The B U L L E T

Home , Barrel piano, Norumbega Park, Pearl White (organist), Pianomania, Steinway Mansion, Steinway Street

The http://www.amica.org Volume 48, Number 4 July/August 2011 AMICA B U L L E T I N Automatic Musical Instrument Collectors’ Association

Pedal-Electric Duo-Art Restoration Catalog cover contributed by Don Teach

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 ISSN #1533›9726 ThE AMICA BULLETIN AUToMATIC MUSICAL INSTRUMENT CoLLECToRS' ASSoCIATIoN

Published by the Automatic Musical Instrument Collectors’ Asso- Visit the AMICA web site at: http://www.amica.org ciation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, tax exempt group devoted to the to enter the “Members-Only” portal, restoration, distribution and enjoyment of musical instruments using perforated paper music rolls and perforated music books. Current User Name: AMICA AMICA was founded in San Francisco, California in 1963. Current password: rewind

VoLUME 48, Number 4 July/August 2011 AMICA BULLETIN FEATURES DEADLINES Ads and articles must be received on or before the 1st of these ODD Restoring a Pedal-Electric Duo-Art. . .by Peter Phillips . . . .187 months:

January July March September May November COLUMNS Bulletins will ordinarily be mailed in President’s message...... 176 the 1st week of the even months, for expected delivery mid-month. Vice-President’s message ...... 177 Editorial Observations ...... 176 Terry Smythe 55 Rowand Avenue Book Review ...... by Kees Nijsen...... 177 Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3J2N6 Web Sites of interest ...... 179 204-832-3982 (email preferred) [email protected] New Additions to our On-Line Library ...... 179 Nickel Notes ...... by matthew Jaro...... 180 MEMBERSHIP SERVICES Lost and Found ...... by Ken Long ...... 184 Membership Dues: membership Update ...... 183 USA Bulk Mail ...... $55.00 USA First Class ...... $70.00 making of a classic carved Steinway ...... 201 Overseas ...... $70.00 Canada-Mexico ...... $65.00 chapter News ...... 206 Renewals – Additional $5.00 due if in memoriam ...... 228 renewed past the Jan. 31 deadline Ads ...... 229 Address changes and corrections Directory information updates Additional copies of Member Directory . . . $25.00 Single copies of back issues ($10.00 per issue – based upon availability)

Lyle Merithew & Sandy Swirski Front Cover: Weber Pedal-Electric Duo-Art 416 Colfax Drive San Jose, CA 95123-3403 Inside Front: Wurlitzer catalog cover, contributed by Don Teach 408-227-9284 Inside Back Cover: Violano promo contributed by Don Teach, Hi-Babit Ad [email protected] outside Back Cover: Preston Auction Ad To ensure timely delivery of your BULLETIN, please allow 6-weeks advance notice of address changes.

AMICA Publications reserves the right to accept, reject, or edit any and all submitted articles and advertising. While the AMICA Bulletin offers accurate and historic information to its members, the bulletin, its publisher and the AMICA Board cannot be held responsible for contributions that may be considered by some as inaccurate, speculative, or of an OP/ED Format

PRESIDENT PAST PRESIDENT EDIToR Tim Baxter John Motto-Ros Terry Smythe 939 Briarcliff Rd NE 110 Allen Ranch Road 55 Rowand Avenue Atlanta, GA 30306-4664 Sutter creek, cA 95685 Winnipeg, mB, canada R3J2N6 404-377-1220 209-267-9252 204-832-3982 [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

VICE-PRESIDENT TREASURER Alan Turner Joe Orens 148 Kingsway Avenue 8917 Wooden Bridge Road Winnipeg, mB, canada R3m 0H1 Potomac, mD 20854-2448 204-489-3075 301-340-6664 [email protected] [email protected]

SECRETARY MEMBERSHIP SECRETARY Bob and Bonnie Gonzalez Lyle Merithew & Sandy Swirsky 26 Foremast cove 416 colfax Drive corte madera, cA 94925 San Jose, cA 95123-3403 415-924-6834 408-227-9284 [email protected] [email protected] - Committees -

AMICA ARCHIVES CoNVENTIoN CooRDINAToR Tom hutchinson Frank Nix 15361 Hopper Road 6030 Oakdale Avenue Sturgeon, mO 65284 Woodland Hills, cA 91367 573-442-6675 818-884-6849 [email protected] [email protected]

AMICA MEMoRIAL FUND AMICA Honor Roll Ray Dietz Thomas & Donna Stengel 1250 Lanier Road 46 court St. martinsville, VA 24112-5212 Lancaster NY 14086-2302 276-638-8563 716-683-5309 [email protected] [email protected]

AUDIo-VISUAL & TECHNICAL WEBSITE MANAGER harold Malakinian Karl Ellison 2345 Porest Trail Drive 6 Lions Lane Troy, mi 48098 Salem, mA 01970-1784 248-528-3111 978-740-5680 [email protected] [email protected]

AMICA ENDoWMENT FUND Richard VanMetre 1506 South courtland Avenue Park Ridge, iL 60068-5333 847-318-7310 [email protected]

174 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 AMICA INTERNATIoNAL Chapter officers FoUNDING CHAPTER Board Rep: Vincent and Maryam Morgan Vice Pres: Ken Hodge Pres: John Ulrich - 510-223-9587 Newsletter Editor: Bill Maguire Sec: Louise Lucero [email protected] Treas: Barry Weiss Vice Pres: Karen Simons LAND oF DIXIE Reporter: Larry Emmons Sec: Jack & Dianne Edwards President: Walt Gerber - [email protected] Board Rep: Jere DeBacker Treas/Bd Rep: Lyle Merithew & Sandy Swirsky Vice President: Robert Soule Reporter: Bob & Bonnie Gonzalez Treasurer: Tim Baxter SoWNY (Southern ontario,Western New York) Secretary: Danita Gerber Pres: Glenn Roat BoSToN AREA Board Representative: Tim Baxter [email protected] Pres: Phil Konop [email protected] Vice Pres: Bob and Kathy Singer Vice-Pres: Bob Hunt - 207-985-2308 Sec: Shirley Roat Sec: Kirk Russell [email protected] Treas: Dorothy Bromage MIDWEST (oH, MI, IN, KY) Treas: Holly Walter Reporter: Don Brown Pres: Don Johnson - 248-650-1840 [email protected] Board Rep: Bob Hunt - [email protected] [email protected] Reporter: Audrey Cannizzaro Vice Pres: Liz Barnhart [email protected] CHICAGo AREA Sec: Hilda Merchant Board Rep: Pres: Jerry Biasella - 708-756-3307 Treas: Alvin Wulfekuhl Photographer: Bill Lukasiak Vice Pres: Richard Van Metre Reporter: Christy Counterman Sec: Carol Veome - 773-338-1042 Board Rep: Liz Barnhart SoUTHERN CALIFoRNIA [email protected] Pres: Jerry Pell - [email protected] Treas: Joe Pekarek NoRTHERN LIGHTS Vice Pres: Mike Choate Reporter: Curt Clifford Pres: Paul Watkins - 763-421-0672 Sect/Reporter: Shirley Nix Board Rep: TBD [email protected] [email protected] Vice Pres: Mark Kraabel Treas: Diane Reidy HEART oF AMERICA Sec: Michael LuBrant Board Rep: Frank Nix Pres: Bob Stout - 816-833-1556 Treas: Barbara Watkins [email protected] Reporter: Jerrilynn Boehland TEXAS Vice Pres: Dan Davis Board Rep: Paul Watkins or Mark Kraabel Pres: Rich Clayton - 972-369-0470 Sec: Trudy. Moffitt [email protected] Treas: Brian Graham PACIFIC CAN-AM Vice Pres: Michael Barisonek Reporter: HC and Marlene Beckman Pres: Bill Mote - 360-403-1970 [email protected] Board Rep: Gary Craig [email protected] Treasurer: Janet Tonnesen Vice Pres: David Goodwin [email protected] LADY LIBERTY Secretary: Judy Mote Secretary: Suzanne McCall Pres: John Dousmanis (646) 638-2201 Treas: Mark Smithberg [email protected] Vice Pres: Vincent Morgan - 718-479-2562 Reporter: TBD Bulletin Reporter: Ken Long [email protected] Bd. Rep: Dan Brown [email protected] Sec: Bob Stuhmer Board Rep: John McCall Treas: Maryam Morgan RoCKY MoUNTAIN j-mccall@sbcglobal .net Reporter: Martin "Buzz" Rosa Pres: Jere DeBacker - 303-367-1493 [email protected] Affiliated Societies and organizations

American Theatre organ Society (AToS) Carousel organ Association of America Netherlands Mechanical organ Society-KDV President/CEO – Ken Double Editor/Publisher: Ron Bopp A. T. Meijer 5705 80th Street North (918) 527-0589 Wilgenstraat 24 St. Petersburg, Florida 33709 4725 Montrose Dr., Bradenton, FL, 34210 NL-4462 VS Goes, Netherlands Phone: 281-798-6205 [email protected] E-mail: [email protected] Northwest Player Piano Association THEATRE ORGAN Co-Editors – Friends of Scott Joplin Everson Whittle, Secretary Mike Bryant and Don Feely 1217 St. Croix Ct. 11 Smiths Road, Darcy Lever, Editorial Office Kirkwood, MO 63122-2326 Bolton BL3 2PP, Gt. Manchester, England 3111 NE 165th Pl. website: http//stlouis.missouri.org/fsjoplin Home Phone: 01204 529939 Vancouver, WA 98682 Email: [email protected] Business Phone: 01772 208003 Phone: 206-619-6645 Email: [email protected] International Piano Archives at Maryland E-Mail: [email protected] Performing Arts Library,University of Maryland Pianola Institute 2511 Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center Associazione Italiana Musica Meccanica Clair Cavanagh, Secretary College Park, MD 20742 Villa Silvia - Via Lizzano, 1241 43 Great Percy St., London WC1X 9RA Phone:301-405-9224 47023 Cesena (FC), Italy England Fax: 301-314-7170 Phone: 0039-547-323425 Email: [email protected] Fax: 0039-547-661264 Player Piano Group Email: [email protected] International Vintage Phono Adam Ramet, Bulletin Editor Website: www.ammi-italia.com & Mechanical Music Society 42 Park Road, Westcliff on Sea, Essex, UK C.G. Nijsen, Secretaire General Email: [email protected] Australian Collectors of Mechanical Musical 19 Mackaylaan Instruments 5631 NM Eindhoven, Netherlands Smithsonian Institution Peter Phillips - Editor Division of Musical History 26 Alice Street Musical Box Society of Great Britain Washington, D.C. 20560 Padstow, NSW 221, Australia Alison Biden Phone: (612) 9773-4734 St Giles Hilltop, Northbrook Close Society For Self-Playing Musical Instruments email: [email protected] Winchester, Hants. Gesellschaft fur Selbstspielende SO23 0JR, UK Musikinstrumente (GSM) E.V. Netherlands Pianola Association email: [email protected] Ralf Smolne Nederlandse Pianola Vereniging Emmastr. 56 Att. Jan van Hulzen, Member of the Board Musical Box Society International D-45130 Essen, Germany Chopinrode 25 Rosanna Harris, Editor Phone: **49-201-784927 2717 BH Zoetermeer, Netherlands 5815 West 52nd Avenue Fax :**49-201-7266240 email: [email protected] Denver, CO 80212 Email: [email protected] Phone: 303-431-9033 Fax: 303-431-6978 Email: [email protected]

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 175 President’s Message Dear AmicAns,

i hope this finds you well and enjoying your automatic instruments. The rash of recent natural disasters – in Japan, and the many here in the U.S. as well – have me thinking about what folks can do to protect their instruments and associated media in the face of floods, fires, etc. The first line of defense would be to have your collections properly insured, and you should consult an insurance expert about how to best get that done. What about splitting up aspects of your collection to shift loss? can you store rolls in a different placefrom time to time and shift them back and forth? can you work with the roll scanning groups to insure that your roll is copied - and could be duplicated – if you were to suffer a loss? i know our house carries “replacement cost” insurance for its contents; i have always wondered how an insurance company would react if, in the event of a catastroph- ic loss, i explained that i needed the amount of money necessary to recut each roll in my collection from a scan. Regardless of which way that coverage dispute went, at least with a scan, a priceless and potentially irreplaceable roll would not be lost forever. i don’t have any cut and dried answers to these questions; i am simply putting them out there for your thought and reflection. And the issue is not just related to our instruments; you should think about whether your photos and movies are backed-up off-site (easier with digital media; but for actual photos, maybe one should store the negatives off-site or in a fireproof safe?). in fact, you should think about all the stuff you can’t replace, think a second time about what would be the most devastating to loose, and try to come up with a plan against the vagaries of fate. On a cheerier note, many of our members are gearing up for the AmicA meeting in the UK. my hat is off to all of you that are able to go; i will be in the thick of the kids’ school year by that time and will be unable to get away. i wish all of you a happy conclusion to this summer, and hope it is cooler where you are than here in (seemingly equatorial) Atlanta.

Best wishes, Tim Baxter [email protected] Editorial observations With this issue, i am delighted to have a fine article on the restoration of a Weber upright Pedal-Electric Duo-Art, by Peter Phillips in Australia. it recently appeared within a series of issues of the journal of the Australian collectors of mechanical musical instruments (Acmmi), an AmicA affiliate. matthew Jaro brings us somewhat of a scoop, revealing a new web site service within the mechanical music Press. Ken Long once again brings us, in his new Lost and Found column, a delightful report about his recent visit with AmicAn Jean- Jacques Trinques, who established and maintains a fine piano museum in the south of France. With the current economic downturn, there has never been a better opportunity to inspire new members. Silent player pianos are emerging everywhere, for no more than the cost of moving them. This is how i got my start in the mid-60's, upon an evening of pure enjoyment pumping a player piano in a friend's home. i resolved to find one for myself, and within a few weeks acquired a nice New Scale Williams. it was silent. in the absence of books and advice, i did the best i could with hospital sheeting and surgical tubing and got it working. Over the years, i've learned a lot about proper restoration. Newcomers acquiring their first player piano, likely silent, are enthusiastically moti- vated to "..get it working..." it is important not to suppress this enthusiasm. New members need encouragement, not criticism that their initial methods and materials are not absolutely flawless. Knowledge about proper techniques and materials will come with experience, no different than it did for me. AmicA can lend a huge helping hand and in the process, harvest new members. AmicA has a major role in the preservation of this unique slice of our musical heritage. Our members, each in their own way, can make significant contributions to this objective, be it participation in community events, supporting worthy charities of choice, or simply lending a personal helping hand. it all counts. As Ellen Goodman once stated, "i am awed by those who strive to make one small difference after another, rather than heroics to change the world."

Regards, Terry Smythe [email protected]

176 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Vice-President’s Message Hello AmicAN's near and far,

Summer is drawing to a close and i see many of you have been busy displaying your instruments and collections at public events, this is fantastic and can only create some new interest in the hobby, keep up the great work! As the fall approaches and you are returning home from your vacations and summer hol- idays, please sit back and think of new ways we might attract new members into the hobby. No idea is too far-fetched! Feel free to email me with any of your thoughts and ideas. duo- [email protected] Let your friends and acquaintances that show an interst in the hobby but might be afraid to start for reasons of cost or lack of skill that today (2011) is an ideal time for them to join the hobby, it is comparatively inexpensive to acquire a mechanical musical instrument in good working order, and even cheaper to get one in need of repair. Be sure to tell them that anybody with basic workshop skills, patience and fairly inexpensive materials coupled with the vast amount of technical information available on the AmicA website and other websites as well as Art Reblitz's excellent book (Player Piano - Servicing and Rebuilding) can rebuild almost anything out there. cheers, Alan Turner Vice-President AmicA international

BooK REVIEW central r61e in this. After introductory chapters with definitions of instruments and musical principles, he gives ample descrip- by Kees Nijsen tions of parts like springs, governors regulators, gearwheels and Mechanische Musikinstrumente driving mechanisms, followed by electrical parts and switches, motors, all separately explained with clear, understandable by herbert Jüttemann drawings. Pneumatic principles, including different kinds of iSBN: 978-3-936655-65-0 bellows and blowing systems are treated in the same way. in chapter 8 all sorts of organ pipes are explained and illustrated. A comprehensive book on mechanical musical instru- in chapter 9 the bearers of tonal information like cylinders, ments was published in Germany by Dohr Verlag in cologne. it tapes and disks are illustrated, including EPROm and FLASH. was written by Dr. Herbert Jüttemann of A separate part of the book is devoted to early mechanical Karlsruhe, a renowned expert in this field, also known for his organs and their inventors like De clear, instructive drawings of all sepa- cous, De Fluctibus, Kircher and rate parts, which have proved to be Scott. musical boxes are explained in very useful for restorers of these detail, including bird organs (Ser- instruments. A successor to a previous inettes) and the bigger organs for work under the same title, it was street music and fairs Organettes, revised, made up-to-date and provid- zithers, accordeons and mechanically ed with an extensive chapter on mod- controlled wind ern piano systems like the Disklavier, instruments are not forgotten. The written by Dr. Walter Tenten, an origin of piano pushups and integrated expert in computer technology. player pianos lead to the treatment of All together we can now orchestrions and related showpieces build up an impressive library of mm like mechanical violins. A final chap- books, as there are already those of ter is devoted to the notation of musi- authors like Bowers, Buchner, cha- cal scores and modern tone systems. puis, Gelatt, Haspels, Hocker, Howe, The book costs 98 Euro and is avail- Ord-Hume, Reblitz, Weiss-Stauffach- able from christoph Dohr Verlag, Sin- er and Witteloostuyn, not all available dorfer Strasse 19, 50127 Bergheim, in English of course, but extensively Germany. provided with facts, drawings, etc. for perusal by enthusiasts in the fields of http://www.dohr.de/ instrument collecting, museums, con- [email protected] servatories and the like. Jüttemann's book may play a

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 177 Bonnie Bergstrom Capitol/Supertone Recording Artist by Robert Perry considered for many years to have been a ‘probably August 5, 1940 carried an pseudonym’, Bonnie Bergstrom was, in fact, a real (and very article about Bonnie in young) roll artist. Her first Supertone roll was issued in October their radio section, men- 1931, which means that it was released when she was still a tioning that the "talented month away from her 16th birthday! She continues to appear and versatile young lady, until the final capitol Supertone issues in 1933. who has been thrilling ever Robert Perry Bergstrom was the daughter of Ellis and Hilma, Swedish so many radio fans for the past several months with her musical immigrants who arrived in the USA in 1906. Ellis worked as a offerings with the 'Diplomettes of Rhythm’ featured twice daily pattern maker for a printing firm. She also had a younger brother, from the Hotel Foeste to WHBL", was also the president of the Bertil (born August 1917). By 1928 the family were prosperous official Barbara Stanwyck Fan club in addition to her busy enough to afford a visit to Sweden, arriving back in the USA 17 schedule "being constantly on tour or featured entertainer at spots September 1928 on the ship Drottningholm, from the port of all over the United States. Bonnie is most modest about it all, just Gothenburg. as she is abuot her great talent in music. As most folks round She was one of the best these parts have learned, Bonnie and brightest at Lindblom High plays the piano and piano accor- School in chicago - the June dion and sings equally well." 1932 yearbook listing her as A Billboard magazine article Vice-President of 4A and 3B of 10 July 1943 reports on a per- classes, Girls council, Honor formance by Alice Rawleigh And Society, Scholarship of the "L" Her Diplomettes Of Rhythm in club, Editor of the "Steam Whis- San Diego, and mentions "Bonnie tle", and Treasurer of the Junior Bergstrom, another looker, is a Girls club. She is also listed as triple-threat gal, handling piano, 'Radio Artist' next to her photo- accordion and doing much of the graph - many of the other stu- arranging". The article also dents have professions listed, mentions her as being one of the from private secretary to estima- vocalists for the group, both in tor to aviatrix, and i'm unsure as trio singing and as a "torchy to whether this was the career soloist". path they were studying to attain, The probability of this Bon- or work they had already secured. nie Bergstrom being the same as The daughter of capitol the chicago roll artist is increased head arranger Roy Rodocker by the fact a Hilma O. Bergstrom, (Joyce) was also in the same year born 3 February 1884, is recorded as Bergstrom, and belonged to the as dying in california (Los Ange- same Junior Girls club, so mr. les) on 15 August 1966 and Ellis Rodocker may have become Bergstrom, born 9 October 1886, aware of Bonnie’s talents through died in Los Angeles on 26 August Joyce. Her first known roll was 1968. These match perfectly the issued as Supertone #4720, Save details of her parents, so it's likely The Last Dance For me. This the entire family had relocated piece was composed by Walter west. Hirsch and Frank magine and Bonnie may have married a was copyrighted in October 1931. From then on she is one of the Frank milello in August 1948 in chicago, but i have been unable mainstays of the Supertone catalogue, along with other artists to confirm this is the same lady. At some point, she definitely John Honnert, Pearl White and Bernie Schaik (who were also married Robert Frederick Hickman (1920-1967), who served as a young, being born in 1908, 1910, and 1914 respectively!). Her Sergeant in the US marine corps during the war. final known roll was issued as Supertone #4926, You've Got A Social Security Death index lists a Bonnie B. Hick- Everything - this Kahn and Donaldson foxtrot was copyrighted man, nee Bergstrom as dying in San Diego on 22 April 1983. The September 1933. This was also the third to last birth date of 4 November 1915 does match that implied in the Supertone roll issued by the columbia/capitol concern before 1920 census (Bonnie is listed as 4 years 1 month old, and the cen- QRS/imperial took over. sus was taken 2nd January 1920). This Bonnie Hickman is buried Following the demise of her roll-making career, Bonnie in Fort Rosecrans National cemetery in San Diego, Plot Q1416, successfully continued her musical life. The Sheboygan Press of with her husband.

