Those watching the Cleveland Guardians on television this weekend as they play the Detroit Tigers at Comerica Park probably won’t see Dave Calendine, but they’ll definitely hear him.

The 1989 Champion High School graduate is the organist at Comerica Park and plays at every Friday, Saturday and Sunday home game.

“There’s nothing more fun than at that seventh-inning stretch, when the host throws it to me, and I start doing the intro to ‘Take Me Out to the Ballgame’ and having 40,000 people sing along,” Calendine said. “There’s just been nothing like it. It’s just an absolute blast.”

Calendine, who also has played at Detroit Red Wings hockey games, started the Tigers job a year ago this month. Both teams are owned by Ilitch Holdings, and Calendine said it started with a conversation at a hockey game with Pete Soto, the vice president of production and entertainment services.

“He said, ‘Man, I really want live organ music at the ballpark,’ but we knew they weren’t going to buy a new organ with all the other construction going on (at Comerica),” Calendine said. “I said, ‘Well, you know, I have an organ I could take over to the ballpark and use.”

It needed to be in a place where Calendine could see the action on the field and also protect the organ from the rain (a definite necessity this week). It was installed in a corner of the press box, which drew some worried looks from beat writers covering the team.

“A couple of the, shall I say, old timers did make some comments,” Calendine said. “I told them, ‘You’re not going to hear a thing that I play in the press box, unless you open up the window and let the ambient sound in, being that it’s digital. I have the speakers that I use to practice in there off, and I have a headset on. … I hear the organ through my headset, so if the press didn’t hear my feet pushing down on the foot pedals, or watch me moving my hands, they would have no idea that I’m playing.”

Calendine admitted he wasn’t much of a ballplayer growing up, but his grandmother loved the Cleveland Indians, and he often watched with her.

“My grandma lived to be just shy of 100 years old, and she was an Indian fan right up to the end,” he said.

Instead, music was his passion. His grandfather repaired organs, nickelodeons and player pianos, and Calendine started taking piano lessons at age 5.

Dorothy Brown, the organist at Champion Presbyterian Church when he was growing up, cultivated his interest in that instrument. He learned to play the foot pedals from her, and she also told him about the theater organ at Akron Civic Theatre. As a teenager, Calendine would lie to his parents that he was going to the mall and instead drive to Akron to play its “Mighty Wurlitzer” organ.

He moved to Detroit 32 years ago to become house organist / organ curator at the Fox Theatre.

“I’m still listed as the house organist there, but it needs to be completely rebuilt, and they’re just not spending that money on the organ right now,” he said. “It’s going to cost several hundreds of thousands of dollars to get that organ rebuilt.”

At the Tigers’ games, the pitch clock rules in baseball puts strict limitations on when Calendine can play — “I literally could get ejected from the game if I don’t stop playing,” he said — which limits him most of the time to what he calls “happy, clappy stuff.” That is music like the theme song from “The Addams Family,” something with an instantly recognizable riff that engages the crowd.

He can do more during the pregame and, of course, he gets that seventh-inning showcase on “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” as the crowd sings along.

With the Tigers in first place in the AL Central and the best record in baseball going into Friday’s games, the crowds at Comerica Park have been large and enthusiastic, making it even more fun.

While he can’t be found on the Tigers’ 40-man roster, Calendine has his own jersey with No. 61, which he picked because that’s the number of keys on an organ keyboard. He lives close enough to Comerica Park that he usually walks to the games, and fans often stop him and tell him how much they enjoy the organ during the ballgame.

That could help Calendine’s goal of getting to play all 81 home games instead of just weekend dates.

“The big thing now is exit surveys. ‘What did you think?’ And the organ has been mentioned as being a great new addition, which I am thrilled about,” he said.

He knows what his grandmother would think, even if he is playing for her favorite team’s rivals.

“She would be laughing and smiling and just enjoying every second of it,” Calendine said.