Organ Jazz Club Abecafe

Organ Jazz Club Abecafe, located near Numabukuro Station in Tokyo, Japan

Daisuke Kawai on organ Otsuki Hidenobu Kalta Otsuki on drums at Organ Jazz Club Abecafe in 2025

Organ Jazz Club Abecafe is a special jazz bar whose defining feature is the Hammond B3 Organ, a characteristic instrument in jazz that could almost define a subgenre in and of itself. OJC highlights this wonderful tradition of jazz organ by establishing itself a place that knows what it wants to do and does it extremely well.

Drums and organ at Organ Jazz Club Abecafe in 2019

The large beast of the Hammond organ system includes the famous Leslie speaker system enclosed in a wooden cabinet next to the organ. This heavy box contains an upper and lower horn rotating at different speeds controlled by the player by increasing or decreasing their different rotational speeds.

As they play the keys, the musician can adjust the controls to create different three-dimensional effects: Doppler, chorus, tremolo, and phase modulations filter through layers of organ tones to change the vocal-like vibrato and breath-like fluctuations in the sounds spreading out through the room. Watching the organist manipulate the various dials, pedals, and switches, and hearing the resulting variety of amazingly different textures produced, is also a lot of fun, in addition to just enjoying the grit, groove, and beauty of the music they are playing.