178 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Web Sites of Interest Norumbega Park Wurlitzer 146B carousel organ (contributed by Tim Trager) News item about the world's longest piano (18' 6") http://tinyurl.com/3flsuck and then photos of its construction by a teenage boy. http://tinyurl.com/3czr4ex Brentford musical museum Pianola Day (UK) http://tinyurl.com/3kzfn3s (contributed by Adam Ramet) http://tinyurl.com/6yqo4dn Adam Ramet's photos of 2011 Waldkirch Organ Festival http://tinyurl.com/666yg4n The Only known Pair of matching Singing Bird Pistols http://tinyurl.com/3tkkh4p The Bayernhof museum of music boxes and automatic (contributed by Vincent morgan) musical instruments, in Pittsburgh, PA http://www.bayernhofmuseum.com/ chinese girl with no fingers on one hand wows on piano http://tinyurl.com/69gjjmh music and the Brain Webcasts - 18 videos (contributed by Vincent morgan) Library of congress http://tinyurl.com/3g2nakk milhous collection Auction February 2012 in particular the video by Dr. Alicia clair http://tinyurl.com/5ut7kqc (contributed by Vincent morgan) DeBence Antique music World http://www.debencemusicworld.com/ il Volo - 3 young italian boys with amazing voices http://tinyurl.com/3jr9xqm Delightful duet musical saw and a street organ. and http://tinyurl.com/6z7jfo5 http://tinyurl.com/3znm5fw (contributed by Thad Kochanny) Pianomania, a video documentary about Stefan Knupfer, a Steinway piano tuner extraordinaire. Derek Paravicini, a piano prodigy http://oval-film.com/wordpressEN/ http://tinyurl.com/3mvoyqb (contributed by Thad Kochanny) A pneumatically operated Oomphalapompatronium (contributed by Keith Bigger) Virtual Keyboard http://tinyurl.com/6h34t6w http://tinyurl.com/yscrcw (contributed by Thad Kochanny) Gene Korolev's Piano Solutions XXi http://www.pianosxxi.com/devices.html Amazing world-wide real-time performance. http://tinyurl.com/btyh5l Thanhouser Films Preservation (contributed by Thad Kochanney including 56 full length silent films http://www.thanhouser.org/ Standalone midi piano synthesizer http://tinyurl.com/3q958rw

New Additions to our on-Line Library Duo-Art Piano Roll catalog 1927 Duo-Art_Test and Adjust instructions Aeolian catalog, 587 pages 55 pages

Zaharakos Souvenir Booklet Steinway_Art_case_calendar_2004 (courtesy of mike Barnhart) marque_AmPicO_Footpump_Blueprint Ampico_A_Upright_Pictorial (courtesy of keith Bigger) Simplex Player Action Described 35 pages Ampico_A_Tubing_chart_1925

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 179 Nickel Notes by Matthew Jaro For this issue we will explore a very important new web 3331 153 Band Organ Our 19363 site for the mechanical music community. This is the mechanical 12/21/1920 Serial 21.21 music Press website: Location: Hutchinson, Kan.

3331 153 Band Organ White http://www.mechanicalmusicpress.com/ 12/21/1920 Factory 2-137 Matthew Jaro Customer: Benj Brodbeck; Kinsley, Kan. At first glance, this may seem like only a commercial Roll Mechanism: Duplex frame. Spool: New spool. Chest: Jame- web site --- but wait, there’s more !! son chest. Drum Action: WA236.

The Mechanical Music Registry 3331 b 153 Band Organ White 3/17/1927 Factory 3-71 Customer: Ben Brodbeck; Kinsley, Kan. The most important new feature is the mechanical Roll Mechanism: Duplex frame. Chest: Unit block chest. Drum music Registry. This is just absolutely amazing. There are the Action: WA236. most detailed articles on mechanical music machines that i’ve ever seen. 3331 153 Band Organ 135 3/18/1927 Repair 19.03 The site began years ago with new information about Location: Kinsley, Kan. Art Reblitz’ book The Golden Age of Automatic Musical Instru- ments, combined with Terry hathaway’s study of extant This information allowed me to find pay dirt on the internet: The small town of Kinsley, Kan. (pop. 1,875) isn't known as "midway USA" just because it is halfway between New York and San Francisco, according to John Ploger, president of the non-profit National Foundation for carnival Heritage. The community was home to one of the first traveling shows of the 20th century, started in 1901 by charles Brod- beck. Ploger said the carnival eventually branched into six units by the 1950s, anchored by Brodbeck & Schrader Shows and Strates midwest Shows. Ploger, a real estate and insurance agent in Kinsley, spearheaded a movement two years ago to document that historical footnote by opening a carnival museum located in a two-story, 12,000 square-foot building next to his office. Terry Hathaway Art Reblitz The museum also has a hall of fame with five members, (c. 1971) all from the state of Kansas: charles Brodbeck; his two sons, Philipps orchestrions from his previous Hathaworld site. Over Fred and Ben Brodbeck; sword swallower Estilline Pike; and the years, Terry and Art have added other topics, wanting to share her husband, John "Lucky" Ball. the information they’ve collected throughout their lives. compil- Thanks to the Registry, i found out the date of manufac- ing and sharing such information is necessary to preserve our her- ture, the story of the original owner and when repairs and itage. As time passes, and we drift far away from the time when modifications were made. those machines were made, the information gets more obscure and difficult to verify. Electric Motors Just what is there in the Registry? To begin with, there is detailed information about, deKleist, Hupfeld, marquette (cre- consider another great example of using the Registry. i mona), Nelson-Wiggen, Operators (coinola and Reproduco), have a Holtzer-cabot motor on my Seeburg “G” machine. The Phillipps, Seeburg and Western Electric, Welte and Wurlitzer. serial number is 190108. The registry has a topic “Electric This encompasses American and European nickelodeons, motors used in American-made coin Pianos and Orchestrions. orchestrions and band organs. Now is a good time to explore There is a chart of serial numbers for the motors and what year some of the interesting features of the Registry. they were manufactured. The serial number 188,513 corresponds to 1916. The Gram piano also dates from 1916 so i have a good Wurlitzer Ledgers idea of when the machine was built. if you click on any of the pictures, there is an expanded To demonstrate how the information can be a personal view of a number of large detailed pictures. This is a really great boon to all owners of instruments, we can pick my Wurlitzer 153 feature of the web site. band organ, serial number 3331. The registry has all of the Wurl- itzer ledger information carefully transcribed into a database for- The deKleist Journals mat and made available by downloadable PDF files. So for my band organ, i looked up the combined information from all The deKleist musical instrument manufacturing com- sources and found: pany was an important producer of band organs. The journals

180 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 cover the period from 1903 to about 1908. The company was cones, interconnected by a flat leather belt, to adjust the for- bought by Wurlitzer in January, 1909. considering that any infor- ward (playing) speed of the music roll. mation before 1910 is extremely sparse, these journals are incred- chronological History: ibly amazing. The introduction states: circa 1908 manufactured by J.D. Philipps & Sons, Bockenheim, Frank- its genesis, however, inspired a lot of new research, some of it furt-am-main, Germany. in the Archives Department at the Smithsonian institution in circa 1908/ Washington, Dc, where certain accessible original deKleist imported and sold by Rudolph Wurlitzer company, New factory records, donated many years earlier by the Wurlitzer York. company, were photographed. circa 1908/09 Glockner music company, Los Angeles, california. Encouraged by Dana Johnson, Dave Bowers sought out the deKleist ledgers and photographed them. Dave gave them During restoration of the PianOrchestra, a business card was found buried within the mechanics of the machine, bearing the imprint: "Wm. L. Glockner, Agent for the celebrated Wurlitzer Automatic Pianos and Harps, [Telephone] Sunset 2221 or 3189." Additionally, there was the shadow of a label on the case that appeared to be the same size and shape as known Glockner music company decals. Thus, it is speculated that this PianOrchestra was originally shipped to William L. Glockner (a.k.a. Glockner music company), a musical instrument Dealer and Wurlitzer agent located at 917 South Broad- way, later moved (circa 1919) to 325 New High Street (now Spring Street) in Downtown Los Angeles, california. if the PianOrchestra was originally shipped to Los Ange- les (from Wurlitzer's New York facility) there is another possible shipping destination that merits mention. it is unknown Dana Johnson Dave Bowers when The Rudolph Wurlitzer company of california first to Terry hathaway who meticulously and lovingly transcribed opened a store in Los Angeles. it is known that the company, thousands of entries into the database. These are now download- during the twenties, maintained some kind of sales facility on able as PDF files. These journals are hundreds of pages long. the ground floor of the rather impressive Wurlitzer building. This building was, and still is, located at 816 South Broadway The Wurlitzer PianOrchestra in the downtown Los Angeles entertainment district, although it is no longer associated with Wurlitzer. The original high- There is a great deal of flawlessly researched material on relief cartouche emblazoned with the Wurlitzer name is still the PianOrchestra machines and music. This is a labor of love for beautifully intact above the street level retail shops. The build- Terry Hathaway (yes, the historic part owner of the Hathaway ing,built in 1923, was designed by Walker and Eisen, and is a and Bowers orchestrion store in california). Terry writes: 12-story Spanish Renaissance polychrome terra cotta structure with decorative bands and arched windows. Among the deco- This particular project is a fulfillment of a childhood fas- rations are various musical instruments: violin, drum, horn, cination with what was known in America as a Wurlitzer irish harp and lyre. interspersed with the musical instruments PianOrchestra. my initial immersion into the fascinating world are small red medallions bearing the names of famous com- of large orchestrions began in the mid-1940s, when, as a small posers: Verdi, mozart and Bizet. The Rudolph Wurlitzer com- lad, i fell in love with a huge Wurlitzer style 30A mandolin pany of california was still listed at the Broadway address into PianOrchestra, which was located in the Playland arcade, on the early 1930s. the Newport Beach Peninsula, california. This magnificent machine, an automatic self-playing orchestra, was housed in an This description provides a brief insight to the extent of ornate case emblazoned with the Wurlitzer logo. Although i the research involved. in addition to complete chronology, there grew up knowing it as a Wurlitzer PianOrchestra, it was actu- is complete technical information, pipework, scaling and ship- ally an imported Philipps model 30 Pianella (also known as a ping data. There are literally many hundreds of pages of informa- Philipps monopol-Xylophon Pianella, manufactured by J.D. tion. The PianOrchestra rollography is another epic project in this Philipps and Sons, Bockenheim (a suburb of Frankfurt-am- site that is always continuing. main), Germany. The Direct Drive Gear System There is extremely detailed information on all the mod- els, including ownership, chronology, and technical data. As an There is major topic concerning all of the details of direct drive interesting example, consider this section on Jim Krughoff’s gears. Terry Hathaway embarked on an extensive study of this Style 33 machine: topic: This Wurlitzer Direct Drive Gear study project started Notes: out as nothing more than a few insignificant seeming observa- This machine contains the earliest known Revolver tions and accompanying notes regarding the gear drive while mechanism (patented in 1905), which uses wooden tapered studying the deKleist journals. Getting into the 1906 range of

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 181 entries spawned an interest in seeing if there was any mention plate between bass and treble sections, and an extra vertical of when the Direct Drive Gear might have been introduced. frame member in the mid-treble of the lower plate resulting in There was nothing definitive one way or another, but it was four sections of hammers instead of the usual three. Similar already known that the gear drive system was originally adver- pianos appear to have been used in early Operators (coinola) tised as an important feature in the 88 note player piano, as instruments, and in 1920s chicago Electric coin pianos made well as the novel sounding mandolin quartette. This suggested by Smith, Barnes & Strohber. the new gear system began commercial use about February of 1906, when the first of the 88 note players and mandolin quar- There is a complete description of mechanical design tettes began shipping. changes with many illustrations. Again, be sure to click on the thumbnails to see expanded photos and information. Seeburg and Western Electric The Seeburg machines represent one of the most important sections to collectors of Automatic music. Art Reblitz writes: i have been working with a large amount of information about the marquette, Seeburg, Western Electric, Nelson- Wiggen, Wurlitzer, and other coin-in-the-slot piano compa- nies, data taken from music trade magazines, photographs, cat- alogs, U.S. Patent records, personal interviews and other historical records, for over 40 years. Judging by information discovered to date, Seeburg not only manufactured many of the prettiest-looking and best- Simplified extract from Wurlitzer sounding coin pianos and orchestrions ever made, but they also patent #1043056 d/29 October 1912. made more of them than anyone else in America. in addition to the omnipresent piano serial number, many This might seem like a rather narrow and perhaps unin- of these instruments also have a number stamped into the teresting topic, but Terry presents it in a way that is positively piano stack, either on the front, on top, or on the bleed rail or riveting. Remember to click on any picture in the Registry to see its cover. After compiling a lengthy serial number list, we have explanatory text and larger pictures. learned that the Seeburg company numbered its piano stacks from 100 through 9,999 between 1907 to the early 1920s, and Cremona (Marquette) then started a new series with 100 again, using smaller number The cremona section is typical of the information that stamping dies. can be found out about each machine. As manufacturers are Seeburg also owned the Western Electric Piano co. as a secret subsidiary, and these coin pianos and orchestrions also added to the Registry, the formats will be similar. First and most bear Seeburg serial numbers. importantly, there is a database of all the known machines. The While we now have enough information to proceed with information comes from both Art’s extensive knowledge and col- the completion of the Seeburg and Western Electric Registry lector survey forms. Here is an example of a cremona model 2 pages and registry reports, more details are always welcome, entry: because they help to pinpoint the time when various design Cremona 11185 2 Piano with mandolin attachment. and mechanical changes were made. if you have a Seeburg or Western Electric piano, we welcome information, whether you Stack No: 6562 Stack Type: Early (tubing connections in send just a model letter and serial number, or all the informa- back). Roll Mechanism: Worm gear driven roll drive shaft; stepped pul- tion on the form. Just click on one of the Survey Reporting ley for tempo control; Standard spoolbox with cast iron sides & Form buttons below. Your name will also be added to the brass tracker bar. acknowledgments accessible from the Registry opening page. Coin Mechanism: Weight of nickel turns pinned counting wheel. Art Glass: Same as glass in Cremona advertisement for Style 2 The Seeburg section documents the changes made to the piano machines, when they were made and what serial numbers were Comments: Motor: Emerson type 7361 MS #579435; Number affected. There are photographs interspersed to illustrate these on main action rail is 24656. improvements. Also included, of course, is a history of the com- Owner: Ray Fairfield (reported 01/05/2011) pany. A database of over 950 extant Seeburg pianos and their There are extensive articles on the marquette piano company. To characteristics is also included. This information is collected from illustrate the detail provided, consider this excerpt from the text: Art’s extensive knowledge and from contributions from collectors filling out the survey forms. Since marquette wasn’t a large enough company to man- ufacture its own pianos, it obtained many, if not all of its The Purpose of the Registry pianos, ready for installation of player components, from Smith, Barnes & Strohber, a successful chicago maker of reg- Art Reblitz explains the purpose of the Registry in the ular pianos. These pianos are characterized by a two piece introduction. it is tremendously ambitious in concept and greatly piano plate, with the upper part covering the pinblock separate successful in execution. from the lower frame, with a large flowery casting in the upper 182 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 The purpose of the mechanical music Registry project is Terry Hathaway created the databases. This involved to document the technical and historical development of auto- extensive design, then hand-entering all the information from the matic musical instruments; especially coin-operated pianos, ledgers. Sometimes the entries were very difficult to read, since orchestrions, and band organs. in a field where little technical many ledgers came from photos of ledger pages with low contrast information was originally issued and extremely little survives, and difficult-to-decipher handwriting. Finally, the information it has been difficult to know whether certain features and mod- had to be converted into PDF format for general use. Terry also els are early or late. collecting lists of serial numbers without designs and maintains the web. Terry is an expert on the other information would be a fruitless pursuit, but when they PianOrchestra and other Philipps/Wurlitzer machines and com- are combined with constructional details, this information piled that information. enables us to learn more about how the products of each maker Terry says that one of the fundamental features of the evolved through the years. it also provides insight into the his- Registry is the ability to be easily expanded to accommodate new tory of a specific instrument: When it was made, whether it articles and categories. The beauty of a web site, as opposed to a was an earlier or later design, whether all the mechanisms are book, is that the web site can be constantly modified as new original, etc. information becomes available. currently, Terry is working on expanding the Philipps The registry is the brainchild of Art Reblitz, Q. David Paganini section and adding more Registry sections, and Art is Bowers and Terry Hathaway. putting finishing touches on the Seeburg registry. Dana Johnson has a huge collection of photographs of All information contained within the Registry has been mechanical music. He helped compile the information for Wurl- and will continue to be researched and compiled on a volun- itzer, Seeburg and other brands with Terry and Art. Dana has tary, time, and interest permitting basis. it is to be offered known Art Reblitz since the 1960’s. His first exposure to freely through this web site in the hope that doing so will aid mechanical music was a Ruth 38 band organ in crescent Park, in preserving certain historical information and also promote Rhode island (what a way to start!) further interest, research, and preservation efforts in the area of automatic mechanical musical instruments. it is not intended to Conclusion be a commercial endeavor in any way or to any degree for any person or entity, but strictly a freely volunteered gift by all per- i urge all persons interested in mechanical music to sons involved and with the purpose of helping maintain inter- explore this web site --- it’s free, informative and a LOT of fun. est and enlighten future generations regarding our mechanical Also, people with machines should seriously consider filling out music heritage. the survey forms, whether supplied with just the brand name, model, and serial number, or with all the details. This provides Contributors the information that makes this hobby really great. it also helps provide a valuable provenance for your machine. Thanks to all of The idea of the registry was due to an original sugges- this work, we can really leave a useful legacy for future genera- tion of Q. David Bowers. The implementation was carried out by tions. This is what keeps mechanical music alive. Art Reblitz and Terry Hathaway. Art supplied most of the nickelodeon information including Seeburg, Operators, Nelson- Wiggen, and cremona. Art has been in the restoration business for 40 years and has an extensive knowledge of American coin- operated machines. Membership Update

Merritt Bethig Gary & Joan Grootveld Wade and Becky Newton 5856 107th PL 11140 mace River court 7575 Deerlodge Trail chicago Ridge, iL 60415-2202 Rancho cordova, cA 95670 Fort Worth, TX 76137-4139 [email protected] 916-635-4160 817-498-3391 [email protected] [email protected] Robert Deats 1590 Wynwood Dr Robert & Valerie Kushner Ray Siou cinnaminson NJ, 08077-2436 460 Las coches 928 Franklin St #326 [email protected] moran Hill, cA 95037-5734 Oakland, cA 94607 408-205-6365 510-251-1590 Robley and Betty Evans [email protected] 22742 Bayshore La El Toro, cA 92630-3006 Tom Lear & Dick Nelson 714-586-9287 10842 mountair Ave Tujunga, cA 91042-1309 [email protected]

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 183 Lost and Found Musée du Piano by Kenneth Long

it is always an exciting journey to find “lost” mechanical specially open the museum to his music machines that exist in far away places throughout the first ever AmicA guest. Kenneth Long world which are clandestinely remote to us on this side of the monsieur Trinques is a globe. An additional intrigue is discovering unique and unknown local piano tuner and technician and demonstrates his loving ado- machines made by local manufacturers in their particular native ration for the collection which spans two centuries of history country. The singularity of the various mechanisms and their her- from the late eighteenth century to the late twentieth century. itage is always a marvel. The majority of the Last year in may, i participated in the Pipedreams organ 86 or more instru- tour of southern France. The tour was a fantastic ten day excur- ments on display sion of historic pipe organs principally located in churches, but have been donated by also included organ builder workshops, historical places, and, of both professional course, notable cafés of fine cuisine. The discussion of this organ musicians and private tour is not the focus of this “Lost and Found” article but was the individuals to the progenitor to my mechanical music instrument discovery. French Association of After the Pipedreams tour, i took an extra week to Piano Restorers and explore more Tuners (A.F.A.R.P.) locations in the who have helped South of France. The collection i had previously includes harpsichords, square grands, portable pianos, harmoni- noticed in the ums, player pianos, grand pianos, a giraffe piano, a collection of AmicA mem- historic piano advertisements, and other very unique instruments bership Directo- as explained and shown later. in addition, you will see extreme- ry a member listing in Limoux,

F r a n c e . This quaint village is situated on the River Aude in s o u t h e r n France adjacent to the Pleyel Modele Unicordes Piano, circa 1826 region of Village of Limoux on River Aude. my holiday ly rare examples like the one and only unicord Pleyel Piano. sojourn. i decided to visit this international AmicA member, The museum has an exhibit of the various technical Jean-Jacques Trin- innovations that have taken place ques, who is a princi- during the evolution of piano pal of an incredible building since its inception. There piano museum is a whole section dedicated to named “Musée du both pneumatic and mechanical Piano” housed in an old parish church of the city. This collection of pianos, opened may 11, 2002, is located in the Aragou District in Musée du Piano in St. Jacques Cathedral the pristine former St. Jacques cathedral situated in the old quarter of Limoux known as “La Petite Ville” across the river from the town center. The museum was unfortunately closed on the day of my visit but with my advance notice, monsieur Trinques was effusively honored to Piano technician tools 184 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 music as well as From One Millenni- a piano um to Another, Paris, builder’s work- France: Harmattan, shop including 2004; and Le piano tools related to près des étoiles, the musical pro- translated: The fession. These Piano Near the Stars, latter items Paris, France: 2007. were a gift from i purchased each in the Duraud the French version and have practiced my translation skills Ken Long and AMICAn in order to absorb the family, who orig- Monsieur Jean-Jacques Trinques. content. These are inate from car- also available in English and the Pleyel literary work provides cassonne and much history about the Pleyel piano with numerous photographs. assisted with the As a bonus treat, just two or three buildings down the arrangement side street at 4, Rue within of the A n n e - m a r i e museum. many Javouhey, is the other exhibits musée des Auto- show the opera- mates, un Univers tional aspects of Féerique ‘A Magi- pneumatic player cal World’. This is Piano Collections a fantastic and Arranged By Type and Vintage, pianos and the mystical automaton functionality of the piano harmonium. This museum fulfills the museum created wishes of professional pianists and technicians in France to preserve their valuable heritage. The museum facility also boasts the sanctuary’s large pipe organ located on the rear balcony over the main entrance. and assembled by Additionally, a completely restored 1920's Steinway takes center martine morand and stage on the chapel’s altar. it is used currently for professional Jean-Jacques concerts given throughout the year including one performed Achache. This recently by Russian pianist Vladimir mogilevski. The facility, assortment of the museum, and the pianos are extremely well organized, docu- baroque and flam- mented, and presented. This attention to the detail of preserving boyant dolls exhibits history through exhibits and literature contributes greatly to their a mechanical uni- continued posteri- verse pantomime ty and provides which combines the enhanced histori- Musée des Automates, un Univers characters inspired Féerique ‘A Magical World’. cal awareness to by tales and myths future genera- such as the Venetian carnival or other magical fantasies. Visit: tions. http://tinyurl.com/3clg8g5 m o n - sieur Trinques A visit to Limoux is highly recommended when in the gave a most South of France. it is only 15 miles south of carcassonne and detailed and lies 40 miles west of the mediterranean Sea and only 35 miles enthusiastic tour north of the border of Spain. For a visual tour online of the in French, with a musée du Piano please visit: little English, so i http://tinyurl.com/3rv2stp performed the http://tinyurl.com/3k3q6my best translation i could. However, Restored grand pianos used for concerts Sud de la France, un village historique et pittoresque, after an hour monsieur Trinques was trying to explain to me that un musee de piano, la vie ne peut pas faire mieux—c’est la vie! he must leave for an hour for a scheduled tuning. He allowed me in his absence to remain alone to photograph the instruments and The following 3 pictures are of a very early (1932) their placards which are all written in French. i was the prover- attempt at an electric piano, developed at the University of Berlin bial puerile in the piano candy store without the proprietor—what by Walther Nernst and built by Siemens in Hradec Kralove, today a prestigiousness of wild abandon. i proceeded to take over 400 the Republic Tchequei. This instrument is an exceedingly rare photographs of the pieces in the museum. piece, an interesting survivor, despite its poor success, from the monsieur Trinques has written several books, Le piano prehistoric era of electric music. The soundboard is replaced by a Pleyel: d’un millénaire à l’autre, translated: The Pleyel Piano, series of electromagnetic sensors, the hammers are smaller and

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 185 lighter, thinner strings and less tension, subtle and delicate timbre is reminiscent of the old pianos. Embedded in the right rim of the cabinet is an early Paillard radio. The independent external speaker was accompanied by a turntable.

