It's time for me to trouble you with yet another trivial question
about my favorite obsession, Dutch street organs.  Can someone tell
me if "De Duif," as it existed in 1960, was transposed from the scale
given in the reference books?  Perhaps a more relevant question:
is the present "De Tiet" a transposing instrument?

I've been comparing the information that a number of you have
graciously provided about 72-key Carl Frei street organs with my audio
recording of "De Duif," and the first thing I discovered was that the
recording doesn't play the same notes!  It is transposed up two
semitones from the charts I have received.

How do I know, I hear you ask?  Well, after you listen to these
arrangements for 20 or 30 years, you come to know all the places where
the arranger ran out of notes.  Example: the highest note in the melody
of "Wonderful Copenhagen" is dropped an octave.  On the recording, that
dropped note is clearly an A; on the chart the highest melody note is
F, so by that the dropped note would be a G.  I have also studied the
bass and countermelody parts and they are consistent with this
whole-step shift.

If the organ didn't transpose, then the other obvious explanation is
that the record producer sped the master tape up.  It is not obvious
why they would do that, but maybe they thought it would make the tempo
snappier or the tone brighter.  Fortunately, we have ways of undoing
such trickery nowadays.

I've been listening to these tracks using WinAmp equipped with the
Pacemaker plug-in, and cranking the speed down 12% puts everything right
in tune with the charts.  But I'm accustomed to hearing it the old way,
and it's really draggy like this.  I just now readjusted the speed to
only a semitone lower, about a six per cent speed reduction, and it
sounds much better.  Perhaps the answer to my question is that there
was a half-step shift in each the organ and the recording.

It's a fairly academic question, I'll admit, but enquiring minds have to
ask!

Regards,
Doug Mauldin

 [ Some American made instruments are also transposing.  Wurlitzer
 [ Style 165 music rolls played on Style 157 organs sound at three
 [ steps higher.  I think the reason is simple economics: the smaller
 [ instrument costs less to ship and it consumes less space.  It was
 [ designed to play the pre-existing library of 165 music rolls.  Few
 [ listeners are aware of the difference.  -- Robbie