The Genius of George Wright

George Wright was a musician's musician who always seemed to be in the right place at the right time. He was recruited to play Hammond and Wurlitzer organs at Grant Union High School in Sacramento, where he also broadcast on radio. He moved on to San Francisco, where he played on the Blue Network and was featured organist at the Mighty Wurlitzer in the San Francisco Fox Theatre. Transferred to New York by NBC, he played numerous radio broadcasts, sometimes as a member of the Charles Magnante Trio, and was also hired as featured organist at the New York Times Square Paramount Theatre, where he rubbed shoulders with many of the all-time great musicians of the time, including a stint accompanying the newly-discovered Eddie Fisher. George was heard as organist for "The Adventures of Archie Andrews", "Nick Carter, Master Detective", "Songs by Morton Downey", "Jack Berch Show", "The Robert Q. Lewis Show", and many others. His return to California in 1951 was prophetic in his being signed as the lead artist on the HIFI record label, selling millions of theatre organ albums due to the instrument's perfect representation of the new high fidelity recording technology, and the subsequent stereo releases. George also spent 13 years as musical director for the television soap opera "General Hospital." In addition, he had a very successful concert career, touring the country performing on theatre pipe organs. During his lifetime, he also represented a number of electronic organ manufacturers, most notably Conn, for whom he conducted a 12-city nationwide concert tour in 1971, and Allen Organs, who designed a series of digital instruments sampled from the theatre pipe organ installed in George's Hollywood home. This book chronicles George's wildly interesting life, and should be of interest to musician and non-musician alike.