Stransky Mechanical Piano, circa 1894-1900, (above-below) Walnut, 85 Martin Barrel Piano, circa 1880, 7 Octaves, 85 Notes, 30 Note Pedal Notes, Automatic Piano, Roller Mechanism Using Cardboard. Roll Mecha- Showing Revolving Cylinder Studded with Pegs. nism Under the Keyboard, the System Goes In and Out Like a Drawer. It Scrolls the Cardboard Roll with Perforations By a Crank and Sound the Notes By Means of Actuating Pins. The Stransky Brothers Got Various Exposition Medals (1889-Paris Concours, 1890 and 1891-Gold Medal in Edinburgh and Toulouse, 1892-Diploma of Honor in Vienna).

Piano Harmonium; 7 Octaves, 85 Notes; Harmonium is Played with the Piano or Independently.

186 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 This article is reprinted from a series of issues of the journal of the Australian Collectors of Mechanical Musical Instruments (ACMMI), an AMICA affiliate. Restoring a Pedal-Electric Duo-Art By Peter Phillips i recently purchased an unrestored English pedal electric string cleaning rubber and lots of ener- Duo-Art in a 1929 Weber upright. Oh boy, what fun lies ahead! i gy. i was not trying to get them back to thought i would share my experiences in a series of articles in the new condition, just to remove the grime. Acmmi Bulletin as i work through this complex instrument and None of the strings were rusty, and later hopefully get it going. i’m doing this for several reasons, the when Richard tuned the piano, he main one being that so little is written about the PEDA, and what remarked on its general condition. Peter Phillips there is doesn’t apply to mine. Julian Dyer has been an excellent “What a find!” it’s currently tuned to source of information through a posting on his website, but as somewhere between A435 and A440, but will eventually be Julian points out, all PEDAs are different. Another reason is to do brought up to pitch. Right now the piano gets played every day, what all club magazines do, or should do, and that is to share and being in the front room sometimes brings passing visitors to instrument restoration experiences, whether presented by an the door. “Who’s the piano player?” i’m not sure what will hap- expert or beginner. And when it comes to a PEDA, meet mr igno- pen when i start playing rolls on it, but for now the Weber is at rance. As Julian says, the best way to figure out how to tube, least making music. repair and restore a PEDA is to first figure out how it all works. And that is a task in progress. So i’ll start at the beginning, and The upper action share with you what i have so far learned and achieved in my quest to bring this instrument back to life. One of the first things i did was to remove the upper part of the player action, mainly so i could get access to the piano The piano action, but also to start work on the player part, as this is the main reason i bought the instrument. What a shambles. Sitting before When the instrument was delivered, it was a poor, tired me was a complete mystery. There were few clues as to how pathetic thing. covered in 60 years of grime and dirt, all the tub- everything connected together, as the rubber tubing was broken, ing had disintegrated with most of it lying on the bottom of the or easily broken when trying to trace it out. my knowledge of piano. The piano action was frozen, the strings completely black, genuine Duo-Art is relatively small, although i had learned a and every exposed part covered in what was probably smoke, thing or two in the heady days of 1978 when i built the Duo-Art either cigarette or open fire. But it was complete, totally original vorsetzer that Denis condon and i used to record Percy Grainger. (well, almost, as i’ll explain later), and had all the hallmarks of But, as i said at the time, the only Duo-Art part in that vorsetzer an instrument that would respond to conservation, not restoration. was the tracker bar. Now i was faced with the real thing, made By conservation i mean bringing everything back to original con- more complex by being of the pedal-electric type. dition through elbow grease, and only replacing parts or finishes it’s at this point you might be excused for giving the job that won’t respond to polish, cleaning fluids and lots of rubbing. to someone who knows what they are doing. But i was encour- But i’m ahead of myself, first the piano. aged by the thought that i might, just might, get away without i took the piano action to piano technician Richard recovering the stack, redoing the valves or breaking apart the Andreoni’s workshop, where we both worked on it for about expression box. Time will tell on that, but so far so good. The three hours. The work involved using compressed air to blow out problem that lay before me was to determine where the tubing the dust and dirt, a Dremmel to clean up the hammers and the went. And that’s when my learning curve started to ascend, at most wonderful, magical liquid called Protak to free up the first very slowly and finally to a sufficient point to let me start action. Richard imports this product from the US, so i quickly pulling things apart and bringing them back to their original con- purchased a bottle. Protak is applied with a syringe to each and dition. every pivot point, a drop or two is usually enough. The main points of concern were the rotary Duo- Back home, i spent the next few days applying more Art/Pianola switch with nine tubing connections, and a block Protak and regulating the action. The Weber has a Langer action, containing eight valves, with 26 connections. That’s 35 tubes, and made in Germany, which is different from the piano actions where do they go? coffee… You see, Julian’s description and shown in Aeolian publications. So even the piano action in this drawings of a PEDA were close, but his switch shows 11 connec- instrument is not mentioned in the literature. Great start. After tions, and fewer connections to the valve block. Other PEDAs i doing all the usual regulating things, such as tightening every have seen have different switches again, one with 10 connections, screw, travelling the hammers, adjusting letoff etc, bit by bit the others as separate slide switches. And none have a valve block action started to come to life. Nothing was broken, every adjust- like the one i was staring at. coffee… ment was easy to use and thanks to Richard, the action was look- it took me several weeks to decode this thing called a ing much smarter. it remains to replace the dampers, but these Pianola-Piano “Duo-Art” with Themodist and metrostyle lever. work well enough for now. i’m familiar with Ampico, but here’s another language. i still The piano keys were the big surprise. Every ivory is in don’t fully understand the function of the wonderfully named virtually perfect condition, with only minor yellowing. This is Temponamic lever, and i guess i still don’t know the full versatil- typical of a player piano, in which the keyboard gets little use. ity of the PEDA. But that’s all in the bottom action, which is yet The keys took some cleaning, but with spray cleaner and warm to be explored. For now i realised it was time to get my hands water gently applied, it took only a few hours to get the keyboard dirty and dismantle the switch and the valve block so i could fig- back to almost original condition. The strings were another mat- ure out what they do, and how they worked. But before i start ter, as they were all as black as soot. To clean these i used a piano explaining these (yes, i figured it out), it’s appropriate to give an

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 187 overview of the PEDA’s operation, and what the rotary switch Themodist part of the box can take over. This is achieved with the (shown below) is supposed to do. Duo-Art cutout primary valve shown in the diagram. it connects to two inputs on the expression box which connect to two valves in the expression box which when operated, block the flow of air through relevant parts of the box. Next are the Themodist connections. The Duo-Art (and any Themodist player) has two theme holes in the tracker bar which in a Duo-Art determine how the stack is controlled, in which the choices include all notes at accompaniment level, all notes at solo (or theme) level, or half the stack receiving accompaniment, the other receiving solo level vacuum. That’s ok for Duo-Art, but not for Themodist rolls. instead there are now two Overview of the PEDA more valves in the expression box that only function when the switch is set to Pianola. That is, there are four theme valves in the expression box, which are connected to four theme primary According to Julian Dyer, the PEDA was first manufac- valves, which in my case are in the valve box mounted on the top tured in the UK around 1921 and proved very popular. There is action. also an American pedal electric instrument, but these are quite There’s more. The four expression holes on either side rare. Even so, it is the instrument featured in a service manual of a Duo-Art tracker bar are mounted above the last four treble reprinted by Vestal Press. All PEDAs built in the UK are different and last four bass note holes. A Duo-Art roll has 80 notes, so in some way, having been constructed from whatever parts were there are never any note holes to expose the expression holes. But in stock at the time. The block diagram below shows the main in an 88-note roll, it’s possible there will be note holes that could parts and their location in my PEDA. All PEDAs have these uncover the expression holes, and send the Duo-Art box into a parts, but not always of the same type, or in the same position. in frenzy. The accordion pneumatics which operate the Duo-Art this instrument, the pump is a vacuum cleaner type, the tracking expression box are operated by primary valves, which connect to system moves the tracker bar and there are 80 pneumatics in the the expression holes in the tracker bar. These eight valves have stack (fortunately, as this simplifies things a little). it also has a cutouts which transposer, a repeat switch and a soft switch, which simply connect to a single tube that connects to the rotary switch. On the switches on the soft pedal. Duo-Art setting, the cutout is disabled, allowing the accordions to respond to the expression information. On the Pianola setting, the cutout is operated and therefore prevents the accordions from operating. Operation of PEDA theme valves

Figs 1 and 2: Switch set to Duo-Art, which appliesvacuum to the Duo-Art theme cutout pouches allowing DA theme valves to operate. The Themodist theme valves (also connected to the theme holes) are prevented from operating by the switch applying atmosphere to their cutout pouches.

The rotary switch

This is a good place to start, as it helps explain what has to happen when the switch (of whatever variety) is set to either Duo-Art or Pianola. The switch has three functions: pedals on or off, to set a Themodist playing level when playing an 88-note Fig.1: Theme hole covered, valve off, atmosphere to theme sec- roll, and switching various Duo-Art functions. The latter requires ondary, which is therefore closed. more explanation. The expression box in a PEDA has extra parts not found in a standard Duo-Art expression box, including mechanical connections to various levers on the front of the piano, and Themodist operation. So when an 88-note roll is being played, the Duo-Art part of the box has to be blocked off, so the

188 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Fig.2: Theme hole open, valve raised, vacuum to theme secondary, causing it to operate (open). Fig.5: Roll tracking incorrectly.

That’s the Duo-Art switching functions, now to the bit about setting a minimum playing level for 88-note rolls. it seems there are various ways this is achieved, including having an extra accordion on the accompaniment side which is only operated when playing 88-note rolls. On this PEDA you have a choice. There are two input connections, one to the power 2 accordion, and one to the power 4 accordion. A tube to either one (block off the other) goes to the rotary switch, so on the Pianola setting, either accompaniment accordion 2 or 4 is collapsed. The pedal on-off connections are simple. The tracker bar pedal holes are either blocked by the switch (pedal off) or connected to the pedal primary valves (pedal on). But what of the switch itself? it’s here the going suddenly got tougher, as unbe- Fig.3: Cutout operated by switch, blocking connection from theme known to me at the time, someone else had been fiddling with hole to valve. Atmosphere to theme secondary at all times, clos- this instrument. in fact, the more i got into the dismantling, the ing theme secondary. more evidence i saw of on-going repairs, perhaps made by an Aeolian technician during the 1930s or 1940s. One of these was to cover a hole in the rotary switch, making me think this was Four-hole PEDA tracking system correct. A red herring as it turned out. Once i knew what had to happen with the three settings of the rotary switch, the next step was determine how the switch should be connected. This meant dismantling the switch and fig- uring out what happened to each of its nine connections for the three switch settings, which are: Duo-Art rolls electrically operated; foot operated 88-note rolls pedals on, and foot operated 88- note rolls pedals off. The Aeolian instruction booklet No.3 for the UK PEDA shows four positions of this switch, wouldn’t you know, where the fourth is quaintly called Personal control, ‘Pianola’ and ‘Duo-Art’ Rolls. Perhaps this happens anyway with my switch, but it certainly only has three click positions.

The valve block

The literature on the PEDA, or any Duo-Art is remark- ably lacking in information about the operation of the various valves i was about to encounter. Now this is not rocket science, Fig.4: Roll in correct position. but i could not work out how these valves worked, even after disassembling the block. (And this guy is the editor of the Acmmi Bulletin!) But, as you have probably seen in the centre pages, i have finally determined how they work, including those in the notoriously complex 4-hole tracker system.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 189 Perhaps the greatest mystery was this thing called a leather as a cutout pouch, and decided the reason was to ensure a “cutout”, an extra pouch in the valve assembly. i assume the term totally airtight seal. i decided to use rubber as the replacement “double membrane valve” is another way of describing these material, the sort you can buy from a Physio shop for stretching valves. The problem is that not all cutouts operate in the same exercises. i have been experimenting with this material for a way. One type requires inputs of either vacuum or atmosphere, while, and it certainly gives an airtight seal. The photo below another has inputs of atmosphere (open) or closed. This is impor- shows the newly installed rubber pouches, and a closed cell neo- tant, as until i knew how the various cutouts operated in the valve prene sealing alongside the original leather to ensure a good seal block, i could not determine how the switch should be connected. with the bottom board. i’ve also coated the timber with two lay- After a lot of sketching, head scratching and coffee, i came up ers of shellac. The valves now work as they should, perhaps for with diagrams of the three different types of valves in this valve the first time. The sealing i have applied should hopefully save block. leg muscles when pumping a roll. The valve block is actually in three sections and has four In the first part of this ongoing article, I described theme valves, two tracker valves, and two valves to do with the PEDA’s rotary switch and the valve block mounted on pump motor on-off and reroll. The theme valves are the most crit- the top action. In this part, I’ll connect them together. First a ical, and have an adjustable throw to get the quickest response. couple of corrections. UK member Denis Hall has pointed The colour drawings are my attempt to show how the theme out that the PEDA was first marketed in 1923, not 1921, valves work. Note that the cutout pouch requires either vacuum which helps date these instruments. Denis also pointed out or atmosphere. The drawingsare an even braver attempt at deci- the four-hole tracking system is actually very good with phering how the four hole tracking system works. it’s just a pity damaged rolls, not relatively useless as I had suggested. that this form of tracking system is only good with new rolls. Denis points out, however, that it’s essential to seal the Note that its cutouts (there are actually two per valve) operate pouches in the tracker valves. with either atmosphere or closed, different to the theme valves. i’ve produced these drawings in colour for best clarity, as it might Tubing connections just save you (and me later on) some head scratching when trou- bleshooting a faulty valve. As i explained before, the problem i faced was how to connect the rotary switch to the rest of the instrument. i now have three different tubing diagrams of the PEDA, but none of these are correct for my instrument. And yet, as Denis Hall also pointed out, all PEDAs operate in much the same way. They have to. So why the many tubing variations? Why was there not a standard PEDA? There are probably all sorts of reasons, which ultimately don’t matter. What matters is how to tube each part so it achieves its desired function. That the parts differ from PEDA to PEDA is the challenge. Above: The valve block. Left By now i had worked out the operation of the three different four valves are theme pri- types of valves in the valve block mounted on the top action. maries, centre two are for Next i had to determine how the rotary switch is connected to tracking, right two for reroll, achieve the required functions, which are: motor off. ● Pedals on or off (Pianola position only) Right: Theme valve “tosh” cutouts. One is removed to show how ● Duo-Art position: the cutout blocks the connection between the theme hole and ● allowing Duo-Art theme valves to respond to theme holes theme valve pouch. in the roll, and preventing the Pianola theme valves from responding, achieved by operating or not operating Repairing the valves their related cutouts ● allowing the expression accordion primary valves to Before disassembling the valve block, i bench tested it, respond to expression information on the roll, achieved and found to my dismay that it did not do what it was supposed to through cutouts in the primary valve block do. in particular, the cutouts in the theme valves did not work, ● switching valves in the expression box for Duo-Art opera- which meant both the Duo-Art and Themodist valves always tion and isolating the part of the box for Pianola/The- operated together. After a phone call to a well known restorer modist operation (Duo-Art cutout off). (thanks Jim), i had the courage to pull the valve block apart, and yes, as suggested by Julian and Jim, there was the problem: the in the Pianola position, the switch has to: cutouts were made of “tosh” which had perished. But there were other issues i began to discover, all ● prevent Duo-Art operation by isolating the Duo-Art theme pointing towards rough workmanship at the Aeolian factory. The valves and allowing the Pianola theme valves to respond inside of the valve block was not sealed in any way, making it instead very porous. The metal valve seats were in poor contact with the ● switch the expression box to Themodist operation (Duo-Art wooden surface, a great potential for leaks, and the various cutout on) leather seals were obviously only partly effective. Perhaps i had ● operate an accordion in the accompaniment side to give a found the problem the Aeolian technician all those years ago suitable playing volume could not. ● prevent the accordion expression valves from operating i wondered at the use of rubberised cloth, rather than

190 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Having already worked out what was needed to operate blocked otherwise. a particular function, eg, its input open to atmosphere, closed or ● 1 operates an accompaniment accordion (either #2 or #4) to connected to vacuum, next was how the switch might achieve set the minimum playing level on Pianola. (The hole to this. To do this i disassembled the switch and made a paper fac- atmosphere had been blocked by a serviceman, thereby pre- simile of the top part of the switch. The aim was to figure out the venting this function from operating and causing me great interconnections of the nine inputs to the switch, which is shown confusion.) below. The diagram belowshows the connections between the switch and the rest of the instrument. These connections differ from all the tubing diagrams i have, because of the different types of switches, some with 10 connections, others with 11. But in the end, they all achieve the same results, just differently.

To work this out i laid the paper version of the top part of the switch over the bottom part of the switch and noted what happened for each of the three switch positions. The possibilities were a switch input being connected to atmosphere, blocked, or connected to another input. At the time i did this, one of the holes in the top part of the switch was covered with tape, giving the appearance of having been done at the factory. This red herring caused a lot of head scratching, until i realised it was a modifica- tion done by a serviceman. The tables below show the results i obtained: Duo-Art Pianola position Pianola position Position (pedal on) (pedal off) 9 connects to 7 9 connects to 7 9, 8, 7, 6 blocked

8 connects to 6 8 connects to 6 5 and 4 connect to 3 5 open to 5 and 4 2 blocked atmosphere connect to 3 Reaching the point where i could actually present the above connection diagram has taken an absurd amount of time. 4 open to 2 blocked 1 open to Now that this point is reached though, the rest of the work, while atmosphere atmosphere time consuming, is relatively straightforward. At this stage, work 3 connects to 2 1 open to has progressed on the top action, which presently is in many parts atmosphere stored in plastic bags. A question i need to answer is whether to 1 blocked reseal the primary valve leathers. it has been suggested this is essential for best operation, but it’s invasive work i would rather avoid. it seems logical to do this work now while the top action is From these results i was able to determine that: in bits, although another argument is to get it all going then see if the valves need to be resealed. After all, Aeolian player actions ● 9, 8, 7 and 6 operate the on-off function for the damper and are nicely built and can be disassembled reasonably easily. soft pedals Having now sorted out where most of the tubes go in my ● 5 operates the Themodist primary valve cutouts by applying Weber PEDA, i was able to start doing some restoration work, vacuum in Pianola position (cutouts off), and atmosphere in initially on the spool box. At first i thought this would be easy, if DA position (cutouts on) time consuming. in some ways it was easy, at least until it came ● 4 controls the Duo-Art cutout primary valve by applying time to put all the newly polished parts back together. Here, i out- vacuum or atmosphere. in DA position atmosphere is applied, line the restoration work and the problems i had to solve to get turning on the primary valve and allowing air to flow through the spool box working properly. it seems that at the time, Aeolian the DA expression box. Otherwise vacuum is applied, which had a quality control problem. turns off the box. it’s hard to believe how many parts there are in a typical ● 3 is the vacuum supply to the switch, taken from the switched spool box. You get to realise this when each one has to be vacuum source supplying the valve box restored, from tiny screws to timber panels. Spool boxes are gen- ● 2 controls the cutouts for the DA theme valves and accor- erally fairly similar as they all do much the same thing, although dions by applying vacuum to the cutout pouch in DA position, a PEDA spool box possibly has more parts than most. As i knew i would be doing the restoration work over a period of time, rather

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 191 than all at once, it was obvious i had to do this carefully, so i would not lose components or get them mixed up. i therefore started at one end of the box (bass) by removing each metal component, restoring it, then putting its various, now restored parts in labelled plastic bags. Prior to doing this, i took lots of photos, although i now realise, you can never take too many photos. Restoring the metal work

The metal parts in a PEDA are all top quality and respond beautifully to polishing and restoring. Parts are made of brass or steel plated with chrome or nickel. Plated surfaces tend The timber panels in the spool box, to deteriorate over time, and in many restorations, need to be except the bottom panel. replated. in this case, most of the plated parts were still in good condition, requiring only cleaning and polishing. Brass does not deteriorate with age, so no problems there, just lots of polishing. Sometimes two or three goes are needed to clean the my armoury of restoration products included Brasso, a surface fully. Once clean and dry, i applied a light coat of Feed- tube of metal polish, and a brass polish from Howard Products N-Wax and polished it into the surface to get a smooth, low gloss (more on this later). These plus 0000 grade steel wool, fine finish rather like the original. i chose restoration rather than grades of abrasive paper (glass and carborundum papers), a spray repainting, as the timber work was in good condition, and i want- can of incralac (now made by Wattyl and called clear Lacquer ed to preserve the finish as it was 80 years ago. The celluloid Finish) and a copious supply of clean cloths. labels also responded to the same treatment, although care has to There are no real be taken to avoid removing the black writing. As these are tacked on, i left them in position while cleaning the timber surface.

