I thought it fun to (again) open an old discussion about what the
attraction of mechanical music instruments is all about.  It is,
in my opinion, a very important issue, because decisions that have
impact on the trade are based on those assumptions.

I think that the discussion will always come down to four main pillars:

 - Musical value (voicing, scale, balance, arrangements; in all,
how well does it play?)

 - Front & artistic value (Originality, value of used materials,
decorations, maintenance; in all, how beautiful does it look?)

 - Visual & mechanical value (Originality, materials used, engineering,
maintenance; in all, how well and interestingly is the "machine"
constructed?)

 - Age (Age has some mystical value.  People seem to be willing to
respect the fact that someone is so handy that he can do it by hand,
and they pay extra for that, although the question, "How did they do
it with the means available at that era," doesn't give you always the
optimum value -- drilling holes by hand could be more expensive and
not as good as a CNC might do it.)

The value of the instrument depends of coarse on the mixture of those
four pillars.  If one pillar fells short, another will have to make up
for it, or the price must go down; it's simple as that.  I'm pretty
sure that a discussion of which pillar is more important will never
end in agreement, because this depends too much on personal attitudes,
feelings and abilities.  (A blind person will probably care less about
how it looks compared to how well it plays).

But you could go for the second best thing, and that is finding out
which percentage of the population cares more about which pillar.

If I had to give the four pillars each a number of 1 to 10, total not
to exceed 20, I would do it as follows:

 - Musical value: 10 (important above all).

 - Front/Artistic value: 5 (important, even more so for the wife).

 - Visual/Mechanical value: 4 (important, as long as it puts no negative
side on the musical value.  I like to look at a bellows more than at a
blower, which has _no_ visual fun at all!  But if the blower makes for
better music, I would go for the blower).

 - Age: 1 (not very important to me, because I'm not in it for the
"treasure in the attic" side, but for the music quality).

So maybe this idea could be moulded in a survey in which all MMDigest
subscribers could take part.  I sure would want to know on which part
we need to focus more if we want to make our instruments more appealing
to customers.

And then -- for people like us who try to make mechanical music into
a never ending story -- *Is there room for more?*  The above survey
could give a partial answer.  If age makes for a high score, "new"
instruments are less likely to be appreciated.

And if there is room for more, what is this word "new" standing for?
A "new" reproduction of an "old" design?  Or a "new" product born out
of the "old" designs, but upgraded will all technical advances of
today?

That I take the time to write this article may be in part the sad fact
that I went to the funeral of a musical friend that I accompanied on
the piano on many different occasions.  This funeral was shown on the
national TV, because my friend was a pretty famous singer.  The church
was loaded, and some colleagues sang sad songs during parts of the
ceremony.

As usual, the massive church organ was left alone, and all music
(except the last song) was accompanied/played on an electronic
keyboard.  All the music was played live, and they only used simple
voices like strings or choral.  Even though the church organ was in
perfect condition, as I could hear when the last song was played, it
was not used to accompany the (modern...) singers.

I wonder why nobody seems to be alerted by these developments, and why
nobody seems to _want_ to do something.  With new wind regulators you
can create beautiful string effects on pipes, and the new swell
shutters can provide excellent dynamics.  MIDI control provides the
ability to play the organ from a distance, so that players can be more
in the middle of the action.

Church organs are not my trade, but could some new developments make
things any worse?

We are finalising a development that took a lot of time to try to
prove different.  The idea was easy.  Make acoustic instruments (of
the type used in Mechanical Instruments for years) play automatically
in the best way we could, using any means.

We succeeded, as the hearing test results show that it is nearly
impossible to tell if the real accordion player is at work, or the
(live or midi-recorded) reproduction of the music on our new
MIDI-playback accordion in the next room.  The accordion player may
apply any bellows shakes or bellows techniques, all is reproduced the
same instant.

This system applied on pipes opens a new world.  Unlimited, instant
pressure control from zero to full blower pressure.  The system comes
with an integrated low frequency oscillator (LFO) so that initial
vibrato, or blow-attack effects, etc., can be called up with the press
of a button.  Soft attack or "spitting" in the pipe can be triggered
from pressing the keyboard soft or hitting it hard.

You can imagine that, when this system will be included in, say, an
orchestrion, it will surpass any existing instrument when it comes to
variation in the tonality of pipes.  (I can send a little MP3 audio
demo if anybody is interested to hear a sample of this new development).
And the best thing is, press reset and all is back to the way it used
to be.

To connect this last part to the beginning of the story, what is the
commercial value of a new instrument with following percentages:

 - Musical value: 10 (better than any existing instrument, very close
to live played instruments).

 - Front/Artistic value: 8 (Can be anything, even a reproduction of
any existing instrument).

 - Visual/Mechanical value: 2 (No bellows going up or down (blower),
no paper roll mechanics to look at (it uses a MIDI player with animated
piano roll), no lead tubes going up and down (the MIDI signals are
connected by wires).  Visual effects like swell shutters or moving
drumsticks are comparable to the old style instruments).

 - Age: 0 (New).

One could make things more visually appealing by including stuff like a
paper roll reader, so that existing rolls can be played, but this would
reduce the musical value to comparable [old] instruments using the same
scale as long as the instrument is played by the paper roll mechanics.

I would not completely be surprised if it turned out that musical value
would _not_ be rated as highest importance.  I understand that making
a sailboat go faster by means of a motor would not be popular either.

And that may be _the_ dilemma.  Is a mechanical instrument all about:
(a) acoustic instruments mechanically driven by _any_ means to produce
best performance with minimum problems (comfortable yacht getting you
fast from point A to B with minimal hassle), or (b) is it about acoustic
instruments mechanically driven by _certain_ means?  E.g., a sailboat
slowly takes one from point A to B, with maximum hassle, and the owner
loves every minute of it!

Or the answer may again be both, as there are both motor yachts _and_
sailboats for sale.  Then again, it would help to know how big one
compares to the other in terms of commercial value/market share.

I would appreciate all feedback that helped me to find my bearings in
this big forest of mechanical music instruments.

Tony Decap
Herentals, Belgium
http://www.decap-herentals.be/

 [ Nostalgia -- an excessively sentimental yearning for a past era
 [ or irrecoverable condition -- is implied in many MMDigest articles.
 [ I think nostalgia is a big element in several of Tony's evaluation
 [ categories.  -- Robbie