Hello MMD readers,  Shortly after receiving the requested British
patent number from Paul Lehrman (associated with the 16 Disklavier
and the 8 Clavinova presentations of George Antheil's music) I hastened
to get the complete information from their archives.  Happily, the
material arrived today for Patent #207,798, filed in Nov. 1922 in
France, Nov. 1923 in England and granted on Nov. 27, 1924 for Great
Britain.

There has been much discussion recently about a Pleyel patent
that didn't work, forcing composer Antheil to make do with a single
pianola along with keyboard pianofortes in his performances of Ballet
Mecanique, which also involved a motion picture film (possibly 2!),
for an audio-visual avant garde experience in the 'Twenties.

The patent says: "This invention relates to a synchronizing system
available for various applications, to automatic instruments or
mechanical apparatus, amongst which may be mentioned by way of example:
automatic musical instruments, kinematographs (motion pictures),
phonographs, these several apparatus being naturally in any number."

The 6 page treatise, which includes a sheet of 5 illustrations,
actually covers no new territory, and in fact the system would have
worked in synchronizing multiple pneumatic player pianos.  It was
written before George Antheil arrived in Paris and was obviously at the
height of the Pleyel Piano Company's development activities when the
idea of a "mechanical ballet" (movies synchronized with Pianola rolls)
was conceived.  By the time the British patent was granted, however,
the Lee De Forest "Phonofilm" shorts were already being made, followed
by "Tri-Ergon" photo-electric sound in Germany along with the
"Movietone" and "Vitaphone" films made in the States, beginning in
1926.

Thus, it would appear that the synchronization idea for movies, extra
player pianos and/or phonograph records was dropped, since only months
after the British patent was granted, radio broadcasting, amplified
sound (public address systems) and talking pictures all burst on the
entertainment scene in short order.

What's amusing, for me, is that the idea of using control holes on a
master roll -- the heart of this patent treatise -- to operate a tempo
control on a slave mechanical musical instrument (a Pianola or a
Fotoplayer) was already attempted in the States.  Welte had used
control holes in the middle of organ rolls for tracking systems and
later employed the idea for synchronizing special M. Welte & Sons
'reproducing' player piano rolls with gramophone records.  (Some of
these rolls exist, and were described as well as illustrated in the
AMICA magazines a few years ago.)

Melville Clark long-playing 'classical' rolls were used in connection
with a Seeburg coin-operated upright piano; these also tweaked the
tempo lever up-and-down for the next selection, the medleys having been
compiled from existing 88-Note and Art-Apollo single rolls already
released.  Both Welte-Mignon and Aeolian had tempo setting controls
on remote players and changers for their automatic pianos and pipe
organs, while Tel-Electric advertised years before the idea of coupling
their solenoid player actions, followed by American Piano Company's
Flexotone-Electrelle which used an electro-pneumatic approach.

Scientific American Magazine of December 4, 1915, long before George
Antheil appeared on the scene, published an article entitled "The
Modern Electrical Piano: a Triumph of Musical Expression."  One line
of this article pertains to the synchronized piano idea of the later
Pleyel patent application: "Where volume and carrying power are
required, as in auditoriums or dance halls, two or more electric pianos
may be operated in synchronism."  (I would assume that "or more" could
include up to 16 electrically-connected player actions!)

A meeting of the New York Electrical Society was going to have a
presentation on December 10th of that year, wherein demonstrations of
the electric and electro-pneumatic player possibilities would be shown.
(Incidentally, this is the same group which made an early talking
picture, explaining in sketchy terms the operation of the Vitaphone
sound-on-disc talking picture system, prior to the Warner Bros. release
of "Don Juan", a silent feature with synchronized phonograph record
accompaniment.)

Thus, there were no problems in connecting up pianos long before Pleyel
considered this particular synchronization feat.  The cost of doing so,
and the space that multiple instruments would take, was the primary
consideration, it would appear.  Having a second player grand piano as
an external loudspeaker was done in any number of player pipe organ
installations.  I recall the Welte-Mignon system at Death Valley
Scotty's Castle in the 'Fifties, where a large pipe organ and grand
piano in the Music Hall were connected to another instrument (not
working at that time!) on the other side of the residence; visitors
were told that the small grand played what the larger instrument did,
back in the late 'Twenties.  If so, this was yet another example of the
'piano-as-an-external-loudspeaker' concept -- the primary use (before
Ballet Mecanique) of connecting up a series of pianofortes.

Thus, the claim that "16 pneumatic players couldn't be synchronized"
because "the synchronization patent didn't work" can be laid to rest,
now, I should think.

The idea of using a master roll to control the speed of a silent
movie projector is a departure from the prior projects and short-lived
experiments in coupling up mechanical pianos and/or synchronizing them
with gramophone records.  This borders on a principle of a "perforated
Vitaphone" idea, but it would seem to this writer that the movie
projector, not a player roll, should be the master source of
synchronization in this case.

While a Pleyel-built automatic Fotoplayer (a multiple roll instrument
with the sound effects, tympani, organ pipes and xylophones) probably
never got built for motion picture use, the idea of a second piano is
the primary focus of the British patent text.  This would appear that
motion picture accompaniment might have been the thrust of these
claims, since scaled-down theatre organs were now replacing single
pianos in even smaller movie houses.  Two or three pianos could bring
fuller sound for a small movie theatre, and the cost would be vastly
lower than installing a pipe organ.  Fotoplayers (with extra slave
pianos) and cinema organs would both possess the same kind of
percussion and sound effects devices as well.

As for "improvements", for someone involved with players to the extent
I have been, this patent material is just the same pool of older ideas.
They would have worked, but would have been complex and costly,
especially if more than four pianos were attempted.

Within the next few days, I expect to post the entire patent text on
my Ballet Mecanique page in the Artcraft web site with a link to these
1923 papers and the sheet with illustrations.  Then, those interested
in the subject of synchronized Pianolas, movie/audio synchronization,
etc., can read through the patent specifications and see what "might
have been" in earlier times.  The vacuum tube, I believe, brought the
death knell of this synchronization design from the House of Pleyel.
Visit http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/antheil.htm

Regards from Maine,
Douglas Henderson - Artcraft Music Rolls
Wiscasset, ME 04578 USA
http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/