Problems putting it back together

i’ve mentioned before that this spool box was assembled very badly. Just how badly i was soon to discover as i reassembled it. i started by rebuilding the bass side of the box by refitting its metal components in the reverse order i had removed them. i tricks i can pass on, although i found i had previously noted that the top bearing flange overlapped that got a better result with Brasso than with of the Duo-Art/Pianola switch, and that the installer had ground a the more expensive Howard brass pol- chamfer to give a degree of clearance. The effect however was to ish. Perhaps the most time-consuming cause the bearing shaft to be at an angle, with the roll end of the part is polishing screw heads. in this shaft pointing skywards. This explained the wads of packing case, the Aeolian employee who assem- under the bearing support at the treble end, which would also bled the PEDA was either untrained, cause its shaft to be at a similar angle. (i’m not making this up.) incompetent or just plain rough. All screw heads were burred, and The fix seemed simple of course rusted. enough, and after filing the brass Restoration meant filing the burrs, then polishing the bearing flange so it could sit cor- screw heads with fine abrasive paper while the screw was being rectly, i then proceeded with the rotated in a lathe. Once shiny, the slot had be cleaned by carefully rest of the assembly. it was only sanding it. Brass screws were similarly treated, then sprayed with when the box was rebuilt that i incralac. i found several brass-plated steel screws, which seemed found it impossible to put a roll a strange economy, given that the brass transposer alone weighs on. The bass end shaft would not over 1kg. The photos above show most of the metal parts, but not retract far enough, as it was hit- the many screws or the linkages to the front controls. ting the bearing. Then it struck me. The bearing had been Restoring the timber sections mounted back to front! Revers- ing the bearing now exposed the my aim was to restore the black painted timber surfaces chromed section (previously hid- rather than respray them, and it’s here i want to proclaim two den in the timber panel) and products you may not have heard of. These are called Restor-A- allowed it to fit perfectly in the Finish and Feed-N-Wax, both made by US company Howard available space. No filing, grind- Products. These are sometimes stocked by antique dealers, and ing or distorting needed. The can also be purchased on-line from Howard Products Australia photos show this bearing, and (www.howardproducts.com.au) The process is simple enough the grinding and filing applied to and starts by applying Restor-A-Finish with either a cloth or 0000 make it fit when it’s mounted grade steel wool to remove the grime and leave a semi-gloss fin- backwards. ish. 192 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 i wish now that i had tried to put a roll on before the box was disassembled, as although it must have been possible, it would have been difficult, and only made possible because the bearing shafts were at such a crazy angle. And this is from new, as i’m sure this spool box has never been previously worked on. if this was the only issue, i might perhaps have forgiven the installer. But there were many more, such as the tracking. The tracker pneumatic had at once stage been set alight, i assume Exposed switch connec- The original switch tors, behind the spool box caused by a cigarette lighter used to light up the darkness behind the pneumatic. Recovering it was very fiddly, due to the way the directly to 240V. cloth has to be cut. Prior to recovering the pneumatic i noticed its That plus the potential for the lamp socket to cut into the timbers had not been sealed internally, either due to Aeolian poli- wiring at the exit point meant it was essential to rework this cy, or more likely slackness on someone’s behalf. Once sealed arrangement, including getting rid of the ridiculously large on-off and recovered, next came installation and connection to the track- switch. Surprisingly, the 25W Philips lamp, possibly original, er bar, as this pneumatic moves the tracker bar, not the supply was still working. While originality is important, so too is safety, spool. and there was no way i was going to keep the original wiring. Previously, after fitting the tracker bar exactly as it had instead i used modern wiring, a new switch (toggle) and a re- come out, i had to fit spacers to the tracker bar support bearings engineered lamp socket made from the original. That plus a cover so the bar could move. Whether it had originally been free to over the switch and clamps to hold the wiring. move seems suspect. in any case, the link connecting the pneu- There were other more minor issues that needed fixing, matic and the bar was too short, which the installer had remedied such as the position of the rear brass protector strip. The installer by putting considerable packing under the connecting bracket on had mounted this strip too low, which required it to be tucked the pneumatic, causing it to sit at an acute angle. This would have behind the quad beading at the back of the box. This meant the made the linkage very stiff, and i doubt now if the tracker system centre screw holding the piece of beading could not be inserted, ever worked at all. as the brass was in the way. Raising the protector to its correct Then there’s the transposer. This massive contraption height solved this problem nicely, and returned the box to how it must have been expensive, as there’s nearly 1.5kg of brass should have looked when first sold. involved, plus considerable machining. in principle, it has two This completes the upper action, except for the valves. predrilled bars with one sliding over the other such that in each of The key pneumatics are surprisingly air tight, and don’t need the seven possible positions, tubing on one side connects to tub- recovering, nor does the air motor. However, advice from other ing on the other side. The position of the moveable bar is set by collectors was proven correct when serious tests were applied to the transposer lever slotting into cutouts in the front panel. As the valves. Yes, they need to be done, and they will be, but not by you might have guessed by now, the alignment between the two me. This is territory i’m too unfamiliar with. instead, restorer Jim bars was never right, caused by the way the front panel had been Nicholson has agreed to do them, which pleases me greatly, as he mounted. But this is nothing compared to the spool box light will do a far better job. installation. it’s possible this light was retro-fitted, perhaps by the Sydney dealer who sold the piano. in any case, it uses the electrics of the times. The bayonet cap lamp socket was cobbled together from nearly compatible parts, and is made of brass. To fix it to the box, the installer hammered the socket’s mounting flange (see photo) around the side of the box, such that a mounting screw was on the front, the other on the inside. (The photo on the right below shows how the socket is now fitted.) Lamp socket flange

Completed spool box, now better than new.

cable exit after i figured the next part would be about the bottom action; rebuilding the expression box and all the many pneumatic parts located in lamp socket the bottom of the piano. But as it turned out there was still a way to go with the top action. By now the valves have been restored Matching screw holes by Jim Nicholson (beautifully, might i add), so it seemed a straightforward task to assemble and tube the top action. i even The wiring from the socket was clamped between the had high hopes of having it ready for the August Acmmi meet- top of the side panel and the socket’s exit point, then stapled to ing. But i had not counted on Aeolian engineering. completing the top of the side panel and connected to a large, metal push-pull the top action therefore became a topic in itself, as it was far from switch fitted to the back of the spool box. The connections to the the easy, if repetitive task i had envisaged. switch were exposed, and anyone reaching behind the spool box would easily have come into contact with them, and therefore

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 193 Starting the tubing won’t switch off during reroll should the roll not maintain contact with the tracker bar, and also so it won’t switch off until the roll There are three main components on the top deck of this has completely rewound, indicated by uncovering the take-up PEDA action: air motor, spool box and the valve block on the spool hole and the motor port. bass end. As mentioned in previous parts, the valve block has While this arrangement is unnecessarily complex, at four theme valves, two tracker valves and two more valves that i least i could figure it out. But what of these two unidentified had not been able to put a use to. These unidentified valves are valves? And where were the restrictions mentioned in the litera- like a typical primary valve in that there’s a pouch (with bleed) ture? You may have already figured it out. These two valves, with that lifts a wooden valve to send either suction or atmosphere to their single restricted output, operate the motor switch pneumatic. the output. Except… There are two valves, but only one output. The motor port goes to one valve, the other valve is connected to Furthermore, the output is not exactly suction or atmosphere, it’s the repeat switch (see diagram). actually either suction or a restricted connection to atmosphere. At the time i investigated these valves, i decided to put them in the too hard basket and wait until i had to really figure them out. That time came when i started the tubing. Other than tubing the bar to the transposer, it was obvious that the last part of the tubing would be the connections from the transposer bar to the valves. This had to be done after i had completed all the many connections to the valve block, the manifolds on the bass and treble ends of the action, the tracker pneumatic and so forth. in other words, i now had to figure out how the reroll, repeat and motor off functions worked in this instrument, as the tubing for these parts has to go in first. And therein began a journey of discovery, frustration, many cups of coffee, phone calls to other club members, and of course reference to all the documentation i have assembled. None of this helped as it turned out. i Construction of the valves controlling the motor switch pneumatic. had to figure it out myself. When both valves are operated (motor port and take-up Motor switch pneumatic spool holes open), there is enough atmosphere allowed into the switch pneumatic to overcome its bleed and to cause it to operate. Reproducing pianos if the repeat switch is on, the take-up spool hole is now connect- have an electric pump, which ed to the repeat pneumatic, so only the motor port is still active. is switched on manually, and Therefore only one valve will operate, giving an insufficient usually switched off automat- opening to atmosphere to operate the switch pneumatic. ically by a collapsing pneu- The vacuum supply to operate these two valves comes matic. in an Ampico, switch from the switch pneumatic supply, requiring tubing to run from off is achieved by a pneumat- the treble end of the action to the valves at the bass end. To make ic that operates when a hole it worse, Aeolian installed a 3/8" input nipple at the valve block, in the take-up spool is uncov- and a control size nipple at the treble manifold. The original tub- ered. if the repeat switch is ing had a length of 3/8" tubing run almost to the manifold, cou- on, this hole is diverted to the pled to the manifold with a short bit of control tubing stuffed repeat pneumatic which causes the play mechanism to be inside the larger tubing. All to supply two primary valves. i engaged at the end of reroll. Simple and effective. replaced this excessive tubing size with control size tubing. So i figured Aeolian would do something similar. But i am still scratching my head as to the complexity of this no, even though it too has a pneumatic to turn off the motor whole arrangement, given the additional cost it would have switch, a repeat pneumatic, and a hole in the take-up spool. For involved. This is surely a case of using a sledge hammer to crack reasons i have yet to work out, the Duo-Art tracker bar has a hole a nut! called the “motor port”, which is often a mystery to many people, as it was to me. Why another hole to operate the switch pneumat- The manifolds ic? isn’t one enough? There are two manifolds mounted on the top deck of the Putting my questions aside, i examined the Duo-Art action. The removable section of the 16-way manifold at the bass literature and slowly the light began to dawn as to how the switch end is tubed to a 16-way manifold attached to the piano (see pneumatic was controlled in this instrument. All the drawings i photo next page). The 3-way manifold in the photo is tubed have show that the repeat switch is a wooden slide switch with directly to the action. The treble end manifold on the action has four connections. in my instrument, the repeat switch is rotary, four connections, in all accounting for 23 tubes. So my next task and has three connections. in the former, the connections from was to determine if there is a standard way of identifying these the motor port hole and the take-up spool hole have a restriction connections. Again back to the literature. Fortunately this turned in the tubing. The idea is that opening one hole doesn’t overcome out to be easier to figure out, as most Duo-Arts have a similar the bleed in the switch pneumatic, which is only achieved when arrangement. The diagrams below show the connections i have both holes are open. Apparently this is done so the pump motor settled on. These are in general accordance with the drawings in

194 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 my library, at least those that except for the presence of two brackets that seemed ideal for the show the manifolds. The Duo- purpose i put them to. This tubing goes to the 16-way manifold at Art Service manual identifies the bass end. a few of the connections, and The treble end manifold has four tubes that all come assumes you know the rest. from the bass end of the stack, and which lie under the stack tubing, requiring these to be installed first. Finally, the 80 tubes from Tubing the action the transposer bar to the valves, requiring about eight hours of poking and pushing recalcitrant rubber tubes over submerged nip- With all the connec- ples. Patience, spit and long nose pliers! (As a friend one tions now identified (phew!), i remarked, like pushing a marshmallow into a money box.) Then a could start tubing the entire final tidy up, and lo, it’s time for the Acmmi meeting. top action. The first task was to connect the pedals to the Summing up tracker bar ports, in particular the soft pedal, as its tube need- Feedback from readers of the Bulletin has shown that ed to run under all the other members appreciate reading about rebuilding experiences. in this tracker bar tubing. Then the Upper base end manifold. instance, the instrument is particularly complex, but it also has components common to other Aeolian installations, making this restoration story relevant to many people. i hope also that i am not putting anyone off doing a restoration job. i can tell you that there’s something therapeutic about an “Aeolian challenge.” in the end it’s simple, but the journey is another thing, and that’s perhaps where the fun really is, at least in hindsight. This completes the upper action. The valves were fully restored in that the valve block was completely disassembled (320 screws), the pouches were sealed, valves cleaned, then reassembled and sealed with shellac as required. The throw of each valve was set by adding spacers so all valves had the same above left: 3-way bass end travel of a bit over 1/32". One pouch had been eaten by an insect, manifold otherwise the valves were in excellent condition. The cloth cover- above: 16-way bass end ing the striker pneumatics and air motor is original, but also in manifold excellent condition. Tests show it is airtight and supple, testimony that the Aeolian purchasing department made up for the engineer- left: 4-way treble end mani- ing department, in that parts and materials are all top quality. fold The next job is to attack the awaiting horrors of the bottom action, where space is a premium, and mechanical linkages tracker bar to the transposer bar, which had its own special issues. fight it out with the tubing. This might take more than coffee. it wasn’t until after about 10 connections that i realised the transposer bar and the tracker bar move horizontally, sometimes in opposite directions. my neat, just-long-enough tubing would not allow this movement, so back to the beginning, this time checking for freedom of movement as i went. consistent with current practice, i am using rubber tubing for the tracker and control sizes, PVc for larger diameters. Then came the tracker tubing, with its four connections to the valve block and two to the tracker pneumatic. i left the latter two tubes long enough to swap over if necessary (which Rear view of completed top action. proved later to be a good idea, they were connected the wrong This part covers those components you might find in way). Working inwards at each end of the tracker bar, next came any Aeolian player, although as i’ve learnt, there is no such thing the motor port and reroll connections, the latter going from a as a standard Aeolian anything. As well, i have decided that the tracker size nipple to a control size nipple. This anomaly occurred term “Aeolian engineering” is an oxymoron, at least when com- several times, for no apparent reason, requiring custom made pared to the Ampico, an instrument i have worked on many times joining nipples to accommodate the two tube sizes. over the years. Before i could start tubing the expression holes to the Up to this point, i had done absolutely nothing with the manifold, it was necessary to complete the connections to the components in the bottom of the piano. When that time arrived, i valve block, about 16 in all. This was fiddly work, as the nipples first removed the motorA turbine pump and its associated are close together and the tubes intermingle. The connections to 240-110V transformer, a huge beast of a thing dated 1943, brand- the valve block are shown in Part 2 of this series (Bulletin 153). ed Admiralty. Why 1943, and not an earlier date is open to specu- Once done, the expression tubing went in next, with the treble lation, as the piano is dated 1929. Next came the foot pedal/reser- tubing arranged across the back of the spool box. i had few clues voir assembly, which has two tubing connections; one to the bass as to how the tubing was installed in the original instrument, side, another to the treble. The only way to remove this unit was

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 195 to saw through the hardened rubber tubing, easier said than done. style pump is used (as in this instrument), because the airflow (An engineer would not create such a dilemma for the serviceman through the pump cools the motor. Without the airflow, the motor and would have had a more sensible arrangement.) will quickly burn out. A final function for this unit is to provide Removing the pump and pedal assembly instantly gave a unswitched suction supply to many and various parts of the much better view of the rest of the installation, allowing me to instrument. See photos below. explore it more fully. i decided to start from the treble end, as that’s where a cluster of pneumatics lay, these being the motor governor, the reroll-repeat pneumatic and associated valves, and a Spill valve operated by third unit that is peculiar to pedal-electric instruments, which i’ll spring loaded pneumatic Suction supply points. explain further on. Before getting into the pneumatics, i started with the electrics, a field i am more familiar with. The original wiring was, of course, dangerously deterio- rated, and if i was really keen for originality, i would have purchased new, braided wiring. But originality can sometimes be taken too far, in the belief that a particular instrument will be Leather flap valuable in years to come, and therefore should be kept entirely valve under To motorized original. However i doubt this instrument will ever be much elbow, connects pump sought after in the future. There are many better quality players, to reservoir. such as those installed in Steinways. These will always be valu- As you can see, there are many connections to this unit, able, unlike my old upright Weber. Unit containing pump changeover valve and Nonetheless, i wanted to have a good looking job, for motorized pump spill valve. my own satisfaction, so my method was to make the wiring including nipples supplying suction to the air motor governor, the almost invisible. To this end i used black twin core cabling reroll/repeat valve block, a valve controlling an as yet unidenti- throughout, routed discreetly and held in place with black painted fied pneumatic attached to the governor, and another to a valve wooden clamps i made from old pneumatic timber. That plus a controlling a similarly unidentified pneumatic on the expression brown 3-pin bakelite socket for the connection to the spool box box. The main work was to completely disassemble the unit, light, and another white PVc socket in the bottom of the piano recover the regulator pneumatic, make and fit new gaskets, and for the pump motor. i retained the all-metal pump motor switch, replace a crazed pot-metal elbow (strange, as all the other elbows as it’s difficult to find a suitable replacement. As a precaution, i so far have been made of aluminium). The pneumatic was tricky insulated the metal pull rod from the switch. i don’t entirely trust to recover, because it is part of the assembly, not a separate pneu- old electrical hardware. matic attached to the assembly. (The photos above are of the unit Next was the re-roll/repeat pneumatic, which is con- prior to restoration, in case you’re wondering at my recovering trolled from two abilities.) valves mounted Then came the air motor governor, a unit mounted in an in an adjacent almost inaccessible place, only now accessible due to the removal block (see of the change-over pneumatic. Although not shown in the above photo). The photos, there’s a valve attached to one of the supporting legs of cloth covering this unit, which operates a pneumatic mounted on the governor. the pneumatic The input to this valve, as i eventually discovered, connects to a was airtight and port operated by the mechanical linkages for Play/Reroll. in fact supple, so no there are several linkages involved with this play-reroll trap need to change. work, but more of that later. Right now, my task was to remove However i was the governor without injury to it or self. (Hint. Use a pillow when surprised to see Reroll and repeat valves. lying in the bottom of an upright piano. it’s amazing how many Aeolian cross valves in the valve block. i had thought these things there are in this crowded place that can cause injuries!) valves were only found in older instruments. By now i was beginning to wonder about the history of to air motor this instrument. When was it built, and was it rebirthed at a later time (perhaps by Aeolian in Sydney) from a lesser instrument to a PEDA? in any case, the next pneumatic is a unit that has two tempo linkage functions, and is only required on a pedal-electric instrument. The first function is provided with a leather flap valve, such that reroll linkage under pedalled suction, the valve closes and prevents air flow tempo adjust through the motorised vacuum pump. When the motorised pump is running, the flap opens and connects the pump to the reservoir, reroll slide valve which is mounted behind the foot pedals. The other function is to provide a spill for the motorised pump. The idea is that under reroll or low pneumatic load conditions, the spill will operate and allow airflow, thereby reducing Restored air motor governor. Above left: complete unit. Right: slide valves connected by mechanical linkages. the load on the pump. This spill is most important when a turbine

196 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Two views of the governor are shown. This unit has lit- at a rate determined by the suction level and the position of the tle resemblance to the illustrations in the Duo-Art service manual, slide valves that cover these ports. All other valves are closed. if but works in much the same way. in play mode, airflow is from the pianolist completely closes the slide valves, air flow will now the air motor, through the key shaped slot covered by the tempo occur through the two flap valves adjacent to the accompaniment slide valve, through the knife valve operated by the regulator suction outlet, as this suction (set by collapsing an accompani- pneumatic, then to the pump. When reroll is selected, the slide ment accordion) is now greater than the stack suction. if the roll valve on the right of the photo opens a large port, allowing full has Themodist perforations, these will operate the Themodist air flow to the motor. theme valves, which open when the relevant theme hole in the But what of this little pneumatic? it’s job is to slow the tracker bar is opened. This allows full suction to flow to that side air motor during reroll, which is now being supplied with full of the stack, depending on which theme valve has been operated. suction. Summarising, when the mechanical linkage is in reroll However, you will hear a difference only if the slide valves are position, a port is opened, operating the valve mounted on the almost fully covering the cutout ports. change-over pneumatic. This valve operates the reroll pneumatic When the motorised pump is turned on, an external shown in the photos, which causes a slide valve to close, limiting pneumatic on the box closes, thereby moving a slide valve to supply to the air motor. This arrangement would not be required uncover a port that connects the right hand side of the box to the on foot impelled instruments, as the operator can control the suction supply. This side of the box has two spill valves (only one reroll speed. All these many parts just add to the complexity and is shown in Fig.1). These are the Duo-Art spill valve and another time taken to restore them. i’m sure a simpler arrangement could operated by the Temponamic lever. if Pianola mode is selected, have been devised, but not in this case. Space prevents me dynamic level is now determined by the amount of spill via both describing the pedal valve/regulator assembly, which has similar- of the above mentioned spill valves. The Duo-Art spill valve will ities to the bits i’ve described here. be partially open as it only closes at power 10, and the Tempon- .Earlier, i mentioned that when the top action was amic spill valve is under pianolist control. The two manual installed, there were air leaks that appeared to be coming from dynamic slides operate as before, and the suction level can be the expression box (as everything else had been attended to). i increased by pumping the pedals, giving quite a lot of manual had therefore decided to bite the big bullet and refurbish the control over the dynamics. expression box, despite my fondly held hope that this would not Duo-Art operation is only practicable when the be necessary. Fortunately Steve Rattle was staying, and in a trice motorised pump is turned on, which operates the pneumatic he had removed the box, without either damage to himself, the described above, thereby supplying suction to the theme regula- box or the piano. i had been puzzling for weeks as to how to tor. Selecting Duo-Art causes the Duo-Art cutout valves to close, remove this box. Up in the workshop we noticed a quality control so air flow to the stack is now via the flap valves adjacent to the sticker dated 1925, and that this sticker was split where the box accompaniment regulator. When a theme hole is opened in the separates. Obviously it had been previously repaired (pouch tracker bar, a Duo-Art theme valve operates, connecting the replacement), which explained why it was now easy to pull apart. selected side of the stack to theme suction via another flap valve. With the box now separated, my first point of interest Because theme suction is intended to be higher than accompani- was to determine how this contraption worked. my knowledge of ment suction, the themed notes or phrases will be louder than the actual DA expression boxes was limited, being mainly gleaned accompaniment. if both theme valves are opened, the entire stack from the literature, which shows rather fanciful drawings of what is now being controlled by the theme regulator. Otherwise it is seems to be a rather hi-tech device. Quite the opposite in fact. normally controlled by the accompaniment regulator. This is all The other point to make is that this box is probably like no other, achieved with flap valves, pouch-operated valves and intercon- as Aeolian constantly changed the design. Furthermore, this unit necting airways. The valves are around one inch in diameter and is for a pedal electric instrument, which makes it the most com- travel about ¼", not exactly subtle. plex of all DA expression boxes. However, despite the differ- ences in design, all DA expression boxes work the same way, D-A Cutout valve with this one incorporating pedal player (Pianola) functions. See Themodist valve inside back cover for more photos of the box. (treble) treble D-A Basic operation Accompaniment theme valve suction theme suction it’s difficult to easily explain how this box functions, supply to despite it being a very simple device. The photos on page 14 accompani- show the top and middle sections of the box, with most of the ment regula- supply to tor/knife valve theme regu- parts labelled. in principle, the box allows three types of opera- lator/knife tion: as a Pianola where the user provides pedalled suction, as a valve Themodist player where the motorised pump is on and probably D-A cutout augmented by the user pedalling as well, and finally as a Duo-Art valve bass D-A theme valve where the user does nothing. The tricky bit is to show the airflow Themodist valve through the various parts of the box for each of these functions, (bass) as there are channels underneath those in the top section shown in Fig.1, earlier. When Pianola mode is selected, the two Duo-Art cutout Fig 2: centre section PEDA expression box valves are opened, allowing air to flow through the cut-out ports

