Lanny R Bergthold wrote:

> I don't have a player piano, but have a upright Steinway piano built
> in 1900.  The reason for my contacting you is that I have a whole box
> of piano rolls that belonged to my grandparents.  I unfortunately have
> never heard them and I would like to have them recorded onto a CD.
> Is there a way of doing this, and could you point me in the right
> direction who might be able to do this.  I am hoping that the expense
> would not be prohibitive.  I would guess that there are player pianos
> that can burn a CD at the same time.  I would appreciate any
> information that you could offer.
>
> Thanks
>
> lanny@juno.com.geentroep [delete ".geentroep" to reply]

Hi Lanny,  In fact, music rolls have been used to create quite a few
analog CDs, i.e. wave or MP3 files.  Music rolls have also been used
to create numerous digital CDs, i.e. MIDI files.  However, the whole
process has always been rather complex, and those who are involved
have every right to expect reasonable compensation for not only their
'inventions' but also for the time spent to make a custom-ordered CD.

I won't hazard to guess what such a project might cost, but it might
be discovered that a number of the rolls you have have already been
converted or recorded.

As to pointing you to the right person, I'm sending a copy of this email
to the Mechanical Music Digest (MMD, MMDigest or simply the 'Digest').
The people who are most involved is such projects are members of the
MMD and, most likely, they will respond to you personally or share
their knowledge on the topic via the Digest, which is basically a daily
newsletter that gets sent to some 1200+ members.

Musically,

John A. Tuttle
Player-Care.com
Brick, NJ, USA