Music Boxes at SFMBC
By Larry Smith
Well, the San Francisco Music Box company remembered my birthday (they always do =) and sent me a 25% off card as a present, so I took me off to my local purveyor of musical hardware to get me something nice.
"Something nice" for me means Reuge. I have a much too well-developed taste for the good stuff to have much use for 18-note Sankyo movements. Bad news: SFMBC is discontinuing all their Reuge inventory - they will no longer be carrying their "heirloom" line at all. The good news is, all the ones they have in stock are now 20% off. That, plus a birthday discount, if you have one (anyone can have one, just show your license) means real good values, but only for a while, and after they are gone, they're gone. No more good stuff, just the little tinkle-tinkle jobbies and a smattering of the 32 and 72 note fixed cylinder Reuge movements. They may or may not continue to carry the Reuge/Thorins four and a half inch disk unit in the fancy case.
I bought the 72-note interchangeable unit. This is normally $4000, with the 20% discount this is $3200 - and with my birthday discount, I got it for $2400. This is a very handsome unit, a bit over a foot long, and perhaps eight inches wide, and six deep, with a beautiful, mirror-like finish. It plays 15 tunes on five different cylinders using the company's standard 72 note movement cleverly adapted for cylinder interchange. Warning: while interchangeable, these cylinders are _not_ exchangeable with other machines from the same series, I tried moving a cylinder from one of these movements to another and it sounded absolutely _awful_.
Another caveat: these movements have been gathering dust in SFMBC warehouses, backrooms, or display cases, sometimes for _years_. The one I got was four years old. These movements may have gotten a fair amount of mishandling, and are sensitive to being wound while playing - of the three interchangeables I looked at, _two_ had real problems with dampers - they had noticeable squeaks and chirps! I daresay the average mall-crawler might not notice them, but if you are shopping, _don't_ assume it's okay because it looks so new, give it a _listen_ to. Ask to try it in the back room if it is too noisy in the store, and get your ear right up to it.
This applies to _all_ Reuge movements - I also looked at a really lovely 4-tune antique reproduction from Reuge, all hand-built, none of the standard assembly-line parts, cylinder nearly a foot long, complete with a horizontal spring motor and old-fashioned governor and it, too, had chirps. It was a lovely, lovely job, and I'd have loved to own it, but I already _have_ music boxes that need damper work, and I expect restoring my Freres would give me a better box. =)
However, the SFMBC lifetime guarantee will continue to be honored - if you are more patient than I, you can buy a box and have it sent for repair. They will continue to honor the warranties on all boxes they have sold. They will also special order boxes, but, as always, there's the risk of getting something that isn't just what you wanted.
If any of you are in New Hampshire or Mass and go to the Fox Run Mall in Portmouth NH to the SFMBC there, ask to see "Rick" and tell him I sent you. His store has the largest inventory of these types of movements on the East Coast, because as they are discontinued in other stores and as other stores close, these movements are sent to him. He also gives the best discounts.
I really like this movement - it is very quiet. Not at all like the similar 72-note fixed cylinder movements that I mounted in the Sears cases, more similar to the 32-note Thorins disk player. Like a modern 18-note all grown up, and unlike the authoritative, sometimes almost brassy sound of an antique disk machine, or the mellow depth of an antique cylinder, but still very charming. It loses some resonance because of the drawer for the extra cylinders. But it has a rather nice, almost intimate sound, as if it were playing just for you, and it makes a nice addition to my collection.
regards,
Larry Smith |
(Message sent Mon 18 Mar 1996, 15:59:44 GMT, from time zone GMT-0500.) |
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