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 197 ensure a good airtight seal, i fitted to stack manual dynamic control closed-cell neoprene to the top of the (treble) linkage (treble), operates cutout and Themodist valves. i left the slide valve to cover output port. original leather top on the Duo-Art reroll linkage operates theme valves. slide valve on reroll to block supply to box linkage to pneumatic that closes The two regulator pneumatics (shown closed) when motorized pump is on. It were then recovered, and the knife moves a slide that opens a port to supply vacuum to this side of valves removed and lapped. i spent a the box and to the D-A theme lot of time ensuring all moving parts regulator. did so without obstruction. The accor- D-A theme port (treble) dions did not need recovering (as they had previously been recovered), but air way through D-A theme port (bass) side of box the accordion valves needed considerable attention, in particular replacing to pump the cutout pouches (these operate on Pianola mode to prevent the accordions responding to note information). There were many other fiddly things to do, such as cleaning all linkages to Themodist remove rust, fitting new seals so the theme various outlets were airtight, realigning (treble) (bass) spill valve operated by accordion linkages, and generally Temponamic lever (oper- going over the entire box to fix many supply to pedal ates only when motorized pneumatics pump is on) small problems. One of these was to move the end stops for both #8 accordions, so they could now operate over the required ½" of travel. supplies to valve flap valves box on top action manual dynamic control Modifications to stack linkage (bass) (bass) To make installation and future repairs easier, i decided to do a Fig 1: Top section PEDA expression box few modifications. A problem to fix was the placement of the elbows to the Restoration work treble theme valves (Duo-Art and Themodist). The elbows were positioned so the connecting tubes passed through the spill valve in general the box was in reasonable condition. The and accordion springs. To prevent the tubing fouling the springs, pouches had been changed and the regulator pneumatic cloth i fitted brass tubing such that the end of the tubing was now in an covering appeared airtight. Nonetheless, i decided to do every- accessible position at the rear of the box, and the tubing passed thing, starting with the slide valves, which all needed lapping on correctly through the springs. i also used brass tubing to intercon- fine abrasive paper to ensure a good seal. While dealing with the nect the two cut-out valves, which both operate from the same slide valves, i fitted stops to the linkages so the slide valve travel primary valve. This tubing passes over the top of the box, and was permanently set, making installation easier. i also had to re- was positioned to prevent it hindering the operation of the Duo- engineer some of the connections (elbows and nipples), as some Art spill valve mechanism. Another mod was to fit perspex cov- of these were screwed to the box such that their screws contacted ers to the top of the box and the underside of both regulators. other screws. Two take-off nipples were too small for the holes These were attached with numerous screws and sealed with plas- drilled in the box, so these needed replacing with larger size nip- tic foam gaskets. This turned out to be a great idea… ples. The pneumatic that closes a slide valve when the motorised Getting it going pump is turned on was barely capable of doing its job, so i spent a lot of time adjusting spring tensions and the tension against the Bench testing soon showed i would need to move the slide valve to get satisfactory operation. Because of the potential knife valve positions, even though these had been set at the facto- for air leakage around each of the many mechanical linkages, i ry and not moved since then. This became apparent after realising glued closed-cell neoprene rubber washers to the outside of the that the accordion linkages had been previously adjusted to pull box, such that a linkage passed through the central hole of the hard on the knife valve shaft and rotate it to a working position. washer, which was punched to give a tight seal around the link- This was clearly wrong, but was how the box was previously age. adjusted. in the end, after several attempts (and removal of the Next came the valve block (see Fig.2). i accidentally regulator perspex covers), i achieved what appeared to be correct tore one of the pouches, but this confirmed my view that these operation. That is, when suction was applied to the box, the regu- did not need replacing, as the old leather and my replacement lators closed by around ½", and the stack vacuum settled to 5.5". leather had a similar strength, even though my leather was thick- i spent a lot of time adjusting the accordions to get the correct er. i ended up replacing two pouches, and simply re-sealed the throw, achieved by measurement with vernier callipers. The final rest. The valves themselves seemed in good condition, but to test was to confirm a total throw of 15/16". 198 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 The most perplexing problem was how to obtain a into a single output, and it also needed a motor. After a few days i theme vacuum level always higher than the accompaniment level. had the pump together, now driven by a ½ HP two-speed electric After much experimenting, i fitted the weaker of the two regula- motor from a washing machine. So back inside with the pump to tor springs to the theme regulator, and finally achieved readings see what happens. that appeared correct. i cannot explain why a weaker spring was Nothing. The pump, despite having been previously required, as the theory specifies a stronger spring. During testing, restored, could not even drive the air motor. Back to the work- i also had to disassemble the entire box, as it was now apparent shop where i disassembled and recovered the pump, on the way that the valve ports did not line up with the valves i had carefully finding out why it was not working: faulty flap valves. The inter- positioned in the centre of the replaced pouches. in short, i spent nal valves, which were virtually new, had curled around the snap weeks on this thing, but at least it seemed to work on the bench. spring, preventing them from sealing. i modified the flap valve in the next part, i’ll describe what happened when the box was arrangement by fitting three raised bridges across each leather reinstalled in the piano. flap to keep the leather flat, while still incorporating the original installing the expression box back into the piano took snap springs. Further tests also revealed that the pump construc- some doing. As mentioned in Part 6, my aim was to make the tion was in dire need of strengthening, as although producing a installation, removal and subsequent dismantling of the box much vacuum, it was now bouncing across the room. This required fit- easier. To this end i used flexible tubing to the pump reservoir ting metal bracing to the pulley side and a hefty timber panel to and similar tubing to the bass side of the stack. After several days the opposite side. To get a satisfactory vacuum level, the motor of lying in the bottom of the piano, cussing and getting my hands needed to run at its higher speed, resulting in an increased noise into inaccessible places, i finally had it installed. Let’s see how it level. my solution to noisy pumps is to isolate them, in this case pumps now. You might recall from Part 6 that prior to removing by installing it under the house. the expression box, it had become apparent that there were leaks This photo somewhere in the instrument, hopefully in the box. But no! There shows the completed was no difference, air was leaking as it was before. The best i pump, now ready to could get was a pedalled suction of around 10" WG. What was install. The lower going on? Everything was now restored, other than the pedal two external flap pneumatics, which were not the problem. valves can be seen, i decided to remove the top action, as it appeared the with three bridges on leaks were coming from the stack. By now i had also noticed that each flap to keep the one note was coming on when it shouldn’t, and others were not leather flat against repeating properly. So there were many reasons to remove the top the timber. i can action and check it out. it turned out that the screws holding the assure readers that stack together had worked loose. Easy enough to fix, and shame this arrangement works. on me for not checking these before installing the action. But what of those notes that were not working correctly? i soon Restoring the case and brass work traced this to the transposer bar, which i had been suspicious of for a while. This over-the-top bit of hardware is often a problem, After installing the expression box, i set about polishing as it introduces considerable restriction to air flow from the track- the brass levers and knobs that control the instrument. i also er bar to the valve, let alone the potential for leaks. i decided to began work on renovating the piano case. The metal linkages disable it mechanically, and to bypass it for those notes that were under a PEDA keyboard are extensive. For example, the reroll not repeating correctly. There were some dozen notes affected, lever has four offshoots in two different directions. While not vis- which i found by applying a low suction to the stack and playing ible, i wanted the linkages to look clean, and found that some of a repetition test roll. A similar test at a higher vacuum did not these were solid brass. But my focus was on the brass levers in reveal these faulty notes, proof that the problem lay in the restric- front of the keyboard. Getting these out of the piano required tion offered by the transposer. considerable disassembly of the linkages, an effort only exceeded With the stack back in the piano, i then found it worked by replacing everything. Brasso and lacquer soon had the far better than before. i could now pedal a roll without working exposed brass parts looking shiny, and after replacing them, i was up a huge sweat. For the next few days i played the instrument surprised how much it improved the appearance of the instru- (as a Pianola), and began to find a few more things i needed to ment. Also, they now worked more smoothly. fix. The tracker system was proving to be problematic, unless the The piano case took far more doing. i had decided roll was new. Also the damper pedal was very sluggish. But at against relacquering, as preliminary work on the case suggested it least it played reasonably well. would respond reasonably well to a treatment involving three products. These are all sold under the banner of Howard Prod- Vacuum pump ucts, which i obtained from www.howardproducts.com.au. The first is called Restor-A-Finish, a liquid (in this case mahogany But the main thing i was interested in was how it per- colour) that is wiped on the timber surface to remove the many formed as a Duo-Art. Before i could do anything in this direction, years of dirt, old polish and other build-ups. For some areas, i i needed a motorised vacuum pump. The pump in the piano was a used 1000 grade steel wool, otherwise cloths to apply the liquid. motorA turbine unit, which electrical tests showed to be leaking Scratches disappear like magic, and sometimes this treatment is to earth. Too dangerous, and too expensive to fix. As well, these all that is required. pumps are generally very noisy. Fortunately, Jim Nicholson gave Where the finish appeared dull, which was most of the me a pump, possibly out of an Art Echo. it was incomplete and piano case, i used Restor-A-Shine, a polish similar to Brasso, but needed a manifold to connect its four pump pneumatics together designed to polish timber surfaces. it’s here the real work began,

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 199 which i staged over a period of weeks. The polish is applied and ly is only possible with an electric roll drive, and also the piano- removed with cloths, and i found the best results were obtained list no longer has to power the air motor. it’s simple in principle with a car polishing cloth from Repco. in some cases, repeated polishing was needed, but at times the surface just positively shone. And my wrists positively hurt! in hindsight, stripping and relacquering would have been quicker and less work, but the case would have lost something as a result, and my wrists are now much better. The final work, still not good on the wrists, was to wax the polished surfaces using Feed-N-Wax. As the name implies, this is a wax, rather more liquid than wax, that is applied to the surface, left for a while, then completely removed. my test was to see if a residue was left after wiping a finger over the surface. Fixing the remaining problems to fit an electric roll drive, but there can be difficulties integrating an electric motor so its speed matches the player’s tempo indica- While working on the case, i also worked on the player tor. mechanism. Three major problems had become obvious: the The photo needs some explaining. The large round disc damper pedal was far too slow, the tracking system was causing is from a VcR video head motor and its circumference is covered many problems, and the air motor needed recovering. The pedal with a strip of closed cell neoprene rubber. The sliding rod rubs pneumatics in this instrument are barely capable of doing their against the rubber, and is connected to the tempo indicator rod job, which is made even more difficult by the action of the Duo- (with a piece of rubber tracker tubing), so that adjusting the Art spill valve. When this operates, which is most of the time, the tempo causes the disc to rotate. The disc connects to a poten- available suction is around 15" WG. The pedal supply is also reg- tiometer which controls the speed of the motor. The electronics is ulated, although i’m not sure why. in any case, it was becoming relatively simple and is powered by a transformer (not visible in obvious that the single cross valve operating the damper pneu- the photo). The motor is from Jaycar Electronics, and cost around matic was not large enough to give the required rapid operation. $40. my solution was to bypass the Aeolian arrangement and make up The pneumatic at the rear of the assembly connects to a unit of three Ampico secondary valves driven by an Ampico the supply tube for the air motor, and is adjusted so it closes a primary valve in such a way that it fitted nicely between the suc- switch (and therefore turns on the motor) when the suction supply tion supply and the damper pneumatic. Even with this substan- is around 3" WG. To the casual observer there is no difference as tially bigger valve, the pneumatic was still struggling to fully lift to how the player is operated, except now the reroll speed can be the dampers, but could now drop the dampers quickly. in the adjusted. A spin-off benefit is that the spool box light is now also future, i will probably install a larger pneumatic. operated by the motor switch pneumatic, which means the light The tracking system, though fully functional with new comes when a roll is being is played, either foot pumped or Duo- rolls, was causing so many problems with original rolls, that i Art. made up a switch to turn the tracker pneumatic on and off. This involved switching both tubes feeding the tracker pneumatic such The end of the story that the tubes were either connected to atmosphere (off) or to the it took a year to bring this PEDA back to life. i’ve docu- tracker valves. i found an original Aeolian brass lever and fitted it mented the process for several reasons, and i hope some of what i to the switch that is now mounted at the rear of the spool box. To obtain manual tracking control, it was necessary to make up a have explained is of use to other restorers. i titled the series brass rod connected to the tracker pneumatic, with a brass knob “conserving a Duo-Art” rather than “Restoring…”, although on the end of the rod so the operator could push or pull as much of the work is actual restoration. in the end the only new required to move the tracker bar to follow a badly mistracking parts are the tubing, cloth coverings (except stack, reservoir and roll. Tracker bar tracking is, in my opinion, the least satisfactory pump pneumatics), and of course, the modifications i have added. method. Tracking that moves the supply spool at least allows you The player now gets used routinely, and is a source of great enter- to move the spool sideways during reroll to minimise damage to tainment. The player stool came from the Bill Bradshaw estate, an old fragile roll. and required its top to be relacquered. So i guess the top of the The problem with the air motor was more difficult to fix, stool has been ‘re stored’, the rest of it has been ‘conserved’. perhaps because i was making impossible demands of it. i had my thanks go to the many people who helped me restore left it as original, as bench testing suggested it would be satisfac- this complex instrument, which help is a good reason to be in a tory, and in fact it was. But niggling in my memory were the ben- club such as Acmmi. Where else would one get such freely efits of an electric roll drive. i had fitted such a unit to a previous offered advice, parts and actual help? This, and sharing the fun player, and i knew that no matter what i did to this air motor, it with other members who, like me, enjoy pedalling an 88-note roll would never be as good as an electric roll drive. and playing Duo-Art rolls. At this stage the instrument is still Electric roll drive ‘settling down’, and the expression needs further fine tuning to achieve the magical results that the Duo-Art can produce. it has Some readers might think adding such a roll drive motor been a long journey, and now it’s time to enjoy the results. is an unnecessary complication, and that my problems lie in Phew… adjusting the governor and recovering the air motor. And they are Ed. Note: Peter Phillips may be contact at: probably right. But being able to pedal a player really, really soft- [email protected] 200 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 201

204 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Original Hoheny Mansion, from a postcard

The original piano, c. 1906, showing the painting on the underside of the lid to be that of the Doheny mansion.

Copies of this issue (May-June 2010) of Wood Carving , minus the pics on these last 2 pages, may be acquired from:

http://www.thegmcgroup.com [email protected]

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 205 Chapter News and restoring them to perfection. Now you will better understand Texas Chapter this multifaceted, multidimensional, and multidirectional Bishop Spring meeting Saturday, April 30, 2011 who thoroughly entertained this large crowd of local AmicAns all afternoon. President - Rich clayton After many music rolls and songs, we were then guided Reporter - Ken Long with our new zeal and enthusiasm on the journey of remedial enterprise to the cathedral for a grand tour. We were provided The Texas chapter AmicA held its spring meeting on with a wonderful guided tour by historian, Kay Failho, who Saturday, April 30, 2011, hosted by Bishop Kevin Vann of the explained the history and significance of this fine celestial struc- diocese of Fort Worth, Texas. Our meeting convened in the bish- ture. The cathedral is a virtual masterpiece of history and mag- opric facility of St. Patrick cathedral and we were delighted to nificence incarnate. Our tour included an especially rare viewing see and hear Bishop Vann’s restored 88 note cable Nelson of the crypt which is located beneath the main sanctuary. This upright player in the front parlor of the rectory. This finely was a rare and meaningful portion of the tour. restored instrument is blessed with the finest heavenly tone and However, our journey was only at its second crossing angelic harmonic resonance. Soon more and more AmicAns since former AmicA member Phil Bordeleau, who is the newly were entranced into a terpsichorean aura of song and dance. appointed music Director of the cathedral, invited us over to his Bishop Vann has amassed a large collection of rolls from which Ft. Worth home where the Bishop Vann officiated over more we selected more than a dozen to hear which contributed to a day music rolls on Phil’s personally restored marshall & Wendall of spiritual fervor and a most enjoyable entertainment roll after Ampico grand. Then for our fourth and final crossing, the Ami- roll. The spirit of the piano music led us into song on several cAn multitude was guided into further temptation by the next rolls that had dual lyrics printed on the right side and also on the “to-die-for” extravagance--Phil’s exquisitely restored 1929 left. The words were different on either side and were meant to Franklin automobile which he has owned since new—new to be sung against each other—one such roll is my Old Kentucky him, mind you! Home. Never has this rather staid group shown such prowess in What a brilliantly orchestrated meeting and tour where- voice, song, and dance—author included! by the fellow Texan AmicAns spent a blissful afternoon in interestingly, Fort Worth’s first parish church was a rejoice and revelation. This was indeed an ethereal day of fel- frame structure built at 1212 Throckmorton Street and called St. lowship, wonderment, and music in a most sacred and divine Stanislaus church standing until 1907. The cornerstone of St. facility. We extend our most gracious appreciation to Bishop Patrick church, which eventually became St. Patrick cathedral, Vann and music Director, Phil Bordeleau. was laid in 1888; the church was built just north of St. Stanislaus church and dedicated in 1892. The cathedral has been entered into the National Register of Historic Places in 1908. This building was designed by James J. Kane in the Gothic Revival style and has been in use since its dedication. it is constructed of native limestone and features stunning hand-painted stained glass windows which came from munich the year of the church’s dedication. The church’s bell was cast in 1889. But note that music has always graced the cathedral. William J. marsh was Director of music and Organist for the church and during his tenure he wrote Texas’ state song “Texas Our Texas”. Bishop Vann is the third and current bishop of the Dio- cese of Fort Worth. He was born in Springfield, iL, and graduated Springfield’s St. Agnes Grade and Griffin High Schools. He attended Springfield college and earned a Bachelor of Science in medical Technology from millikin University, located in Decatur, iL. After working three years as a medical technologist, he entered the seminary in 1976, spending a year at the immaculate conception Diocesan Seminary in Springfield and four years at Our host, Bishop Vann Discusses His Amica Interests. Kenrick-Glennon Seminary in St. Louis, mO, majoring in Theol- ogy. He celebrated the 25th anniversary of his ordination in 2006. Of most interesting note, Bishop Vann is a most distin- St. Patrick guished and delightful man of not only spiritual and ecclesiastical Cathedral presence but also talented as a player piano aficionado and technician! The Bishop has been a player piano enthusiast since his high school days, and has worked restoring pianos for several years before taking vows to the priesthood. Bishop Vann listened to player pianos in the homes of neighbors for hours as a child vowing to own one of them one day. He then related his history of finding player and reproducing pianos as a very young adult

206 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 St. Patrick Rich Director of Clayton & Music, Phil Bishop Bordeleau Vann Sing in Harmony

Bishop Vann Pumps Out Another Tune.

Bishop Vann and Phil Bordeleau Play Phil's Marshall & Wendell.

Texas Chapter of Amica Group in St. Patrick Cathedral.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 207 MIDWEST CHAPTER www.zaharakos.com. The building next President: Don Johnson door was turned into a Reporter: christy counterman museum, with floor to ceiling cabinets of gen- A rainy weekend didn’t dampen the spirits of midwest eral store and soda chapter members and guests as we traveled to columbus indiana fountain memorabilia. on may 7-8, 2011. columbus is about an hour south of indi- We could buy sou- anapolis, a town of 40,000 that venirs and old-time boasts a large number of candy while looking at buildings designed by the the collections of tins most influential architects of and soda fountain our time. The first stop on our equipment and listen- architecture tour before board- ing to another ing the bus was The First orchestrion. Our din- christian church, designed in Zaharakos owner Tony Moravec ner was held in a pri- 1942 by Finnish architect Eliel graciously hosted our chapter for vate room upstairs Saarinen. Keeping it all in the dinner and dessert. He is thanked (which featured a family, the irwin Union Bank, by Don Johnson in front of Tony’s mills Violano) and now First Financial, was trademark 1908 Welte Orchestrion. was capped off by ice designed by his son Eero cream treats Saarinen in 1954. Other for everyone! important architects began to Our special create buildings for columbus, The spire of the First Christian guests includ- some encouraged by grants Church, designed in 1942 by Eliel ed two from the cummins Engine Saarinen, framed by Henry exchange stu- Foundation, resulting in Moore’s 1975 sculpture dents who almost 60 schools, churches, “Large Arch”. really enjoyed the ice cream. hospitals and busi- Across the nesses throughout the street the high city. in 2000, six In the tradition familiar to Chapter members, school proms buildings were desig- Bob Andersen and Don Johnson enjoy for two nated National His- ice cream treats at Zaharakos. schools were toric Landmarks by being held, and the front windows afforded us a bird’s-eye view the National Park Ser- of the couples arriving in everything from limousines to old vice. Army trucks. After our tour, we took a short Waiting for the break before heading prom-goers to to columbus’ historic arrive across downtown where host the street, are Tony Moravec wel- The 1997 Bartholomew County Memorial Hal and Donna comed us to his for Veterans is inscribed with letters from Estry, Linda Zaharakos ice cream service men and women to their relatives and Jack Link- er, Sherri Neff, parlor. A fixture in back home. (Photo by Bob Andersen) and Hugh columbus since 1900 when it opened as a candy store, it was McIntyre. owned by the Zaharako brothers form Greece. Fortunately the (Photo by family kept extensive documentation of the store and its fixtures, Bob Andersen) including many photographs over the years until it closed in 2004. Tony began his restoration in 2007, taking the store back to the early 1900s in style. it is hard to describe the elegance and detail of the 50 foot long mahogany backbar decorated with Finishing their stained glass, marble and brass. He restored everything from the shopping trip ceiling tiles to the maple floors, and added marble soda fountains are Sherri Neff, and syrup containers along with memorabilia purchased at auc- Miriam tions to further add to the authenticity. Of course the highlight for Hanscom, Liz us was the 1908 Welte Orchestrion, This wonderful instrument Barnhart and played in Zaharakos for almost 100 years before being sold to a Christy collector in 2006. But Tony tracked it down, purchased it and had Counterman. it restored by Durward center, who returned to the store in 2009. (Photo by You can view some of the restoration process online at Bob Andersen)

208 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Donna Estry and Shirley Ekvall are Wes and reflected in Sherri Neff, the mirrors Donna Estry of the and Mike ornate soda Kukral visit fountain another complete Welte with a 1905 Orchestrion tiffany-style in the muse- lamp. um section of Zaharakos.

Capturing a Hilda and front row seat Warren looking out the Merchant window are from Mike and Liz Michigan Barnhart, Mar- sample garet Bisberg sundaes and Richard after VanMetre. dinner.

Bob Ander- sen rings up Hope Rider’s pur- chase of Orchestrion music at the old National Cash Register Dessert is the best part for Linda Linker, Shirley Ekvall and Alvin Wulfekuhl.

Sunday morning brought the business meeting at our Miriam hotel. There are 60 households in our chapter. A chapter meeting Hanscom will be held during the convention in England for those attending, was once a and we discussed possible locations for a fall meeting as well. soda jerk. We’d like to thank President Don Johnson and Bob Andersen She (and Nils from Germany) for making the pre-trip to columbus to demon- plan our weekend. strates her Ending the weekend skills dis- with the business pensing hot meeting at our hotel: fudge for Donna Estry, the the group. Merchants, Don Johnson, and Bob Andersen sporting his Cincinnati Con- vention t-shirt.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 209 Chicago Area Chapter ing our hosts prepared and served our first summer cookout including hamburgers, brats and various side dishes and desserts President - Jerry Biasella provided by chapter members. At the conclusion of dinner most Reporter - curt clifford of the guests returned to the house to enjoy the balance of the About 30 members of the chicago Area chapter of Krughoff collection. it was a great way to welcome the summer AmicA enjoyed a pleasant pre-summer day outing at the home - great music, good friends and food. of Jim and Sherrie Krughoff. They have one of the premier collections of automatic musical instruments in our area. Among

Bennet Leedy speaking on various AMPICO artists.

