Introduction and Player Organ Question
By Dave McNally
Greetings, all.
I've been reading the digest since June 1, but have not posted before. My interests run more toward pipe organs, theater organs especially, but have found your discussions enlightening.
My father was a registered piano tuner and rebuilt countless (non-player), mostly grand pianos. I grew up leveling keybeds, adjusting actions, and so forth. He was only too glad to pay me for doing tedious stuff (I was a mercenary little tyke). Of course, if you're surrounded by pianos, you long to have an organ instead. Go figure. :)
At age 10 I owned a harmonium which I played (and dissected regularly). There was usually a player piano in the house. In the 1950s there were still plenty of original ones that worked.
My career was spent working at IBM, servicing computers and their predecessors, both hardware and software support. I've rebuilt several player actions over the years, and done various work on band organs, nickelodeons, and pipe organs.
I'm not a collector per se; I have an upright Brinkerhoff/Schultz 'Recordo' electric player which I rebuilt 15 yrs ago. Also a Hammond B vintage 1938, and am installing a theatre pipe organ in the basement. I'd love a Mills Violano, but it's out of my league. Too bad so many of them became elegant liquor cabinets.
+++++++++++++++++++
My hobbies 'converged' recently, when a friend showed me an organ roll player he acquired, and wants to add it to the theatre organ installed in his home. Seems the right time to say "Hi... Help!"
Rolls are Duo-Art "Semi Automatic" (?). Holes are terrifyingly small at 13 per inch. The tracker bar has 130 holes (I didn't actually count them), and the paper measures 10-1/8" wide.
Registers are: (apparently) 61 notes solo 49 notes accompaniment 13 notes bass rewind, and a few unused (?)
This format does not (seem to) include stop changes, and organ registration suggestions and expression are printed on the roll.
* Was this the same roll used with the Hammond roll players? They
appear to include Hammond drawbar/preset suggestions. * Was this *the* generic organ roll? * Did other 'standards' exist? (for organs with keyboards) * Are any still cut/recut?
I've never encountered this genre of rolls, and hope someone here can shed light on it (a tracker bar layout, perhaps?). In the interim, I'll map it the best I can.
Just a rundown on the fate that awaits:
The roll frame itself was built (strike that... 'assembled') by Aeolian-Skinner Organ Co out of Duo-Art parts (and seemingly whatever else was hanging around). It's tubed to pouch primaries, each simply operating a contact closure. In fairness to A.S., I'm quite sure it's been 'reworked'. It's just not their workmanship.
This was removed from a pipe organ console, and is just the player 'guts' with no cabinetry, screwed to a piece of plywood. It all looks like a careless hobbiest's first attempt. No doubt the console structure provided mounting for linkages and the various components. They lacked the shame to provide an action cutoff, and handled the consequences electrically. Meanwhile, the pouches got lots of exercise.
A regulator feeds the action at one end, with the roll motor fed from the action thru a tempo slide. There's no tempo bypass for rewind, but they 'graciously' included a pneumatic to yank the tempo lever wide open. There's a ventil to remove vacuum from the entire unit, but if it had a motor-driven vacuum source, that seems pointless. I think it was supposed to be the action cutoff.
There are many functions (like disabling the tracking device during rewind) controlled by pipe organ chest magnets scattered about. Oh, puh--leeze... (no action cutoff, remember?)
Ain't life Grand? ... "Here, Dave, build me something spectacular from this box of junk!" (visions of the Phoenix rising from its ashes) "Oh, thank you, thank you.... I'd be sooo delighted to."
Love it... Should be fun. :)
Best Regards,
Dave McNally - mac366@ids.net |
(Message sent Tue 24 Oct 1995, 00:10:02 GMT, from time zone GMT-0400.) |
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