Bruce Clark said: ["Buying Original Music Rolls", MMD 980303]

> Not long ago, I responded to an advertisement for original Ampico
> rolls.  I purchased the entire lot.  When they arrived home, I
> discovered most were hardly playable.  Time is beginning to take
> its toll on original rolls, and the buyer should be aware of that.

Climate has a lot to do with it.  The only rolls that are falling
apart in the UK are the earliest American 65-note dating from the
1890s.  Original American reproducing rolls are weak, but playable.

Even the cheap rolls made in England are still in fair condition and
the standard rolls made by Aeolian/Universal at Hayes and Imperial
Linenised in London (whose plant burnt down in 1918, putting them out
of business) scarcely show any deterioration at all.  The best of them
used paper that is almost comparable in quality to modern dry-waxed
paper.

Rex Lawson gave a talk on Duo-Art music at Jim Edwards's Pianola
Centenary Festival last year, using the concert grand Weber at
"Players, Pumpers & Rolls" in Batavia, IL.  Since the Weber wasn't
tracking properly on reroll I was recruited to reroll all but the
recuts by hand.

To my dismay, a particularly tattered Duo-Art copy of "The Whip" came
softly apart in my hands.  Rex covered this smoothly by saying it would
be sensible for American collectors to lend him their entire old stock
as the air in England was so much better.  I thought the laughter at
this sounded rather hollow.

Computer scanning sounds like something whose time has come.

Dan Wilson, London