Our hosts, Jim and Sherrie Krughoff the European piano orchestrions are the Hupfeld Pan & Helios ii 25, Weber maesto , Phillipps monstre Paganini and a Popper President Felix. There is also a Welte style 4 concert Orchestrion, a Welte Jerry Biasella Brisgovia and three Hupfeld Phonoliszt Violinas. Fair organs (standing) include fine instruments by Steenput, Ruth and Bruder as well as and Mel a dance organ by Arburo and a robot dance organ by Decap. Septon On the American (seated) side are a Seeburg H, listening to bow front mills the Violano, Wurlitzer Paganini. Orchestrion, a Ramey Banjo Orchestra, two spectacular mason & Hamlin art case AmPi- cO reproducers and a Steinway model AY Duo-Art with its origi- Al Choffnes nal concertola roll and changer. Also in this Wayne Wolf magnificent collection in are a number of music conversation. boxes and a pair of The Monstre Paganini Franz Oehrlein automa- ta, Symphonion King Gambrinus and a monopol Gnome. Our day started off with a brief presentation on various AmPicO roll artists by Bennet Leedy who demonstrated them on a mason Hamlin AmPicO model A decorated with original hand carvings from italy. Following Bennet's presentation our host Jim Krughoff spoke on the restoration and rebuilding of the mon- Mason & stre Paganini. This magnificent instrument stands just over Hamlin twelve feet high and almost twelve feet in width and includes a AMPICO A piano, organ, flute pipes, clarinet pipes, violin pipes, piccolo with original pipes, flute pipes, bassoon pipes, bass and snare drums along hand carv- with various other instruments like a xylophone and several per- ings from cussion instruments. Italy. After the presentations our chapter president Jerry Biasella conducted a short business meeting. Following the meet-

210 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Founding Chapter June 12, 2011 President - John Ulrich Reporter - Bob Gonzalez Jim Krughoff and one of June 12th was a picture perfect day at the home of our his hosts - John and Nadine Motto-Ros. The temperature was ideal Hupfelds. and the gentle breeze was soothing. Our hosts provided both the setting and the excellent hospitality for the June meeting of the Founding chapter. Nearly fifty members and guests joined the party.

Seeburg H

Our hosts, Nadine and John Motto-Ros

As Nadine directed the kitchen activities, John was answering questions about the instruments in his collection downstairs in the music lounge. members took turns dropping many nickels in the coin slots. Lunch was served outside on the patio. chapter Presi- dent John Ulrich then conducted a short business meeting. The highlight of the meeting was the awarding of lifetime full membership in the Founding chapter to Bob and Ginny Billings. This was done in recognition of their years of service to the chapter and to AmicA international. Bob is also an early Past President of AmicA. Bob and Ginny spent years putting together their incredibly complete rollography that was donated to

Bob and Ginny Billings were surprised by Bow Front receiving a Mills Violano lifetime membership and a plaque recog- nizing out- standing service to AMICA.

AmicA. After the formal meeting ended, the group seemed to split into two groups. One group returned to the music lounge to

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 211 The many members and guests attending the meeting. Location is the parking area in the front of the Motto-Ros home. talk about and listen to the various instruments. The other group sat down in the upstairs parlor to enjoy a live concert by noted ragtime pianist and historian, Tom Brier. Flautist Julia Riley accompanied Tom. Tom wowed the audience for nearly two hours playing rare rags. Sutter creek rocked with coin-op music downstairs and live ragtime upstairs. All things considered, it doesn’t get better than an AmicA meeting at the home of John and Nadine motto-Ros.

Tom Brier and Julia Riley during their afternoon ragtime concert.

The Music Lounge downstairs with its many guests.

John and Nadine’s 1933 Mar- shall & Wendell Ampico B.

John and Nadine’s home. (Is that a Seeburg KT art glass?)

212 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 help him in this endeavor. Following the meeting he was also Lady Liberty Chapter introduced to the Edison cylinder phonograph, cranked the President - John Dousmanis castlewood organ and a cob organ as-well-as listening to several Reporters - Vincent morgan, Keith Bigger and Allen Dreyfuss music boxes. Prior to the meeting someone donated approximately On Saturday, April 23rd the Lady Liberty chapter gath- 750 piano rolls to the chapter, which were sold to members for a ered in the home of Vincent and Maryam Morgan in Queens suggested donation of $1.00 each. more than 500 rolls went out Village, NY. As always, we encourage new people to join us. of our garage that day! One of the new members who joined at Not only did we have several guests, but three of them became the meeting came back again for more rolls. Later 45 of them members of AmicA! were donated to a ministry in downtown montreal that uses a foot The program for the pumper to reach out to drug addicts and alcoholics in the area. day featured the ever There are still a few left. wonderful story The scrumptious meal prepared by maryam morgan, our teller, Hi Babit. As hostess, was enjoyed by all. Seconds and possibly thirds were usual, he thrilled us eaten, so there were very few leftovers. What a wonderful day! with his stories of his days with QRS and how rolls were Hi Babit punched—or at least auto- how he did it. He graphing made many masters, a roll for especially when QRS Ira Malik. was located in the Bronx. He would Our hostess, Maryam Morgan punch rolls by day and play in restaurants in the evening. Sometimes, he would sneak into QRS at night, so he wouldn’t be disturbed, and punch another roll or two. One of our members, ira malek, brought over 40 of Hi’s rolls to be auto- The irre- graphed! Not pressible Hi only that, but he Babit playing bought another of up a storm Hi’s rolls that we with the auctioned off— music we all and had Hi auto- love to hear. graph that one too. Several peo- Allen Dreyfus and Hi Babit, ple also either pur- with a freshly autographed book. chased copies of Hi’s new book, “The Flying Piano Roll Man” prior to the meeting or purchased copies on the spot and had Hi autograph them. if you don’t have a copy of that book, you are missing out on a great part of the history of mechanical music. One young man, Andrew Park, joined AmicA before coming to the meeting. He is a blind teenager Brief who heard his first Chapter player/reproducing business piano at our meeting. meeting He is enthusiastic under- about possibly learn- way. ing how to restore these wonderful machines and mem- New AMICAn Andrew Park with resident pianist John Sanfilippo, bers of the chapter are who was a former teacher of Andy's. just as enthusiastic to

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 213 Rocky Mountain Chapter ities. Nearby steelworkers - who were on strike at the time - and company management officers came together to set up the President - Jere DeBacker carousel on the grounds of the school. residents enjoyed it for Photos by Jere DeBacker another 27 years. They restored the animals in 1976, and it con- carousel Story by Scott Harrison tinued operation into the 1980's. For the first few decades of the 1900's during the golden age The Rocky mt. chapter of AmicA met in Nederland, of carousels in America, 5,000 to 6,000 wooden carousels exist- colorado a small mining town 15 miles west of Boulder on Sat- ed. Beginning in the 1970's and continuing to the present, many urday, June 25th, 2011. Scott harrison and Ellen Moore were of these carousels have been retired and the animals sold to collectors. in 1987, a New York art dealer bought the animals from the Looff carousel in Utah. Nederland resident Scott Harrison heard about the stripped carousel, bought it for $2,000, and dismantled and trucked the pieces to Nederland for restoration. Today, approximately 210 wooden carousels are left in North America, and the carousel of Happiness is part of this tradition. Harrison had been a marine in Viet Nam in 1966 and '67, and in the midst of the horror of war dreamed of someday building a carousel in the mountains. (learn more about Scott's dream and how the carousel became a reality at the carousel Website: (www.CarouselofHappiness.org) He moved to Nederland in the early 1980's where he and his wife, Ellen moore, established the Urgent Action Network office of Amnesty international USA. He began to carve. Over a period of 25 years after work, in his garage, he carved the animals that would become the heart of the carousel of Happiness. While carving the Our host, Scott Harrison relates the fascinating story of his 58 animals to refit “Carousel of Happiness” over the last 25 years: the history of the the carousel, he original carousel and how he acquired its frame, motor, and band began the painstaking organ; carving the 38 animals; finding sponsors for the new restoration of the carousel building; and equipping the building with energy-conserving features. Looff carousel mechanism. General Elec- our hosts. tric manufactured the The Harrisons are extremely gracious and welcoming original electric and nearly 30 of us had a wonderful time at the carousel with motor that still turns lunch at the Black Forrest Restaurant, almost next door. Dick the 25-ton carousel, Kroeckel played the piano for our entertainment, after a fantastic restored it free of German lunch. The day was perfect and while it was 90 degrees charge. Harrison in Denver, it was probably only about 70 or 75 degrees in the The original GE electric motor found Southern Yel- mountains. We are very excited that Scott and Ellen are mem- (behind plexiglass for safety reasons) low Pine from the bers of AmicA international and of the Rocky mt. chapter. restored free of charge by GE. same era as the origi- Thank You, Scott and Ellen for a truly wonderful and memorable nal carousel flooring that had served as shelving for whiskey and inspirational day!! casks in the Seagram's plant in illinois, and turned into the new floor of the carousel. The Carousel of Happiness Story Generally, all of the metal parts of the carousel are original, and Harrison carved or replaced the wooden components. The carousel of Happiness started as the carousel of Saltair Park, which was built on a pier on the Great Salt Lake just outside of Salt Lake city, Utah. it was built in 1910 by charles i.D. The Rounding Boards Looff, one of the great carousel makers of the 19th and 20th centuries. A skilled woodcarver, he arrived in New York city from There are two sets of "rounding boards" on the carousel of Denmark in 1870 at the age of 18, and by 1876 had manufactured Happiness. These are paintings on the inside and outside of the the first carousel for New York's coney island. During his life- top ring of the carousel. On the outside of the circle are 18 late time, he produced carousels for parks across the nation. Victorian paintings by August Wolfinger, a German immigrant. During its 49 years of operation at Saltair, the carousel sur- They were first used in 1910 for a carousel built by Fred Dolle in vived fires and wind storms. it once survived a devastating park an amusement park in Silver Beach, michigan. Wolfinger was fire unharmed. After a wind storm - during which the roller called the "michelangelo of the midway" by the Brooklyn Eagle coaster was blown over onto the carousel - it was rebuilt with two newspaper. The Wolfinger boards were donated by carousel rows of animals instead of the original four. expert and author marianne Stevens, and have been restored. in 1959, the Saltair Park was declared bankrupt, and Utah's Visitors are fascinated by the late 19th century scenes depicted in governor gave the Looff carousel to the Utah State Training the paintings, including a mysterious depiction of a dog with School in American Fork, Utah, a facility for people with disabil- either a doll or a little girl at his feet. Theories abound as to the 214 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 intention of the This is a band artist in this paint- organ, not a cal- ing, including a liope. A cal- suggestion that this liope - steam or is an example of usually air oper- Victorian "Heroic ated - is loud, Dog" paintings, and consisting of sin- that the dog had gle-toned whis- attempted a res- tles of only one cue. voice - that of a The carousel flute. A band of Happiness has organ has organ a non-traditional, pipes of many second set of "voices." The rounding boards on the inside of the ring. These rounding boards carousel of Hap- are modern, and depict endangered species from throughout the piness band world. They were commissioned and also donated to the organ features Scott’s Wurlitzer 125 organ with Don Hein, carousel of Happiness by marianne Stevens. trumpets, vio- our chapter member who has kept it in tune Between the outside rounding boards are a series of Harrison lins, flutes, and in good repair since the carousel opened. carvings known as "transformational figures." Visitors watching tubas, flageolets the carousel turn round will see a child, a swan and a frog rise up and piccolos. in addition, it has percussion in the form of a bass from their "eggs" and stand up in celebration, and then cocoon drum, snare drum and top-mounted cymbal. it weighs almost back down into eggs again, over and over. 800 pounds. The Twirling Girl The Animals

Up on the very top of the carousel is the "Twirling Girl." This One of the most unique features of the carousel of happiness Harrison carving of a young girl lost in the joy of dance was is the whimsical character of the animals. Although there is one based on a photograph by Boulder Daily camera photographer "traditional" pony in the collection, the animals are a product of cliff Grassmick, which was published in the newspaper in 1999. Harrison's imagination. The 5-year-old was dancing to music at the Boulder Jewish Festi- They include a moose, a val, as her mother sang to the crowd. Harrison loved the picture saddled pig and a dragon so much that he saved it and made the little girl the carousel's boat. many observers "muse" - directing the animals as they turn. in 2007, Harrison enjoy spotting special asked a member of the Board of Directors to track down the girl, touches on the animals, so that he could tell the girl and her parents that she was now rep- including birds sitting on resented on the carousel. After a six-month search, Janette Tay- tails, a rabbit looking at lor found the girl, Eliana Dreyfus and her mother, Sharon Alexan- a watch, a frog ready to der, in Berne, Switzerland. Eliana and her parents first visited play catch and a snake the carousel in 2008, and she wielded a shovel on groundbreak- wrapped around the ing day. giraffe's neck. Each large animal took about 1915 Wurlitzer Band Organ six months to carve. A page on the carousel website, is devoted to The carousel of Happiness band organ is a Wurlitzer military portraits of the animals and the lore and tradition surrounding Band Organ, model #125. These organs were made from 1909 to each of them. There are 25 moving animals and 35 places to ride, 1924, when they were manufactured specifically for carousels altogether, on the carousel. Several non-riding animals peer and skating rinks. it has been carefully restored to its original down at riders, including a raccoon handing a bouquet of flowers condition with the exception of an electric motor, which was to a skunk, and a baby orangutan. added. This model was designed to accompany a carousel and originally relied on a turning shaft from the carousel motor to run The Building the bellows which in turn supplied the air to power the 101 instruments. it uses a paper roll. The band organ is one of the As the carousel itself neared completion, Harrison few machines from its era still in use for its original purpose. the formed a non-profit corporation, carousel of Happiness, inc., and instruments are voiced very loud for outdoor use so they would put together a Board of Directors consisting initially of himself be heard over the noise of the carousel machinery and the and cartoonist George Blevins, whose drawings provided some of screams of excited children. the inspiration for the animals. As people visited the animals - The carousel of Happiness band organ is behind a plexi- early on stored in a Nederland warehouse - donations began to glass shield to muffle the sound for the sake of all our close come in slowly. Visitors recognized the quality and beauty of the neighbors in Nederland. The town sits between a couple of soon -to-be assembled carousel. The Board began to hold mountains the sound bounces back and forth between them. fundraisers in Nederland and Boulder to get the word out. Over When the instrument is open, you can easily hear it all over town. five years, donations from a dollar or two up to almost $200,000

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 215 from one tures a puppet theatre that Harrison crafted from an old band a n o n y m o u s organ shell with the help of carousel supporter Bill Tyree. donor enabled Young visitors are invited to present puppet shows for their par- construction of ents and friends. (Please note that when Scott Harrison got the the approxi- band organ shell, it was already empty. He did not gut a band m a t e l y organ to make this puppet theatre.) $ 7 5 0 , 0 0 0 carousel pavil- The Fairy Project ion. The d o d e c a g o n - The Utah State Training School that hosted the carousel for shaped build- many years called its small amusement park "Fairyland." This Artists conception of the dodecagon ing was inspired a fundraising effort that gave volunteers the opportunity (12-sided) building, now a reality. designed by to make personalized fairies and adopt them out to donors. They local architect Debbie Davenport, and contractors and volunteers crafted more than 40 fairies, 7 inches tall and decorated and labored through a tough winter to get it ready in time for opening dressed them in various themes. The adopted fairies are perched on memorial Day Weekend, 2010. At one point that winter, vol- up in windows, on shelves and hanging from the ceiling inside unteers used hot water pipes to thaw the frozen ground to prepare the carousel pavilion. each fairy represents a $200 donation to it for excavation for the foundation. the carousel, and the adopters names can be found in the Fairy Book. Green Features of the Carousel of happiness and its Building The Mission

The building was designed and built with the environment The carousel of Happiness is dedicated to inclusiveness and always in mind. On the roof is a solar array donated by Light- giving. As the carousel becomes an established part of Boulder house Solar of Boulder. The carpet on the upper level is made of county, it will partner with organizations and other non-profits recycled corn husks, the bathrooms feature low flush toilets, and for the benefit of people with special needs, especially children. there are energy efficient windows throughout. The electric The carousel is welcoming to people with disabilities. Visitors motor which moves the carousel is operated in part through com- who use a wheelchair can ride next to a friendly ape. Schools puterization to start it slowly with little electricity and then turn it and organizations are encouraged to bring their students and off at a certain time before the three minute ride finishes, so the clients with disabilities to visit the carousel, and will work carousel will coast to a stop. All of the bulbs - which are together to create events to the benefit of the organizations. Also, shaped like old original bulbs are LED and extremely energy effi- as a 501(c)3, the carousel plans to donate the net profits from its cient. rides, gift shop and events to the benefit of these groups over time. The Town of Nederland Carousel Information The carousel of Happiness is pleased to be an ambassador to visitors to the town of Nederland. Nederland started approxi- Open 10 am - 8 pm from memorial Day to Labor Day. Off mately 150 years ago as a mining town, starting with gold and season hours will be monday, Thursday and Friday from Noon to moving through silver, tungsten and molybdenum phases as it 6:00 pm and Saturday and Sunday, 11:00 am - 6:00 pm. The developed. Gold mining is still happening near the town, and address is: many of the original mining families are still established in the area. Nederland has many attractions for visitors, including The carousel of Happiness, indian Peaks Wilderness hiking trails, winter sports at Eldora P.O. Box 1811 mountain Resort, the mining museum, a world class skateboard Nederland, cO 80466. park, an ice rink and tennis court park, and many unique restau- Phone 303-258-3457 rants and shops. The Nederland chamber of commerce operates [email protected] a visitor's center in the middle of town. the carousel also wishes http://www.carouselofhappiness.org/ to serve visitors by providing clean public restrooms, menus for area restaurants and other information. The Carousel Shop Roll The carousel Shop is located at the entrance to the carousel mechanism of Happiness and offers carousel-themed gifts and souvenirs. for the most of the work for sale in the shop is the work of area artisans, Wurlitzer including fine silver handcrafted jewelry, photography and art 125 band prints, animal figurines and many other items made especially for organ the carousel of Happiness. The carousel Shop is staffed by volunteers. Rides on the carousel of Happiness are $1.00. Upstairs in the shop annex is an overlook where visitors can look down at the carousel spinning around. The annex also fea- 216 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Southern California Chapter April 30 and may 1, 2011 Art Reblitz President - Jerry Pell in discus- Shirley Nix, reporter & photography sion with patrons of After many years we were invited back to the Los Ange- the les Arboretum to put on an organ rally in conjunction with their carousel. Wild West Days. We were happy to oblige, and it turned out to be a really good venue for both the Arboretum and us. The Arboretum is a huge place, and the Queen Anne cottage there is where the old TV show “Fantasy island” was filmed. Those of you who are old enough to remember that will remember the plane coming in bringing the guests…well, the plane was helicoptered in and taxied across the lake to make its landing. many of the older Tarzan films were shot there also, some parts of “Jurassic Park”, as well as “murder She Wrote” and many, many other shows. it’s a lovely place, and made a really nice spot for monkey organs to play with views of the lake and the cottage. Chapter The grounds are quite impressive, with many of the President, flowering trees in full bloom, and some really interesting cacti Jere DeBacker and succulents blooming. it is a great place for an organ rally, enjoying a and we are hoping it will become an annual event. We were ride on assured they will want us back, although it’s up in the air as to the whether it will be a yearly, or every two or three years. This was carousel. the first year for the western days, and really our first year for a rally, too, as there is new management since we were there many years ago. The water draws a crowd of different birds and wildlife, chief among them the ever-present and very beautiful peacocks, which made a strange accompaniment to the organ music. They are quite vocal, and one even went so far as to start pecking at the cart for Brad Harmer’s organ. That’s a first! We couldn’t decide Dick Kroeck- whether the bird was saying “Play it again” or “Get lost”. We el entertain- chose to hope it was the former rather than the latter. ing us with a medley of There was plenty of shade for everyone, and Jerry Pell German had a great spot where the stagecoach went by. The driver even tunes, rag- stopped in front of his Bruder organ to let the people on board time style, at enjoy the music. That was a first, also. the Black A large crowd came, both for the western days and for Forest Restaurant our music. We had several people drop by who told us they had where we enjoyed our performances at Descanso Gardens and had hoped to had lunch be able to see us again. We were told many people stopped on and our their way out to comment quite favorably on our appearance, business which is always good to hear. meeting. We were pleased to welcome visitor Jack Breen, all the way from massachusetts. Of course, did he come just for the organ rally? Well, work may have had something to do with it, but it was great to see him. He now plays Santa claus at christmas time, and needs no false beard or wig. Dave and Dianne Reidy were there Sunday to participate with their dance group for the big barn dance event. There was something going on all the time, from roping demonstrations, cowboy bands, cowboy poets, and other fun things to do. There was a great barbecue, also, and we all had very good lunches. We played for the entire weekend, and the crowd was steady, if not crowded. We almost always had people in front of the organ, and there was a lot of interest and many questions about the working of the organs, the history, and the music. it’s a great way to introduce people to mechanical music, and hopefully some of them will really get interested, join AmicA and become Idyllic Barker Reservoir enthusiasts.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 217 The Nix Limon- Brad Harmer, aire. who spent Many part time pictures grinding his were organ and taken of part time fight- the organ ing off the and its peacocks. description.

This guy Bob was a Meyer real and his showoff! organs Beauti- . ful!

Jerry Pell Dan and Wright, Diane son-in-law Minzey Steven with the and son Bruder Phillip. organ.

These little guys may be Loading the next the stage organists - coach on they loved one side the Hofbauer and music unloading demonstrated on the by Frank Nix. other.

218 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Don Rugh relaxes next to his Gas- parini organ.

Jack Conway by the old train station.

Frank Nix and visitor Jack Breen from Mass.

The main fountain

"Pride of Madeira" This was by far the most photographed plant, being adorned with pink flowers and purple flowers under the pink ones. The Queen Anne Cottage and the lake.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 219 Southern California Chapter Another large organ is an Arburo which was obtained from Rudy Edwards. This, too, is a great instrument, and both these organs Shirley Nix, Reporter were kept busy with requests all day. We all love these instru- Lowell Boehland, Photography ments, and it’s so much fun to spend the day enjoying good com- may 18th found us at the lovely, recently enlarged home pany and good music. of Mike and Kathy Choate in Dana Point. The choates have A Stinson organ has been moved from the garage into accumulated a wonderful collection of automatic music machines the music room, and it graces the spot in which it is placed nicely. in a rather short period of time. i guess the bug bit hard when it Around the room are also a cremona, a Link, a coinola bit. The music room has had the walls moved out about as far as X and “Zoltar” the fortune teller, to name a few. in the living they can go unless the pool goes. Kathy had lunch set up for us at room one finds a harp and a really nice mills Violano, among the bar, and boy, was it a great variety of food. other things. There is just music anywhere you wish to spend They had been collecting juke boxes for quite a while, your time. Of course, the AmicA members fully appreciated the variety and especially the wonderful condition of each and every item. if anyone needs a hint of mike’s wide range of interest he told us he had sold a mercedes so he could buy a John Deere tractor. (i don’t know what kind of music it plays, but that’s another story.) At the meeting Frank Nix gave a short recap of the organ rally we had at the Los Angeles Arboretum and reminded everyone that these organ rallies are a great place to bring the family. October will find us in Sutter creek once again for the annual rally. This is really a super venue, and John motto-Ros puts in a lot of time and work to make sure it is a success. Our hosts, Mike and Kathy Choate Our christmas party this year will be at the home of Bob and have a really nice collection showing different types from and Diane Lloyd, and that will be a various time periods. The records on each one represents the lot of fun. As usual, it will be a joint party with the local mBSi time period nicely, and they are a lot of fun, and we enjoyed them chapter. thoroughly. After the festivities we drove over to “Bubba’s” for din- One of their latest acquisitions is the wonderful Decap ner, a real treat. fairground organ which they purchased from mike Ames. it is We really want to thank mike and Kathy for their usual really a super organ, both sound and looks are just spectacular. hospitality and generosity in having us there for a meeting.

