1905 Fairground Organ Plays Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody,” and It Works Like a Charm

First built in Paris by Charles Marenghi in 1905, the organ above quick­ly found a home in a Bel­gian restau­rant. And there it remained for many years … until 1967, when it trav­eled abroad, to a Texas fair­ground. Imag­ine the cul­ture shock it must have felt. But that’s not where it ends.

Nowa­days, you can watch the 81-key organ play Queen’s 1975 hit “Bohemi­an Rhap­sody,” quite dif­fer­ent than what­ev­er it was play­ing in Antwerp a cen­tu­ry ago. Alex­ey Rom wrote the arrange­ment for the song, and pro­grammed it using the strip of cards being fed through the instru­ment. Hope­ful­ly this isn’t the last stop on this organ’s grand jour­ney.

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Relat­ed Con­tent:

Expe­ri­ence Queen’s “Bohemi­an Rhap­sody” in Vir­tu­al Real­i­ty: Down­load the Free App Cre­at­ed by Queen & Google

Inside the Rhap­sody: A Short Doc­u­men­tary on the Mak­ing of Queen’s Clas­sic Song, ‘Bohemi­an Rhap­sody’ (2002)

Gui­tarist Bri­an May Explains the Mak­ing of Queen’s Clas­sic Song, ‘Bohemi­an Rhap­sody’

Queen Doc­u­men­tary Pays Trib­ute to the Rock Band That Con­quered the World

The Music of Queen Re-Imag­ined by “Extra­or­di­nary” Clas­si­cal Pianist, Natalia Pos­no­va