YAMAHA YC-20 COMBO ORGAN (RED) -- LATE 1960'S/EARLY 1970'S -- Vox Farfisa

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From 1970, the amazing YAMAHA YC-20 COMBO ORGAN with original CHROME LEGS, VOLUME PEDAL, and the desired HOT RED top! WOW vintage vibe!!! This organ is in good working order. All keys and drawbar functions work including the Vibrato and Vibrato speed. The touch vibrato function has been intermittent (shaking the keys side to side gives a vibrato effect); perhaps a contact cleaning. There is a subtle intermittent rubbing of the highest register G and A keys, but this is just a slight adjustment under the hood (it is mostly hearing a bit of plastic bumping rather than affecting sound or play). The top (where the controls are mounted) and keybed are both hinged, and lift up for complete easy access. The organ is in good condition overall cosmetically I would say with age-appropriate scuffs and cuts seen on the black tolex and patina seen on some areas of the red top. No cigarette burns or discoloration of the keys. The red color on this organ is spectacular, especially with the high-gloss polyester finish. This thing exudes 1960's and would have looked amazing on the old fangled color TVs. Why don't they make 1960's red like this anymore? I love this organ but I have had it for nearly 20 years now and it was used as a functional backup to my matching YC-20 and it is not getting any use! I have a large collection of combo organs and have played decades in 1960's authentic sounding bands and recordings, and I can say without blinking, that the YC-20 is my first choice to gig with. Sounds great, plays great, looks great, and is worry free. Other YC organs are great and have even more features, but they are rarely useable sounds being mostly novelty and the sheer size of the other YC organs make them less useable. The smaller YC-10 lacks the full organ registers to create the Vox sound. The YC-20 is not a lightweight but it is portable by one person and can get into the back seat of your car. It comes with original volume pedal and chrome legs.The YC series was inaugurated in 1969 with the economy YC-10 which itself was a followup to the A-4. The YC-10 only had 16, 8', and 4' registers common for introductory level combo organs at the time. The Yamaha YC-20 was introduced in 1970 as a direct competitor to the Vox Continental Organ and to a lesser degree the Farfisa Combo Compact Organ that dominated the airwaves in the 1960's. Whereas these more infamous latter organs were fragile and prone to detuning and destabilizing during play, the Yamaha YC series of organs were notoriously stable and built like tanks. They have aged better than any organ of the era. Every YC organ I have ever owned (six in fact) has always worked 100% decades later (and absolutely every other combo organ I own or have owned have required work and expense to bring them back!). The YC-20 organ's sound is a near copy of the Vox Continental with its flat top and trendy chrome stand. It benefited however from notable improvements in projection, compression, and versatility. Whereas in the Vox the highest notes could be drown out by lower registers, the YC-20 sounds better voiced. The keyboard action is spectacular in an era where cheap unsatisfying plastic keys were used. Indeed Ray Manzarek is said to have stopped using the Vox organ when production switched to the hollow plastic keys. Not so with the YC-20. The keys play quickly and confidently, and allow for glissandos and machine-gunning.Compared with the YC-10, the YC-20 was fitted with much more extended capabilities and the full range of registers: 16', 8', 4', 2-2/3', 2', 1-3/5', 1' (Section 1) and 16', 8', 4', 2-2/3', 2' (Section II). Every register has 4 intensity options. Whereas in the Vox organ the 2-2/3', 2', 1-3/5', 1' registers are served by one drawbar synonymously, in the YC organ each register is controlled individually in terms of on/off and intensity (4 intensity options for each); this ability gives you amazing versatility. In addition, the YC-20 added the option of percussive effect. Unlike the Vox organ's infamous vibrato which was one mode on/off only (unless you adjusted s... read more

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