Here we all are in front of the wonderful DeCap organ

220 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 NoRTHERN LIGHTS CHAPTER President – Paul Watkins Reporter – Jerrilynn Boehland

The Northern Lights chapter of AmicA headed to Hud- son, Wisconsin on Saturday, June 11, 2011. it was a beautiful day and the St. croix River was filled with many boats and yachts. Our first stop was the Winzer Stube Restaurant for a delicious German dinner followed by a business meeting lead by our new secretary, mark Kraabel. Our meeting sites for the remainder of 2011 are still not in place, so most of the time was spent discussing venues for up-coming events. Our next stop was the Phipps center for the Arts situated Cal Soest sits in front of the Arburo along the St. croix River. Ron Rhode gave an exceptional concert on the Wurlitzer Theater Pipe Organ with attached Wurlitzer Grand Piano. The Wurlitzer console is a one-of-a-kind chinese art deco model originally built for the Oriental Theater in Boston in 1930. it was recently donated to the center by Terry Hochmuth in memory of Dan Stanke. The 18-rank organ was originally installed in the capital Theater in St. Paul in 1926. it was reinstalled in the KSTP Television Studios in the Twin cities in 1957, and moved to the Phipps center in 1983.

Enjoying the day, with Zoltar and the Stinson Organ in background.

The Phipps Center for the Arts in Hudson Wisconsin.

Ron Rhode at the Phipps Wurlitzer.

Ed and Peggy Cooley partake of the goodies while Kathy urges them to take more.

From left: Jerrilynn Boehland, Kristie & Mark Kraabel, Jeff Dinner at "Bubba's" Charlton, Kay & Bob Dumas, Michael Lubrant & Phillip Baird.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 221 In The News The music Trades wrong size hammerheads arrive days before a major performance New York, NY by the likes of Lang Lang, Alfred Brendel and Pierre-Laurent 27 June 1925 Aimard. Perfectionist Aimard, for example, asks that his piano be made to sound like an organ, a clavichord, a DUo-ART ARTIST oN THE AIR harpsichord and a theremin (kidding), all at Robert Armbruster, Distinguished Pianist, Broadcasts the same time. Selections Recorded for Duo-Art Roll Library Get to know fabled Robert Armbruster, distinguished young American Steinway pianos No. 245 pianist and Duo-Art recording artist, is playing a series of four and No. 109. See a con- recitals on the radio. Station WJZ, New York, is broadcasting the cert master play eight Armbruster recitals, the first of which was heard recently. g r a n d An interesting tieup with the recitals is being made by pianos in a row and many of the Aeolian dealers throughout the country. mr. Arm- announce which two bruster, besides being a concert pianist of wide reputation, is also might be future super- one of the most popular of the DuoArt recording artists. His Stefan Knupfer and Lang Lang stars. Listen to the “color” splendid recordings of operatic selections and the lighter classics as seen in ‘Pianomania.’ of a 400-year-old spinet, are found in great abundance in the libraries of all Duo-Art own- and, of course, get to hear ers. the music of Schubert, Bach, Brahms, mozart and others. Duo-Art dealers are, therefore, notifying their clientele Shot using an often unsteady, hand-held digital camera, of mr. Armbruster's radio recitals, advising them to tune in on the film follows Knupfer over the course of a year and notably Station WJZ on the appointed evenings and listen to the playing contains shots of a suspension bridge and waterfront cranes to of their favorite pianist. give us an implicit idea of what sort of physics are in play. A mr. Armbruster's programs are made up largely of those piano is, after all, a technological marvel. numbers which he has already recorded for the Duo-Art and The pianists are incredibly demanding and specific which have found great favor with purchasers of Duo-Art rolls. about what they want. Knupfer delivers it. His first program included his own arrangement of selections As comic relief, we see Knupfer at work with new-age- from Victor Herbert's "Babes in Toyland," Friml's "chanson," the Victor-Borges Hyung-ki Joo and Aleksey igudesman, who have a "melodie" of Huerter and Liapounow's "carillion." show they call “A Little Nightmare music.” See it on YouTube The first program was enthusiastically received and mr. (some 20 million hits!), and see “Pianomania” while you’re at it. Armbruster was called many times to the telephone at the WJZ studios to be congratulated by listeners in the vicinity of New Ed Note: York. Since then he has received thousands of letters in appreciation from all sections of the country. mr. Armbruster's next recital News item and video trailer may be seen at: will be on July 1, from 9.30 to 10 p. m. http://tinyurl.com/6z3cvbg If anyone finds where the English language DVD can be acquired, The Edge please let me know. ts (a publication of the Boston Herald) Worthing Herald 24 June 2011 Worthing, Sussex, UK ‘Pianomania’ well-played 23 may 2011 Worthing’s world-famed Wurlitzer By James Verniere [email protected] under threat The Herald filmed a performance of Worthing’s world- “Starring” a Steinway & Sons technician who is part surgeon, part detective, part psychotherapist to virtuoso pianists, famed Wurlitzer in the week it was announced the instrument is “Pianomania” is like no other summer movie, and that’s a really under threat. good thing. Worthing council has given Sussex Theatre Organ Trust A documentary by Robert cibis and Lilian Franck in a year’s notice to end the contract which ensures the £500,000 German with subtitles, the film follows a year in the life of Stefan instrument remains at its present venue, which is acclaimed for Knupfer, a slightly nerdy, self- effacing, bespectacled, relentlessly its acoustic qualities. good-natured, hugely accomplished pi-ano tuner, repairman, The council wants a free hand in arranging for someone woodworker and mechanic. else to run its theatre venues, which council tax payers are cur- Who you gonna call if your fabulously expensive piano rently subsidising to the tune of £1.3million a year. starts sounding like a klaxon with a keyboard? Knupfer, that’s But organ owner Jim Buckland, the 92-year-old chair- who. He will arrive post haste with a bag full of what look like man of the organ trust, told the Herald they would fight “tooth martian surgical instruments and a pot of hot glue and get to and nail” to keep the organ in situ, and the matter was now in the work. hands of the trust’s solicitors. Vienna’s neoclassical Konzerthaus, Kunsthaus and other “it would be the end of the organ for ever if it was famous recital halls, plays like a thriller at times, especially when Knupfer, calipers in hand, must figure out what to do when the moved from the Assembly Hall,” said mr Buckland. “There is nowhere else it could go, and the council wants to get rid of it for 222 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 no reason. it is the largest such organ in Europe, and there is no that they were capturing,” Salerno said. After the first year, Saler- musical entertainment in Worthing to match it.” no decided to continue the performance annually, and it soon council leader Paul Yallop told the Herald: “The council became a full-fledged festival spanning two days. Next week- hopes that by this time next year, someone else will be running end’s events will continue the tradition of remembering Boone the town’s theatres, and we are advertising to this end. and his musical colleagues. “We have a contract with the organ trust. it is a technical The grand kickoff to this year’s festival is a new perfor- issue that if we don’t end the contract, it will stop us from getting mance, “The Talented Young Artists’ concert for columbia’s another body to run the theatre.” Youth.” The concert is free for families at Jesse Hall next Sunday click to watch a performance on the Wurlitzer by organ- and incorporates the talents of four up-and-coming performers ist Richard Hills. who have accepted the torch of ragtime music. Ranging in age from 14 to 19, Ben Anderson, Will Perkins, max Keenlyside and Read story and see video at: Adam Swanson arrive at Jesse Hall from as far away as califor- http://tinyurl.com/3p79sjr nia and Prince Edward island. in addition to their piano performances, Eastman School of music Professor Tony caramia will speak with the teenagers about their experience with ragtime columbia Daily Tribune music to date. columbia, mO The other main events next Sunday pair an afternoon’s 29 may 2011 musical tribute to Joseph Lamb with an evening survey of Festival brings the spirit, sound beloved ragtime music, complete with guest Willie cogshell, a native of columbia who recently starred in the University of mis- of ‘Blind’ Boone back to life. souri’s production of “Fences.” As a special treat, Joseph Lamb’s By Jill Renae Hicks daughter Patricia, now 80 years old, Salerno said, will also make [email protected] an appearance at his tribute concert. Salerno pointed to Lamb as one of the three classic ragtime composers; Scott Joplin and Nearly 150 years ago, missouri — and the rest of the James Scott are the other two. nation — had yet to discover the batch of talents all wrapped up The morning of June 6 will begin with a special tour of in one young boy. John William Boone, born in 1864, had his the Blind Boone Home, now a national historic site with a “beau- eyes removed to reduce brain swelling as a 6-month-old. But his tifully restored exterior and its currently frightening interior,” severe talent and intellect were left intact, and “Blind” Boone said the festival’s press schedule. Altomari also has coordinated a became the man historians link to the flourishing of ragtime bicycle-ride fundraiser to raise money for the completion of the music. “Learning about John William Boone seems to touch home’s restoration, which will take place at 10 a.m. Saturday everyone who hears his music and understands his life experi- beginning from the convention and Visitors Bureau. ences,” said Susan Altomari, a music specialist at Lee Elementary Other notes of interest for the weekend include a “music School. She helped develop a Boone-based curriculum last year fair”; two seminars about San Francisco ragtime and music copy- for fourth-graders learning about famous missourians. right laws; an afternoon tour of Boone’s original concert grand The style Boone helped pioneer, ragtime, “had a name piano at the Boone county Historical Society; and two more con- by the turn of the certs in the afternoon and evening, covering the gamut of early century,” said ragtime and jazz to “stride music,” something of a bridge Lucille Salerno, between ragtime and more modern forms of jazz. An essential founder of the J.W. part of the repertoire June 6 will be a memorial concert to John “Blind” Boone Gill, a beloved festival performer who passed away suddenly in Ragtime & Early April. And the concert finale, featuring nationally known ragtime Jazz Festival that musicians Richard Dowling and Frederick Hodges, will be “all begins next Sunday. Gershwin,” Salerno said. On both nights, a late-night jam session She said missouri at the downtown Regency Hotel will be held: “Everybody contin- — St. Louis, Joplin ues to play until there isn’t anyone left to listen.” and columbia — A special component of this year’s festival will coincide was the heartland of with the Young Artists’ concert. Students in area elementary this genre, which schools participated in an essay contest about Boone, and the incorporated winners will be announced at the concert. “Some of the essays aspects of syncopa- will make you cry. most of them you’ll laugh out loud, too. tion and harmonic There’s such sweetness,” Salerno said. progression, turn- “Because of the many layers to his life and because he of-the-century John William “Blind” Boone resided in columbia and considered this his home, i think that the dance music and children of columbia, and the entire state of missouri for that great smatterings of notes. matter, should learn about Boone’s musical contributions to the With a friend, Salerno initiated the area’s first ragtime world of jazz and American music,” Altomari said. “Studying his tribute concert in 1991, named “Ragtime of missouri Valley” — life story also teaches children how to transcend hardships and complete with two performers. The concert existed to remind disabilities and to turn them into opportunities and accomplish- missourians of “the sound of folk ragtime composers in our state ments.”

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 223 “The sad thing about Boone was he was very, very remained for the next 55 years. in 1977, Fenderson donated the famous in his lifetime, but that tends to just drop out of memory carousel to Willowbrook with the promise of a full restoration, for subsequent generations,” Salerno explained. “it’s part of this which took nearly 14 years. in 1991, at the age of 79, Fenderson outreach to make this history of ours come alive to kids and make at last had his very first ride. it important to them.” Flahive spoke with current Publishing this week about News item may be read at: what led to the writing of the book and what she hopes readers http://tinyurl.com/6ho3jh8 will get out of it. Q: What’s your connection to Willowbrook? A: Our connection to Willowbrook began three years ago. Each Keepmecurrent.com September i accompany the Third maine civil War regiment on a Newfield,mE civil War reenactment weekend at Willowbrook to sell copies of 6 July 2011 my novel. Last year, Judy came along, and given her lifelong pas- Telling historic carousel’s story sion for carousels, was overwhelmed by seeing the 1894 Armitage Herschell carousel. in the carousel’s barn, Judy read a By Kate irish collins newspaper article about ivory Fenderson and suggested we write [email protected] a children’s book about ivory’s story. Amelia chamberlain, Wil- NEWFiELD, mE – Sisters and maine natives Jean lowbrook director, consulted with us to make sure our story was Flahive and Judith Thyng have written a new children’s book accurate. Willowbrook is a magical place, and it’s our hope that about the historic 1894 Armitage Herschell carousel at the 19th our “little book” will help increase awareness of this wonderful century Willowbrook Village museum in Newfield, which oper- 19th century village. ates by steam. Q: What’s so special about Willowbrook’s carousel? Flahive, who may be best known locally for her novel, “Billy Boy: The Sunday Soldier of the 17th maine,” has also A: The carousel at Willowbrook is the second oldest Armitage written numerous essays and poems, although she spent her Herschell carousel in existence. The ride, in and of itself, is also career working as an administrator at institutions of higher learn- unique. it’s very fast, and, unlike other carousels where the hors- ing, including as a longtime dean of students at a community col- es go up and down, these horses rock back and forth as if gallop- lege. She and her sister both live in South Portland. ing. The story behind the carousel and (ivory) Fenderson is true Flahive enjoys visiting classrooms, historical societies, and we couldn’t resist telling his story. libraries, and both reading and writing groups, to talk about her Q: What will people, both children and adults, get out of the books and how to blend historical facts into works of fiction. book? “The Galloping Horses of Willowbrook” is based on Flahive’s love of history and Thyng’s fascination with carousels. A: Perhaps what people of all ages will take away from this story The book is that you’re never too old to give up on your dream. (ivory) tells the true Fenderson reached deep into his childhood to fulfill his dream of story of ivory riding on his father’s carousel – a ride that had been denied him F e n d e r s o n , for 65 years. He removed the carousel from his barn, donated it who never to Willowbrook and waited another 14 years for its restoration. got to ride on Finally, at the age of 79, (ivory) Fenderson climbed up on the the Armitage carousel horse and had his very first ride. in a word, his story is H e r s c h e l l heartwarming. c a r o u s e l , Also, the book is beautifully illustrated by Kerry moody which was LaPointe. it’s her first book and we’re all so pleased with the owned by his results, we hope to collaborate on other projects, as well. father, who took it from Q: How much the book and where is it available? fair to fair A: The book is soft cover and was published by Goose River t h r o u g h o u t Press, a maine publisher. it retails for $14.95 and can be pur- New Eng- chased at Willowbrook, through the publisher at land. www.gooseriverpress.com, Amazon and local bookstores. We Fenderson are just getting the word out, so it may take a little time for some was 10 when shops to have it in stock. currently, all the copies available at his father Willowbrook are signed. We had a wonderful book-signing event retired and there recently and sold nearly 50 copies. We will be coming back stored the to Willowbrook for another signing on Aug. 20 and are hoping to Sisters and Maine natives Jean Flahive and Judith t r a v e l i n g schedule a number of book signings around southern maine this Thyng have written a new children’s book about carousel in summer. the historic 1894 Armitage Herschell carousel the family at the 19th Century Willowbrook Village barn in Saco, News item may be seen and read at: Museum in Newfield, which operates by steam. where it http://tinyurl.com/6xhl6s3 224 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 Lynbrook Patch Tricity Herald Lynbrook, NY Kennewick, WA 11 may 2011 18 may 2011 Lynbrook Students Celebrate Kennewick councilman Carousels not giving up on carousel West End classes take part in studying them, By John Trumbo and creating artwork and music. [email protected] By mike Russo KENNEWicK, WA -- Kennewick city councilman Lynbrook, NY - As part of an interdisciplinary project Paul Parish thinks the city shouldn't be so quick to get rid of its about carousels, third graders at Lynbrook’s West End School 101-year-old carousel. studied every aspect of carousels, including how the animals are Parish told fellow council members Tuesday that the 44- carved, how the band organ music is made, and the mechanics of horse carousel built in 1910 by renowned carver charles carmel how carousels operate. should be given another chance. They even took a field trip to get a firsthand look at two "i think we need to give the carousel a home, some place famous carousels — the Nunley’s carousel, which is now housed like columbia Park," he said. at the cradle of Aviation museum in Garden city, and the Parish's remarks come a week after the council voiced carousel at the Source mall in Westbury, which was built in unanimous agreement that time had come to recoup the city's Venice in the 1800s. $815,000 investment in the antique carousel. Working with their classroom teachers and with Library The basket-case machine and faded horses were purchased, mostly with the help of city dollars, in 2003. Since then, the horses have been restored through efforts of the nonprofit Three Rivers carousel Foundation. But fundraising came to a stop in recent years, with no progress made to complete mechanical restoration and find a place to put the carousel. council members learned last week that the foundation members had run out of options. Parish did not attend last week's council workshop because he had a business-related appointment out of town. But Parish said he wanted to share his views this week. "i have total faith the people of the Tri-cities will step forth and support this if we'll give it a home. You cannot put a price on the smile on a child's face," he said. Parish said the city council has taken a lot of negative hits recently, referring to the columbia Park Golf course lawsuit and settlement and criticism about the carousel. "it's time we did something positive," he said. Other council members remained silent as Parish con- cluded his remarks. But Parish said after the meeting that he was working on West End third graders sing influencing fellow council members and is confident the story “The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down,” about the carousel isn't finished. with original lyrics by their music marie mosley, city manager, said last week that it will teacher, Stella Kruh. (Credit Mike Russo) be several weeks before a complete audit of the carousel foundation's accounting of funds is completed. She will give a report to media Specialist camille Duran, they took all the knowledge the council at that time, when the council may decide on the they had gathered and wrote books about the subject. carousel's future. Each child created an original carousel animal with the Also Tuesday, the council held a farewell party for help of art teacher michael christie. Kevin Ferguson, who is retiring after being with the city for 30 Their music teacher, Stella Kruh, wrote original lyrics years. for two songs about the Nunley’s carousel, which she taught Ferguson was hired in may 1981 as an administrative them in music class. The first, entitled “The merry- Go-Round assistant, and by August 1990 was assistant city manager, a posi- Broke Down,” told the history of the Nunley’s carousel, which tion he held for 21 years. was built in 1912, fell into disrepair, and was finally Ferguson received a resolution commending his dedicat- restored and reopened in 2009. The second, entitled “Waltz #1,” ed service. captures the joy of riding the Nunley’s carousel. He said he intends to spend retirement years volunteer- Finally, they put all of these elements together to create ing at the Presbyterian church he attends in Kennewick and in an informative and entertaining celebration for their families, other social service in the community. complete with oral presentations, video footage and songs. "i came and intended to stay for three to five years. it's The carousel animals they created were displayed in been great," he said. their classrooms during the presentations, and were displayed at their annual art show. News item may be seen and read at: News item may be seen and read at: http://tinyurl.com/3r5a2et http://tinyurl.com/6f5t573

