SATOMI MATSUZAKI: YE OLD PIZZA JOYNT

It was a mighty Wurlitzer Pizza joint! Jerry Nagano who was the featured organist at the time played this elaborate organ with an elegant suit on for mostly local families. The Wurlitzer was hooked with drums, train whistles and a monkey toy with banging cymbals. They also triggered flashing lights and a disco mirror ball. Children were running around and spilling sodas. Their mouth was smothered with tomato sauce from Margherita pizza. We sat right in front of bass pipes. Every time Jerry stepped on bass notes with his feet, pipes opened up and low frequencies blew up my hair. It was hilarious. My eyes were all over the place and my ears were overwhelmed by the kids screaming sound and the festive sound of the organ. The atmosphere was almost like a horror movie where everyone was over the top smiling and kids were banging their heads to the music. 
 Pizza was terrible but nobody cared. I would have been happy to pay to be able to just get in. There was no entrance fee. I loved how Jerry was interactive with visitors. He took requests from children. He played Star Wars, Broadway musical songs, popular movie soundtracks and so on. He would play anything. He wanted people to have a good time. You could tell he was super genuine. Later I found out that he was also a computer system engineer at Stanford University during the day. What an interesting guy! This place was my favorite musical spot while I lived in San Francisco.