order, and an entire three-room series of pipes and switchboards that need to be kept clean and climate controlled.
The COVID-19 pandemic saw with it a drastic decrease in the amount of public arts venues in West Seattle and Seattle in general, and it is Kenyon Hall’s goal to keep the spirit of public arts alive, providing stages for artists new and old to perform and space for audiences to congregate and commune with each other.
This Fall we invite you participate in our Kick-Off event by either grabbing a seat at our live event, or tuning in to our livestream coverage on our youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@HistoricKenyonHall) Saturday, September 28th from 4pm-8:30pm.
This fundraiser will be running through the Fall/Winter and we hope to raise $25,000 by 2025! Please share with friends, family, and anyone that is interested in keeping a part of West Seattle History alive and thriving!
Kenyon Hall has long been a place of gathering and witnessing the magic that is live performance whether its the songwriter from down the street, the big band from up the coast, or the internationally traveling one-man orchestra on our Mighty Wurlitzer! Keeping a historic building with historic instruments takes all types of talent and this fundraiser serves to create the maintenance funds necessary to hire and retain those most knowledgeable about repairing and maintaining these marvels as well as those needed to operate the more modern equipment that now dawns our stages and walls. Our goal of $25,000 will go towards setting up a maintenance fund to retain staff for Wurlitzer repairs, purchase rare parts for current repairs, build protective housing for the Wurlitzer and its components, design/build a stage to better suit performers on and off the organ, purchase and install new lights both in Front of House and Back of House to better feature the all encompassing nature of the Mighty Wurlitzer as well as modernize the lighting systems to better serve staffing and repair needs, give a refresh to our interior walls to better serve the magical sounds that both chambers of pipes create, and lastly by updating our film and screen hardware to better serve the needs of our Silent Film Nights as well as our many other filmmakers in the community.
We are endlessly thankful to our generous patrons and donors for supporting our mission over the years and keeping our building and community alive and thriving. We are so happy to be inviting new performers, students, and audiences into the hall, and just as enthusiastic about promoting the history that lives on in our establishment. The creation of these maintenance funds, audio additions and upgrades, and securing high-skilled technical labor will make for a hall that we can all celebrate by participating in the awesome power of local, community art!
We thank you for your generosity and support.
Kenyon Hall is owned and operated by Seattle Artists/Kenyon Hall, a 501(C)(3) non-profit organization which presents live musical and theatrical performance traditions and musical education in an historic West Seattle setting.
Seattle Artists/Kenyon Hall is committed to the ongoing learning in areas of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA). We hope to work with our community to also develop safe spaces for their application.