My Own Science (Dr Stone Senku x reader)

Alone with why-man

Or maybe they thought they were god-sent. Because organs are also very religious instruments, in Europe at least. And I can see why: you're a peasant working in the fields, you walk into a church and then you see this giant monster made of metal, playing this music you couldn't hear anywhere else and that could resonate for miles. Surely God himself could power something like that. And of course, pipe organ players were literary considered holy.

...So, Hollywood! They really pushed the organ into this 'scary and evil' role. I don't know when it started, but there were a few movies when the organ was famously used. First one was in the 30's with 'Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde' (great musical by the way). During the movie's opening credits, that one Bach organ piece everyone knows about plays, except they used the orchestral version. And then, the movie open with Dr. Jekyll playing a different piece by Bach on the organ. What's interesting about that was that in the original story, Jekyll is never described or shown to be a musician, the movie uses the organ to show the audience who the character is, and the audience in this time period gets it. Remember, organs are powerful, complicated and they have strong religious connotations, so this is an intelligent, wealthy and privileged religious man. We get all that information just with this one scene, it's pretty cool.

Then in the 40's, there was this movie called 'the Black Cat' about a satanic cult. I never actually saw it, it just came up when me and my boyfriend were doing research on pipe organs. They also used that one organ piece by Bach, played by the movie's vilain, again conveying all that information. Instead this time, there was a twist! Because we also hear an organ being played during their evil ritual. So instead of representing pure religious music, it's being played for a satanic cult, so all the religious connotations have been corrupted and manipulated to serve evil. But what kind of person would do such a thing? Who would have the understanding of such a complicated instrument, with the resources and skills to maintain such an instrument, and yet alter it to fit their own personal needs?

From that that one piece by Bach became the go-to evil music for Halloween. But guess what? There's another piece to that puzzle, to really get what makes an organ scary. And to understand that, let's turn to the 60's movie 'Carnival of souls'. Long story short: woman gets in a car crash but she survives, big twist, she actually didn't and she's been stuck in some sort of purgatory situation this whole time. So, she works at her local church as an organist, and as the movie goes on she's less and less able to play the organ to the point where her music turns into this creepy nonsensical noice. And everybody freaks out and the church's pastor cries sacrilege. As she loses touch with the living world, she can't play religious music anymore and turns into something almost non-human. And to people who are used to hear organs only playing in religious settings, it all feels very unsettling: as she loses her soul, she can't play the organ's religious music.

And now we have all the clues as to what makes an organ scary: It's not the organ itself, it's who's playing it. Someone who can maintain it and understand how to play it, and is now using it for their on selfish purpose. Thinking about it. If you see this through the perspective of someone from medieval Europe, this guy has managed to manifest the power of God at his fingertips from the comfort of his own home. It is almost supernaturally frightening. An organist spends most of their time alone to practice so they don't sound awful playing to hundreds, thousands of people every week. Give that person some villainous plan, and then you have this mad genius plotting in the background who waited years for the right time to put their plan in motion. That kind of character. Davy Jones plays the organ, the Phantom of the Opera plays the organ, Sweeney Todd doesn't play the organ but the movie opens with an organ so that counts too. Someone who likely comes from a religious background and has fallen from grace, aka Satan, so there's this connection to add as well.

A pipe organ takes a lot of planning and preparation to properly play it, it requires a lot of work and resources just to make it make a sound. Whoever's playing has the money and power to do that. They're loud and powerful and whoever can control it has the confidence and understanding to broadcast that music for a very long distance, and they're doing it in complete isolation. They don't need an orchestra, they don't need help, they don't need anyone. A broken genius left in complete isolation to plot their revenge. A historically religious instrument that's been corrupted by a broken mind, something that could be so powerful and serene has been turned unholy. Who could do such a thing?
...
The scary thing about a pipe organ isn't the instrument, it's who's playing it. If you hear an organ, it's because someone wants you to."