Several people have asked about my posting about the value of
Tel-Electric rolls.  They are surprised that they aren't worth more,
because they must be rare.  Here are some of the reasons for the
current market value.

The Tel-Electric company produced rolls from 1905 to 1917, issuing
around 10,000 titles, as near as we can estimate.  We show over 6,000
in our database, which has enough holes in it to make the 10,000 number
believable.  Considering the duplicate titles we have seen it is
reasonable to guess that at least 500,000 rolls were made.  Two world
war scrap drives destroyed a lot of the brass rolls, but since they
were small and easily stored many survived in attics and basements.

The brass rolls were not easily damaged except by moisture or
intentional abuse.  Most of them were the 65-note Tel-Electric variety,
though after 1912 the company produced the 88-note Telektra label.
Around 1915 they sold a paper roll and reader for the Telektra system,
but so far we have not seen a reader, and have a small number of the
paper rolls.

So there are a lot more of the brass rolls around than one would
think.  We know of perhaps 1,500 titles in various collections,
and more surface almost daily.  The largest number of these titles
are classical.

Even among the collectors there is not a lot of demand for rolls,
once they have enough to demonstrate their pianos, unless they are
collectors for collecting's sake.  The music was all mechanically
arranged until 1912, when the company began a small series of
hand-played rolls for the 88-note Telektra label.  Some of these
were modified for the 65-note series of rolls.

The mechanically arranged music is not very pleasing to us today,
excepting perhaps the rags and one-steps.  Some of it is downright
painful.  There is nothing quite like Chopin arranged by the score,
played on a piano with 3 levels of expression (plus soft pedal)...
Or perhaps Tannheuser on 12 rolls, dehydrated for the piano.

After the players fell into disuse, for whatever reasons, the magnet
banks were usually removed from the pianos because they intruded on the
pianist's leg room.  Many of the consoles (readers) are still around,
since they were relatively small and separate from the pianos, but
without the magnet banks they are not of much use except for spare
parts.  One of the reasons there aren't many Tel-Electric collectors
is that there aren't many complete systems any more.

So the main reasons for the low market value of the brass Tel-Electric
65-note rolls are that

(1) there are a lot more of them around than one would think;
(2) the music isn't that great;
(3) there aren't many working systems, and
(4) there aren't many Tel-Electric collectors -- around a dozen
   at last count.

Occasional titles will bring a high price, but usually they aren't
worth it.  A good example is the Eubie Blake "Bugle Call Rag" we bought
for around $30, thinking it just had to be good.  It wasn't.

The 88-note Telektra rolls are in even less demand, since the readers
used a lot of "pot metal", or white metal as it is also known.  No
original Telektra reader is useable without replacing much of this
metal, as it has deteriorated badly.  There are perhaps 3 operating
Telektra systems today, one of them in England, and a couple being
restored.  So the demand for Telektra rolls is even worse than for the
Tel-Electrics, though there are fewer of them around.

The bottom line is that single Tel-Electric rolls may bring $10-15 for
titles that someone wants, occasionally more.  The common titles may
not sell at all.  Rolls by the lot usually go for less, though if the
lot has good titles it may bring as much as $10 per roll.

Telektra 88-note rolls are hard to call, due to the reader problems.
We have two Telektra readers, both in need of restoration, so we'll
sometimes buy 88-note Telektra rolls for that fuzzy time in the future
when we get one going.  Unless the price is really good or the title
is interesting we'll usually pass on the Telektras.

Speculators sometimes pay a lot more for the rolls, but the speculators
are becoming fewer as they find the rolls don't bring as much as they
expect.

Bob Billings
Reno, Nevada