Bob Mitchell, an organist who was the first such house musician at Dodger Stadium and the last surviving working accompanist from the silent-film era, has died. He was 96.
Mitchell died Saturday from congestive heart failure at Hancock Park Rehabilitation Center in Los Angeles, said his caregiver, Vincent Morton.
For The Record
Los Angeles Times Saturday, July 25, 2009 Home Edition Main News Part A Page 4 National Desk 1 inches; 41 words Type of Material: Correction
Bob Mitchell obituary: The obituary of organist Bob Mitchell in the July 9 Section A said he was the last surviving working accompanist from the silent-film era. Organist Rosa Rio, 107, still accompanies silent movies at the Tampa Theatre in Florida.
When the Dodgers debuted in 1962 at their stadium in Chavez Ravine, so did Mitchell -- on a Wurlitzer double-keyboard organ with a 25-note pedal board. At the time, he was best known as founder and director of a group often called the Robert Mitchell Boys Choir, which would appear in more than 100 movies.
His career as choir director was framed by two stints as a silent-movie organist, played out more than 60 years apart. One of his last performances was in early June at the Silent Movie Theatre on Fairfax Avenue, where he was first featured in 1992.
He helped create "a true revival of cinema on the highest level," said Charlie Lustman, who owned the theater from 1999 to 2006. "That you could walk into a classic theater and see a classic movie accompanied by a man who had done it way back when. . . ."
On Christmas Day 1924, Mitchell was practicing carols on the organ at the Strand Theater in Pasadena when the lights went down and a movie about the Yukon went up. The 12-year-old kept playing, improvising a soundtrack. Soon he was accompanying matinee shows five times a week.
He played for films such as the romantic wartime drama "What Price Glory," the action-adventure "Beau Geste" and the Fritz Lang futuristic fantasy "Metropolis."
With the arrival of talkies and Al Jolson in the 1927 film "The Jazz Singer," Mitchell's first silent-movie career ended when he was 16.
"My father said, 'I see they are going to have sound' " in the movies, Mitchell told CBS News in 2005. "And I said, 'Oh, that will never catch on.'. . . . But, of course, it ended the organist right away."
After being hired in 1934 as the organist at St. Brendan's Catholic Church in Los Angeles, he organized a boys' choir that he oversaw for 66 years. In the early days, the choir sang at Catholic Masses that aired on the radio. The singers were cast in their first film, 1936's "That Girl From Paris," after the casting director heard one such performance.
The group -- also known as the Mitchell Singing Boys -- sang "Ave Maria" with Bing Crosby in the 1944 film "Going My Way" and was conducted on-screen by Cary Grant in 1947's "The Bishop's Wife." Mitchell appeared on screen with the ensemble in 1941's "Blondie in Society."
