Re: Gregg Allman's Equipment

[GOFFProf@aol.com]

To Brad & others wanting--   

-------An Inside Look at Gregg's classic HAMMOND's & Leslie's------

Gregg likes to carry his own two B-3's and two Leslie 122's when he tours,
unless he's renting for a single show.  His main axe is an "almost stock"
 1969 B-3, and the secondary B-3 is a slightly older '63-'64 model.  

We always refer to his equipment as "Pro-stock", a term Chuck Leavell
(Rolling Stones organist, and one of the nicest guys on the planet) coined
since Gregg hates the word 'modified'.   So his pro-stock HAMMOND's have
'sweetened' percussion and chorus, tube preamps with 'sweetened' changes for
a more blues sounding organ, and very good tonewheel generator calibration
and filtering.   They are also maintained well since he generally allows no
one but my nephew Dave or myself to work on his equipment.  He likes the
original brown-case "half-moon" Leslie switches on both, and loves the
original classic HAMMOND-sound that the band is known for.  

His Leslie's are both GOFF Professional 122's, (with the original Allman
Brothers Leslie 122's traded-in and in my shop waiting to be rebuilt for
resale).   Both 122's are also pro-stock, with our new 16 ohm upper drivers,
woofers, crossovers, rebuilt amps (with our own 6550B tubes!), rebuilt
motors, new belts, and new lower-rotor bearings (2), and a new idler bearing
for the horn belt.  

He likes the Leslie directly behind him so he can be a part of the HAMMOND
sound and hear it directly instead of through a monitor.  The band uses two
mikes on the rear of the Leslie, one on the horn slightly off-center, and one
on the rotor in a shot-gun stand.

Another "neat" B-3 -----For his appearance at Woodstock 2 (the Mudfest),
Gregg  decided to rent one of my  (MIDI) B-3's and 122's.  It was also used
by many other artists on Stage Two.  That particular rental-fleet organ is
also a favorite of Joey DeFrancesco, Jimmy McGriff, Jack McDuff, Charles
Earland, and most recently by Ron Levy on his latest CD recorded just last
week.  

Some of the special features include fully-adjustable percussion volume (from
no percussion to 300% of stock level), fully-adjustable chorus (from no
chorus level to full vibrato and beyond), a modified solid-state preamp,
high-gain reverb, a completely recalibrated and refiltered tonewheel
generator, keyboard-inputs, line-out jack, lower-manual, 61-note, 16
channel-send MIDI, and it is wired to use 4 Leslie's without so much as a
groan from the organ.  This B-3 also has a special Leslie connector for
testing my prototype 200 watt solid-state Leslie 122 which is still being
tweaked.  (T-Lavitt called it the loudest Leslie he has ever heard.  I don't
think so, but it is loud!)

The House of Blues was a great show.  The manager of the venue (Teo
Leominster) is also a very goo piano, keyboard & HAMMOND player.     

Al