Ian Fraser of Plainfield, New Jersey, who is a concert organist, plays a medley of Christmas tunes at the start of a free performance he gave Sunday at C&C Ribbon and Florist Co. in Boardman, which was having a Christmas in July sale. The event also was to celebrate the 100th birthday of the Wurlitzer pipe organ on which he played, and was constructed in 1925. Correspondent photo / Sean Barron

BOARDMAN — Midsummer heat, high humidity, thick green leaves and a lack of snow cover didn’t bode well for beginning to look a lot like Christmas, though Ian Fraser did his musical best to make it begin to feel a lot like Christmas.

“I’ve been playing for about eight years. I first became interested in music when I was 2 years old,” Fraser, 24, of Plainfield, New Jersey, said.

Make that eight years, one hour, because he was the star of a 60-minute free organ performance Sunday afternoon that he gave at C&C Ribbon and Florist Co., 8204 South Ave.

The festive gathering at which an estimated 200 people attended was to celebrate the 100th anniversary of when the Wurlitzer pipe organ on which he played was constructed. The majestic instrument was shipped to Youngstown on Aug. 12, 1925, from a factory in New York before it was housed for many years at the Palace Theater in downtown Youngstown.

For several years, the Victor Organ Co. in Austintown worked to restore the instrument.

As part of his appearance, Fraser played a variety of holiday tunes because C&C was having a Christmas in July sale.

Further fuel was added to his interest in music when, at age 16, Fraser, who is self-taught, saw a silent film with accompaniment from a theater organ while on Long Island, New York. From there, he learned to play many jazz tunes from the 1920s and 1930s, along with accompanying silent films.

He fell under the influence of many band leaders and musicians of that time, including the Paul Whiteman Orchestra. In his autobiography, Duke Ellington, the famous jazz composer, pianist, orchestra and bandleader, hailed Whiteman as “the king of jazz.”

Other musical influences for Fraser include George Gershwin; Jesse Crawford, a theater organist in the 1920s for silent films; and Sidney Torch, a British pianist, organist, conductor and composer of light music, he explained.

“I liked ‘Phantom of the Opera,’ one of the first silent films I saw,” Fraser said, referring to the 1925 film starring Lon Chaney.

The musical adaptation by Andrew Lloyd Webber was first staged Oct. 9, 1986.

“About 15 years ago, I came across parts for the instrument and decided to chase it down,” Vic Marsilio, who runs the Victor Organ Co., recalled.

Finding the right parts for the pipe organ also meant it underwent extensive travels. Its “itinerary” included Vancouver, Washington, and Chicago, Marsilio said.

“It took me 10 years to track it down and restore it,” he added.

The fully restored pipe organ made for a variety of tunes Fraser played Sunday, to the delight of his listeners. He began the performance with a medley of popular Christmas favorites such as “White Christmas,” “Silent Night,” “Jingle Bells,” “Come All Ye Faithful,” “Walking in a Winter Wonderland,” “Oh Tannenbaum” and the lesser-known Kay Starr hit “The Man with the Bag.”

Soon after the adjoining Christmas songs, Fraser played a few orchestral tunes that “contradicted each other,” such as “Dance of the Icicles” and “Beach Comer.”

From there, he launched into several well-known pieces from “The Wizard of Oz” that began with his rendition of “Ding Dong, the Wicked Witch is Dead” and concluded with “Over the Rainbow.”

In recognition of the pipe organ’s “birth,” Fraser gave his audience his interpretation of several tunes from 1925, including “Always” by Irving Berlin, along with “Ukulele Lady,” which the Paul Whiteman Orchestra recorded June 3, 1925.

Jumping ahead a few decades, Fraser offered his version of the 1949 French tune “Hymme a l’amour (Hymn to Love),” to which Edith Piaf wrote the lyrics. Later, singer Celine Dion recorded the song.

Fraser finished his performance with several pieces that were part of the “King of Jazz,” a 1930 musical revue that also featured a pre-Code color film of the same name that starred the Whiteman Orchestra.

Under that musical umbrella, Fraser played another medley that included a truncated but melodic excerpt of the famous Gershwin classic “Rhapsody in Blue.”

Before Sunday’s appearance, Fraser gave a performance at Lakeside High School in Ashtabula on a similar pipe organ.

“I’m very happy to see people follow him and came out to see him a second time,” Fraser’s mother, Jill Fraser, said.

For more information about Fraser, visit his website at www.ianfraserorganist.com.