My wife and I were shocked and terribly saddened to hear the news of
Ed's passing.  Ed was one of our hobby's greatest supporters; a true
lover of piano roll music, with the vision to preserve our musical
heritage for future generations to enjoy.

His greatest passion was for the original blues recordings of James
Blythe and Clarence Johnson on Capitol/Columbia A-rolls.  Without his
generosity and incentive over the years, we would today have access
to only a very small number of these exceptionally important rolls.
An A-roll collector has only to look at his shelf to see the number
of times "roll courtesy of Ed Sprankle" appears on the box labels.

In the late 1970s Ed produced two LP albums consisting of four unique
Capitol blues rolls.  To this date I believe this is still the most
important contribution towards educating the non-roll collecting public
to this music in audio format.  Ed also shared countless great 88-note
and nickelodeon rolls with us all via his Echoes recut label.  The
material selected for distribution was always of the greatest musical
and historical value, owing to Ed's impeccable knowledge and taste.

Ed also was first to encourage John Farrell to cut his transcriptions
and arrangements of classic jazz piano performances onto rolls,
fostering a talent which has produced many hundreds of superb rolls,
most of which were never originally available in player roll format.

Ed was my friend for over 25 years, and I shall truly miss him.
I shall always cherish the memory of his company, his bright smile
and wonderful sense of humor.

Frank and Amanda Himpsl