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 225 The Yale Review "school-house ahead," and the like, or set up a wail when he sees Volume 8, 1919 his pet conceptions fluttering under the mud-guard of the flying THE MECHANICAL PLAYER player; but all such preferences and warnings seem small and captious, for son has found himself, his natural gifts are now real- by ARTHUR WHiTiNG ized. His mother was right. "The horseless pianoforte" is now such an everyday The early model of the player had the exuberant spirits sight in the world of music that only the most spirited artist of a machine-gun. The notes of mendelssohn's Spring Song were describes a contemptuous outward curve of protest, while, among shot out like bullets so that the musically-timid hastened to take his steadier associates, familiarity has bred tolerance or amiable cover. in this overwhelming salvo there was no recognition of the indifference. But all pianoforte artists, "handplayers," as they are principles which underlie phrasing; no important and unimportant quaintly known in the trade, should be grateful to their mechani- sounds; no increase and decrease of volume. Such crudeness, cal rival for having released them from much unworthy drudgery, however, soon gave place to machine-like imitations of light and taken over the old load of cheap, standardized effects, and eman- shade, to some emphasis of the melodic line and variations of cipated them from the hopeless treadmill of that kind of tech- speed. in the pneumatic player more or less energy in the blowing nique which, for years, has broken the spirit and benumbed the produces a surge and ebb of sound which is emotional. These sensibility of many a young ambition. refinements have caused world-renowned names to be affixed to As human fingers cannot compete with a machine in letters of endorsement to which the public, when in doubt, may mere accuracy and speed, they must be employed in something refer. if there are still misgivings, one has only to note the beati- else. That something else happens to be the better part of music, fied faces in the home of a happy purchaser, the listeners grouped by virtue of which it is not only an art, but in the feeling of many, about the player as it responds to the exertions of a young lady - the greatest of all arts. The pianist of the past had, often, some- in full evening dress, the several generations in characteristic atti- thing of the charlatan about him; he could astonish the tudes, and the spirits of Wagner, Liszt and, in some cases, meyer- groundlings by technical display which, when it became an end beer, floating over all, such as can be seen on the hoardings of in itself, demoralized both the performer and the public. This any popular magazine. Of course this is an advertiser's dream, but benevolent machine has done more than make him an honest it is one which has come true in thousands of families. man; it has, indirectly, raised his station in the world of music; it is an interesting fact, however, that, while felicity is the modern pianist, like the modern horse, has become perforce common to all faces in the advertiser's world, so that without the an aristocrat. Benevolence, in another form, has reached the plain print below one is unable to say whether they glow from the use people. They are able, by means of the ingenious device, to know of a certain kind of safety razor or from the taste of a certain kind hitherto inaccessible parts of the enchanted world of rhythm and of breakfast bacon, in the real world when the honeymoon of tone, for, while like tourists they get mostly distant and superfi- novelty has waned, these doting countenances often change and cial views, no family need stay at home to-day that has the price become work-a-day, sometimes dissatisfied and severe. But it is of a musical Ford. one of the positive merits of the mechanical player that, under its Our undergraduate, of the football sex, has found great artistic ministrations, the features of some of its admirers grow to satisfaction in the combination of mechanics and aesthetics, typi- a greater intelligence and discrimination and finally, among the fying, as it does, a certain duality in his own nature, which, even truly musical, to a "noble discontent'' so that this entertaining in his Junior year, will not allow him to decide between electrical machine has an educative quality which, tragically, and unnoted engineering and landscape gardening. maternal testimony is to by the advertiser, leads to its own extinction. the effect that he has unusual talent in music and that if only—but Well-to-do Americans crave music in some form, and son's specification of the reasons for his retarded artistic develop- even where they gather uncritically about a blazing gas log there ment is so convincing and exonerating that it should be set down is sure to be one—perhaps father himself—who secretly prefers here in full: (a) uncontrollable antipathy to the personality of Beethoven to chaminade. This germ of taste will develop under miss Boggs, his first, and last, music-teacher; (b) dislocated fore- favorable conditions, and everything is to the good that will fer- finger from foul tip; (c) fatal facility in playing by ear; (d) con- tilize and enrich it. The national sense of beauty has been pitifully genital inability to play anything in sharps. Almost any prosper- unnourished since the forbidding Pilgrims landed on these shores, ous, comfort-loving American household can show one such tal- bringing with them the conviction that religion and art are incom- ent, which might have come to fruition had the requirements and patible— a conviction still held by those of their descendants training for pianoforte playing been less unreasonable. whose lives have a northern exposure. Pioneers of a more liberal in contrast to this demanding and discouraging muse, spirit in other parts of the country could bequeath little of the the mechanical art meets one not only half way but all the way, humanities to their successors of two dreary centuries so that the for there are no preliminaries to its mastery and the soul becomes years of the civil War were for at least the pure arts—architecture at once articulate. Such practice as is recommended by the sales- and music—the dark ages of America. man is guaranteed to be free from anything irksome; indeed, the However, there has been a notable change in the last intelligent running of an automobile in and out of town is a natur- thirty years: a reaching out for things of the spirit, an increasing al preparation for the auto of the drawing-room, which further distrust of utilitarianism, a desire to leave to children something insures against all lapses and contingencies by being fool-proof. more valuable than money. We are still without any organizing Provided that our young musical chauffeur has the use of his feet traditions of arts, and it will be many generations before general and has passed the right and left test he is ready for a spin directly cultivation can be taken for granted. But in the meantime it is the machine is assembled. mounted on a high, commanding interesting to see the germ develop, to follow the fortunes of the bench and being relieved of all digital detail, ever his stumbling- protoplasm which, in this case, is father's furtive love of block, he is at last free; freer even than on the avenue where he Beethoven. often chafes under traffic regulation, for here there are no laws its first sign of life is his vague consciousness that there and no penalties. it is true that the composer may, after his land, are different ways of playing this wonderful music; that some erect signs bearing italian equivalents for "speed limit, 8 miles," ways please him more than others. While his eldest daughter's 226 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 pianoforte gifts and accomplishments are very limited, they himself of these improvements, may be permanently and com- serve, although her faltering fingers are not to be depended on for pletely gratified. But art is a jealous and revengeful mistress, who climaxes or sonorities. When the performance breaks down will not tolerate mechanics in any form on her domain. She has altogether he must make good her shortcomings by humming or a special bitterness for the phonograph because it violates the whistling, for in his innocence he hardly expects any piece, even principle, suggested above, that the presentation of music the least venturesome, to come to a successful issue. But sister depends for its effect on the gamble in human fallibility. it is the has a sweet touch, and he shares, sympathetically, her struggle to boast of an artist that he never plays a given composition twice in round out a phrase, for although he does not know it their com- the same way; indeed, being human he cannot, and his condi- bined effort is a part of the emotional experience. He will learn, tioned versatility is the delight of his listeners. They prize the later, that the dramatic effect of a musical situation depends large- thought that what they have just heard is unique and exclusively ly on the gamble in human fallibility, in the excitement of uncer- their own. it is true, a recorded rendering may be a fine one, hav- tainty as to whether the thing really can be pulled off. ing the graces and surprises of the pianist's genius; but when How different it is the first evening they all stand before these evanescent subtleties are reproduced exactly, are heard the just-arrived mechanical player, which, being entirely self-pos- many times in absolute repetition, they become nothing less than sessed, has even more platform imperturbability than the a mockery of art. Who can guess the itinerary of a butterfly? But applauded virtuoso, even a larger number of decorations on its everybody knows the flight of a railway train to the fraction of an chest from the hands of grateful sovereigns, as well set up and as inch. Phonographic music is like a butterfly on rails, something to shiny, exhaling a delicate odor of the varnish of its native ware- be frowned on by both engineers and entomologists, rooms. After a few introductory sounds which have nothing to do At a recent exhibition the master record of a pianoforte with the music and without relaxing the lines of its inscrutable concerto was given with orchestra. in one long tutti, an interval face, the insensate artist proceeds to show its power. its security usually spent by a human pianist in mopping his brow or in read- puts all handplaying to shame; it never hesitates, it surmounts the justing his chair, the conductor, unwittingly, hurried the pace so highest difficulties without changing a clutch. Always masterful that, as the eager band arrived too early, there was an awkward and headlong, it can, if required, utter notes faster than the human silence on the part of the solo instrument, which refused to play ear can follow. Bouquets of adjectives, thrown by the excited until the exact recorded time had expired. The hiatus delighted all audience towards the unperspiring, unexhausted performer, fall titterers, but the sober-minded, as well as those who hang breath- unnoticed at its feet. Since that memorable first appearance, poor less on the lips of the music-actor, who love him more than they sister has hardly touched the keys. love the music, felt in that silence a horror more exquisite than The youngest member of the family can, and does, at any invention of Edgar Allan Poe; for they found that they were any hour of day or night insert a roll and flood the house with kissing a mask, lying beside a dead man in a world turned to chopin and the "Rag" until, after some months of this copious- stone. ness, the elders show signs of satiety and wish that sister had not The perfected phonograph is, to delicate minds, at once given up her music entirely. The protoplasm is now developing, horrible, comical, and instructive; more instructive than the homi- for father discovers, after many trials, that the brazen readiness of lies of a thousand music-theologians. A devout preacher of art the mechanical genius does not attract him; that while all the may thunder at his nodding congregation and beat seven days' notes that sister missed are sounded with authority, yet when he dust out of the pulpit cushion in his earnest desire to answer that anxiously pushes the button marked "expression" something is Pilatian question, "what is music?". But let him be advised. Let lacking which before gave him satisfaction. Those hard, brilliant him sit passively in one of the comfortable arm-chairs which scales and tempestuous trills do not, after all, make music; they flank the oratorial throne, supporting his weary head on a delicate make only a glittering, repelling noise. He longs to hear again the left hand, while a mechanical player of the most highly organized bashful, hesitating sounds which once charmed him, that human and consecrated type discourses in his place, the sermon having touch which said something to him although imperfectly. in these familiar divisions: firstly, chromatic Fantasie and Fugue short, he recognizes through this experience the demonstration of (Bach); secondly, Wallenstein Sonata (Beethoven); thirdly, Twen- that eternal truth of which, as a boy in the early stages of pen- ty-five Preludes (chopin); finally, brethren, Rhapsody No. 12 manship, he had made some fifty laborious copies, to wit, "the (Liszt). Let him then rise, thank his eloquent colleague, and dis- letter killeth but the spirit giveth life." miss his flock with the assurance that some have seen light that His unfavorable, albeit untutored, judgment on the day; for no one, having the inward grace of music, can fail to find claims of persuasive advertisers has long been reached by more a mechanical and fixed version the very negation of art. Still, knowing critics who look for a decline in the popularity of this negations have their uses and one can half answer the question by jig-saw art, although the sound of the unmitigated mechanical showing, by means of this miracle of imitation, what music is player is still a feature of life in many apartment houses. Howev- not. er, the resourceful inventor has been alive to it as well, and after That which is truth to the few will, later, be truth to the much experiment has constructed a player which sets forth the crowd, which for guidance should remember the maxim, "art and phonographic records of the performances of celebrated pianists mechanics are enemies.,, in this slowly comprehending crowd we amidst the astonished applause of the performers themselves. shall, no doubt, see father; and, as he returns for comfort to sis- While the reproduction lacks some of the vigor of the original, as ter's human ways after a second disappointment, we shall know if the artist had left a sick bed rather than disappoint a fond pub- that his education in the higher branches is coming on. lic, the celebrated characteristics and mannerisms are unmistak- Those almost-persuading verisimilitudes of the phono- ably there. it is even proposed to add a "movie" of the eminent graph will in time be wafted to that limbo where good masks go original so that his gesture and mobile features may accompany when they die. Peace to them! Our waxworks of music have not the sound, presumably with care that the phonograph and photo- lived in vain. graph coincide exactly. it would seem now that all objections to mechanical music have been met and that father, who has been quick to avail conributed by William Dean

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 227 In Memoriam Robert Gellerman Todd Russell Augsberger

Todd Russell Augsberger, Robert Gellerman was 53, died at 4:25 p.m. may 7, born in cloquet, minnesota in 2011, at his home. He was born 1928, attended schools there and Aug. 20, 1957, in Bluffton to was graduated from the Universi- Russell and Jean Archer Augs- ty of minnesota in Electrical berger. His mother survives in Engineering in 1956. Since that Lima. His father preceded him time in his work as a communica- in death. On July 30, 1978, in tions engineer he has traveled Kenton, he married Betty Now- extensively, mostly in Latin land, who survives. America, and lived for a number He was retired from of years in El Salvador, Panama, Puerto Rico and the Bahamas. Allmax Software inc. in Ken- After his retirement, moved to Datona Beach, Florida, ton. He previously owned Pre- later to Gainsville. His sudden death of natural causes in June of cious Promises christian Bookstore. He graduated from Kenton 2011 was a shock to the reed organ world, and he will be sorely High School in 1975 and Ohio Northern University in 1979. He missed. was a member of First United methodist church, Kenton, where "Fritz" Gellerman's interest in reed organs began with an he was active in Sunday school and music ministries. He was an antiquing expedition which produced a Beatty "Golden Tongue" active collector of organettes and roller organs. in his final blog organ with twenty-one stops and a walnut case badly in need of on 7 may 2011, the day of his passing, Todd stated: restoration. Finding a lack of readily available information on the origins of these instruments, he began to research the historical “A faith that hasn’t been tested can’t be trusted.” materials stored in the Library of congress, the Smithsonian That quote by Adrian Rogers has been floating around in institution and the Patent Office in Washington, D. c. His land- my head for months now, probably since i first became aware that i had ALS. Faith in christ has been the cor- mark book, The American Reed Organ was the result. nerstone of my life, and it’s had a lot of heavy use lately. Fritz was a member of AmicA for many years. And my faith has become even more certain as time has passed. i want my faith to be full and complete, not lacking Mike Montgomery in any way. i take that to mean that my faith needs to be tested fully. You see, the process of testing filters out misconceptions and error, and purifies and strengthens Mike Montgomery what remains. The Bible compares the process to refin- (1934-2011) was born in chica- ing gold or silver, using fire to remove the dross and go, illinois. Having collected leave pure metal. it sounds painful and severe, but it’s piano rolls since 1951 and the only way. (See for example 1Peter 1:6-7, 1corinthi- researched the history of Rag- ans 3:12-15, or isaiah 48:10) time and Blues, he had estab- For many people, the greatest and last test of faith is lished himself as a leading death itself. Death is final, only undone by the power of authority on the subject. the resurrection. Jesus overcame death because he went He had produced 16 through it. And my faith is about to be finally and fully LPs [1970-75] and 10 cDs tested in that way. Why do i not shrink back? Because i [1986-90] for the specialized am keeping my “eyes on Jesus, the champion who initi- Biograph label. He collaborated ates and perfects our faith. Because of the joy awaiting on Laurie Wright’s acclaimed him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame.” bio-discography “mr. Jelly (Hebrews 12:2) is not that same joy awaiting me? Lord” by providing ground-breaking documentation on the piano i go to meet the One who loved me before the foun- rolls of Jelly Roll morton. With the exception of “The Pearls”, dation of the world and who created me in his image, the One who waits for me with open arms and shows the mike owned all of morton’s original Vocalstyle rolls. nail-scars in his hands, the One who overcame death and He was working on a book, entitled “Jelly Roll Morton who gives resurrection, the One who promises eternal and The Music Trade Press” and despite the title, it would focus life and in whom i place my soon-tested faith. Amen! on morton’s piano rolls, together with the background of the melrose Bros. and Vocalstyle’s involvement and promotion in the Todd was a member of AmicA and most recently con- weekly trade papers. mike issued occasional piano roll auction ducted a workshop on his beloved organettes at the 2009 cleve- lists and lectured on music; specializing in the importance of the land AmicA convention. U.S. copyright Law of 1909. (Courtesy of DoctorJazz) mike was a member of AmicA for ~31 years. 228 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 ADVERTISING ThE GOLDEN AGE of AUTOMATIC MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS. GENERAL INFORMATION ABOUT ALL ADVERTISING IN New reduced price — order now! To celebrate our 10th anniver- ThE AMICA BULLETIN sary, Art Reblitz’ award-winning reference is now only $99 plus $5 S/H (single copy USA ground ship- All advertising should be directed to: ment). This book has set a new standard Terry Smythe with its hundreds of spectacular color 55 Rowand Avenue photographs. We guarantee you’ll find it Winnipeg, mB, canada R3J2N6 to be one of the most interesting, inspir- Phone: (204) 832-3982 (email preferred) ing, informative books you have in your e-mail:: [email protected] library—or your money back. Everyone has been delighted, and some readers Ad copy must contain text directly related to the product/service being have ordered several copies. Get your offered. Extraneous text will be deleted at the Editor's discretion. Adver- copy today. Mechanical Music Press - tisers will be invoiced, with payment to AmicA Treasurer. Telephone A, 70 Wild Ammonoosuc Rd., ads will not be accepted due to high risk of errors. AmicA reserves the Woodsville, NH 03785. 603-747-2636. right to edit or to reject any ad deemed inappropriate or not in keeping 6-11 with AmicA'sgoals and objectives http://www.mechanicalmusicpress.com . The BULLETIN accepts advertising without endorsement, implied or otherwise, of the products or services being offered. Publication of busi- NEW PIANO ROLL BOXES - Duo-Art Audiographic series - ness advertising in no way implies AmicA's endorsement of any com- Exactly like the originals! maroon with Gold Printing, all 3 mercial operation. sizes available! (small & medium are "Top Hat" style) $6.00 ea. Quantities are limited, so get them before they are all gone! AMICA PUBLICATIONS RESERVES ThE RIGhT TO ACCEPT, REJECT, OR EDIT ANY AND ALL SUBMITTED ARTICLES AMPICO boxes in two sizes: "Top Hat" boxes (for small rolls AND ADVERTISING. with false bottom), and Large (for 3" flange). Black Leather with Gold Printing, Exactly like the originals, $5.00 ea. All items for publication must be submitted directly to the 88 note roll boxes in two sizes-Large (fits 2 34 flange) covered Editor/Publisher for consideration. with Black Alligator paper (Top), Black Leather (Bottom) $3.00 CLASSIFIED AD RATES FOR AMICA MEMBERS: ea. Small (fits 2" flange) covered with Black Leather Paper 1-100 Words $20.00 (Top), White Litho (Bottom) $2.00 ea. Non-member rates are double for all advertising. Other repair supplies available- Parchment Leaders, Tabs, DISPLAY ADVERTISING Tubes, Flanges, Repair Tissue. Quantity Discounts available. Full Page color $ 150.00 Rich Ingram 626-824-4404 (1-12) Full page B&W $ 100.00 [email protected] Half Page B&W $ 75.00 Quarter Page B&W $ 50.00 Bargain priced beautiful "A" roll keyboard and cabinet nick- Business card $ 30.00 elodeons for sale by Seeburg, Western Electric, coinola, Electra- Non-member rates are double for all advertising tone, etc. many with beautiful art glass. Take time to discover the out- Special 6 for 5 Ad Offer - Place any ad, for a full year (6 issues), and s t a n d i n g pay for only 5 issues. Payable in advance. Photographs or halftones a f f o r d a b l e $15.00 each. Loose Sheet or insert Advertising: inquire fun of an "A" roll coin Display advertisers supply camera-ready copy. copy that is oversized or piano! "A" undersized will be changed to correct size. We ordinarily do not prepare rolls feature advertisements from raw content. f a n t a s t i c arrangements. many new rolls are PAYMENT: Advertisers will be invoiced. make check payable to available. contact me today! Tim AmicA iNTERNATiONAL. Typesetting and layout size alterations Trager, mcHenry, illinois call me today at 630-269-3059 charges will be billed if required by professional services. 4-11 WWW.TIMTRAGER.CoM DEADLINES: Submissions must be received no later than the first of the odd months (January, march, may, July, September, November). The Bulletin will be mailed not later than the first week of the even Rare German Red Welte Keyless electric upright reproducing months. piano. Restoration project. Feuerich piano is re-strung and the action re-built but not regulated. Player stack dismantled for re- FoR SALE building. Pump, feeders etc complete, still in the piano and not restored. All parts He has a right to criticize, present as far as is known. in black pol- who has a heart to help. ished oak Art Deco case with brass fit- tings. comes with 20 Red Welte rolls and Abraham Lincoln new test roll with setting up instructions. Offers in region of $2,000.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 229 boxes, 45 Euros each. English barrel organ by clementi & co, 26 * 1 Welte Cottage original test roll, 54 key, 24cm wide on red cheapside, London, circa 1820. Four speaking paper, unboxed, good condition, 55 Euros. stops plus drum and triangle. 17-key action includ- * 1 Ammelotti accordeon orchestrion roll, 11.25 inches wide, ing two for percussion. Three original barrels and pin ends, unboxed, good condition, 35 Euros. original hand-written tune lists. Overhauled and in * 1 Solophone (Pierre Eich) roll with 4 tunes, boxed ,very good good playing order. in mahogany case with carved condition, 35 Euros. details, on original stand with storage for the two * 1 hupfeld Clavatist Universal roll 18635, shimmy, good con- unused barrels. Small and attractive! $6,000. dition, 25 Euros. * 1 Imhof and Mukle Commandant Violin solo roll, unboxed, English Boyd Pistonola 88-note player piano, complete, unre- VG condition, 35 Euros. rf4-11 stored. A rare opportunity for the right collector! case reasonable but could do with re-finishing. Piano action good. Any offers Please contact S. Powers by email [email protected] considered! Pictures available. Email me! [email protected] Wanted David Evans Spool frames to play O rolls, A rolls and APP rolls Director, Revelstoke Nickelodeon museum Xylophone with minimum of 24 notes (prefer 30 notes) 111 First Street West, P O Box 3088, Revelstoke Bc, V0E 2S0, canada Please contact S Powers by email [email protected] Ph/Fax: 250-837-5250 rf4-11 www.revelstokenickelodeon.com I will pay $50.00 each for the following Stoddard-Ampico rolls by Andre Kmita, in good, clean condition: 4059E - Girl From Utah Waltzes * 1 Weber Unica original test roll, boxed and in excellent con- 3927D - hesitation Waltz dition, 140 Euros 29901C - Illusion Waltz * 3 Imhof and Mukle Lord 1 orchestrion rolls for early music David Wallis, 547 marengo Avenue, Forest Park, iL 60130, leaf system. Extremely rare big rolls on heavy card in individual wooden cartridges and in very good condition, 300 Euros. (708) 366-3103 or [email protected] rf6-11 * 1 hupfeld helios scale/test roll. Playrite recut in box. Excel- lent condition, 55 Euros. Seeking pneumatic 3 deck boards 55-5/8 inches by 1 7/8 inches * 1 Welte red test roll in box. New unspooled recut with all from an upright marshall & Wendell Ampico. Originals lost to functions marked, 55 Euros white glue! Please contact Bill Chapman, (760) 564-2951 * 3 NOS multi tune rolls,for Reproduco organ, as new, in email: [email protected] rf4-11

230 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 231 PLEASE VISIT THESE SUPPLIERS oF RoLLS

Brian Stahl: Piano Ticklers Music Rolls Joyce Brite: Player Piano and P.O. Box 220, Elizabethville, PA 17023 Mechanical Music Exchange email: [email protected] http://www.mmdigest.com/Exchange/ www.pianoticklers.com http://www.mmdigest.com/Exchange/rollpage.htm Phone: (717) 599-1369 email: [email protected]

Rob Deland: Blues Tone Rolls Dick Hack: Hack Mechanical Music www.bluesrolls.com 2051 Chesapeake Road, Annapolis, MD 21409 email: [email protected] email: [email protected] Phone: (847) 548-6416 (410) 279-5859 Cell Days (410) 757-2164 Home Evenings Bob & Ginny Billings: Sierra Music Rolls 14010 Rim Rock Drive, Reno, NV 89521 Frank L. Himpsl: email: [email protected] Valley Forge Music Roll Company Phone: (775) 853-4659 604 Linnet Road, Audubon, PA 19403 (484)-250-7046 roll shop Leedy Brothers Music Rolls (610)-291-1841 my cell 4660 Hagar Shore Road, Coloma, MI 49038 http://www.valleyforgemusicroll.com www.leedyrolls.com Phone: (269) 468-5986 - Fax: (269) 468-0019 Kukral Collection: Larry Norman: Rollertunes Welte-Mignon and 88-Note Rolls www.home.earthlink.net/~rollertunes 216 Madison Blvd., Terre Haute, IN 47803 email: [email protected] Phone: (812) 238-9656 Phone: (540) 721-7188 email: [email protected]

Don Teach: Shreveport Music Co. Julian Dyer 1815 E. 70th Street, Shreveport, LA 71105 5 Richmond Rise, Wokingham RG41 3XH, email: [email protected] United Kingdom Phone: (318) 798-6000 - Fax: (318) 797-4572 www.pianorolls.co.uk email: [email protected] Robin Pratt: Artists' Choice Music Rolls email: [email protected] John Motto-Ros Phone: (419) 626-1903 “Nickelodeon Rolls” 516 Pierce Street, Sandusky, OH 44870-4725 “A” “G” “o” Rolls & Boxes 110 Allen Ranch Road, Sutter Creek, CA 95685 Steve Bentley, SB-"o" Rolls series. 209-267-9252 Play-Rite Music Rolls www.johnnysmusicrolls.com 1536 N. Palm St., e-mail: [email protected] Turlock. CA 95380. U.S.A. Phone. (209) 632-5784. Keystone Music Rolls Fax. 209) 667-8241. P.O. Box 650, Bethlehem, PA 18016 email: [email protected] Gnaw-Vol-ty Rolls QRS Music Technologies, Inc. Stephen Kent Goodman 1026 Niagara Street, Buffalo, NY 14213 www.gnaw-vol-ty.com Phone: 1-800-247-6557 - Fax: 1-716-885-7510 E-mail: [email protected] www.qrsmusic.com Fax: 866-828-2165 Magic Melodies D.C. Ramey Piano Company, LLC. 360 Lawless Road, Jamestown, KY 42629 17768 Woodview Drive Phone: (270) 343-2061 Marysville OH 43040 708-602-3961 David Saul: Precision Music Rolls www.dcramey.com 1043 Eastside Road, El Cajon, CA 92020-1414 email: [email protected] email: [email protected]

232 AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 This Violano promo contributed by Don Teach.

AmicA Bulletin - Jul/Aug 2011 “Where Rare Is Common” Over 35 Years of Delivering the Best!

Opportunities Auction Returns with a Smashing Offering in Newnan, GA September 16 & 17, 2011 By Preston Evans (GAL 1287)

After 35 years, an avid collector will sell it all over a two-day period. Also, we have secured a great collection of rare phonographs that the owner must sell due to health problems. The items that money could never buy will now be sold at your price. Included is a sweet find consisting of a rare chocolate phonograph with two original records and three phonograph dolls: Bebe Jumeau, Mae Starr, and Madam Hendron. 10% Buyers Premium Extensive brochure will be available in mid August. Remit $10.00 to: Preston Evans, 31 Redbud Trail, Newnan, GA 30263.

Preston Evans has been in the antique and collectible business for over three decades. Through Preston Opportunities, he provides many venues for the collector, hobbyist, and aficionados to acquire and enjoy the finest in antiques and collectibles. The links below will provide more information about exciting past, present, and future opportunities.

770.502.0028 http://www.prestonopportunities.com/ 678.296.3326 [email protected]