Quality of Modern Rolls
By Thomas Henden
I'm still very new in this business, however I would like to share my experiences with QRS-rolls, which I think has varying quality.
The main problems concerning me are varying quality of the pedaling holes, tempo problems, uncompleted perforations, and a complete lack of theme holes.
I know that new rolls probably never are cut with the Themodist holes, but after listening to QRS roll R-103-A, Liszt's Liebestraume, you'll understand what I mean. The melody is smeared together, with heavy chords, and one gets the feeling that it's played by a poor piano player who doesn't care for vitality in the melody.
I feel that at least recuts of old rolls should have the Themodist and (also other intensity perforations, e.g., Ampico, Duo-Art) in place for those who have a piano reading that information, or don't modern perforators have those holes?
Even worse is it that a number of rolls have poor pedal perforations, or a completely lack of a such, like on roll Q-196, the Connorized "Magnetic Rag." On some rolls there are just a few pedal perforations, and even single holes here and there. This make no sense and forces me to shut off the pedal, and add pedal manually, on those rolls. On one roll, I even experienced that the pedaling holes were just a little too far apart so that the pedal fluttered up and down, obviously with no musical effect. (The hole chaining perforator mechanism seemingly failed.)
On roll Q-196, the introduction chords seems to play in the right tempo, but the rest of the roll, must be played at about 35 instead of 70 which the roll is marked with, or the music will be played far too fast. (Remember Scott Joplin's note on the music sheets that "ragtime never should be played fast.")
(Yes, my piano has it's tempo regulated, so the tempo of the roll is right when the lever's set at 70 according to my test roll)
This roll seems to be a recut of a "Connorized" roll, recorded by Scott Joplin, so my disappointment on this particular roll was great, when it became clear that something's wrong with the recording tempo on this roll.
A strange thing is that every QRS-roll has a 4-5 cm pedal perforation just before the first notes of the melody, either there will be more pedal perforations or not on that roll. Maybe some knows if there's a technical explanation to this.
[ It's a mark to synchronize the stenciling belt. -- Robbie ]
This was not meant to say that QRS-rolls are bad, in fact most of those which I've obtained are very good, but still, there are small but irritating "errors" on too many of them, and I also know that it would be far to expensive these days to have the tempo and loudness lines drawn on the music roll, like on Themodist Metrostyle Rolls, on rolls which probably are copied from such rolls.
Do anyone sell new rolls (recuts) with all their original perforations on them?
Without too much experience however, I would like to recommend the Hupfeld/Animatic Rolls. (Supposedly, there are more of them in Europe than in USA, or...?) These rolls are made on very good (still) white paper, they have the pedal and Themodist holes in the right place, and track very well. If there was ONE disadvantage with the Allied bombing of Germany, it must have been the bombing of the Hupfeld factory. ... (a Piano Horror Story!)
Sincerely Thomas Henden, Norway
[ Against the will of the family the Welte factory in Freiburg was
[ forced to make munitions. It, too, was bombed. War is .... :-(
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(Message sent Thu 23 Jan 1997, 18:41:45 GMT, from time zone GMT.) |
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