The Wilton Town Hall Theatre will be a stop on New Hampshire’s largest vintage film festival, which will also encompass theaters in Manchester, Concord and Keene.

The festival, called Mirthquake, will screen half a dozen feature length silent comedy films and many silent shorts, all with live piano accompaniment from New Hampshire film enthusiast Jeff Rapsis.

Rapsis says showing the films on a big screen with an audience and live music is the way the films were meant to be seen.

“We recreate all the conditions that were present when these films were released,” Rapsis says. “It is surprising how much of a communal experience it is; there’s a coming together of the audience that makes a big difference.”

According to Rapsis, the Wilton Town Hall Theatre is an ideal setting for such conditions, being just the right size. Dennis Markaverich, the owner of the theater, knew Rapsis for a long time. When Rapsis came to him with an idea to screen films, he was immediately on board.

Rapsis accompanies silent films every last Sunday of the month at the Town Hall Theatre at 4:30 p.m. During Mirthquake, which takes place from today through Sunday, the Town Hall Theatre will screen Charlie Chaplin’s “The Kid,” on Sunday at 4:30 p.m. Admission is $5.

Originally released in 1921, “The Kid” was the first full-length feature comedy.

“Chaplin made it work beautifully,” Rapsis says. “He showed it could be done, that a comedy could carry a full film and be a full story as well.”

The film co-stars Jackie Coogan, a 5-year-old child dancer who would eventually go on to play the role of Uncle Fester in “The Addams Family.”

“It is amazing what Chaplin was able to do with this 5-year-old as a director,” Rapsis says. “He went from complete joy to utter tears, an amazing performance and one of the great ones of any child star.”

Later in life, Chaplin cut the film by about 15 minutes to tighten it up, but Rapsis and the other Mirthquake organizers will be screening the full 1921 version.

With films by Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Harold Lloyd and others sprinkling the region, Rapsis has a busy schedule. He must get to them all to accompany each film with live music.

“It’s a great challenge,” Rapsis says. “It’s a terrific opportunity to collaborate with these old filmmakers and create something new.”

Rapsis finds that if he watches a film too many times before he has to accompany it, the music loses some of its spontaneous flair, so he watches each film no more than once or twice before a performance.

“I need to be in the zone,” he says. “I just stop thinking about it and do it as the film unspools.”

At times, Rapsis has had to go on with no preparation whatsoever. At a screening in Portsmouth a couple of years ago, the movie was switched at the last minute from “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari” to “Nosferatu,” which Rapsis had not seen in 10 years.

“I was so pleased; I just nailed it,” Rapsis says. “It was too bad we only had five people in the audience.”

The music Rapsis plays is primarily of the era, but with some modern twists and influences. His philosophy is to play in such a way that the music does not step on the jokes.

Rapsis admits he was a lousy piano student when he took lessons because of his constant desire to play something other than what he was supposed to be practicing. But this has served him well for silent film accompaniment, he says.

“I always made stuff up, and that hasn’t changed,” Rapsis says. “But now it’s appropriate.”

Mirthquake began in 2007 as a celebration of the 100th birthday of character actor Thelma Todd, the subject of a book by co-organizer Dave Stevenson. The festival has continued and expanded over the past two years.

The films are difficult to find, but Rapsis finds some through film collectors.

“There is not some store you can go to,” he says. “It is quite a detective project.”

Some even had to be reconstructed. Stevenson worked to restore “The Candy Kid,” “Shanghaied Lovers” and “Fireflies,” all of which will be screened today at 3 p.m. at Keene’s Colonial Theater.

For more information on Mirthquake, visit www.mirthquakenh.com.