Hello Mech. Music Digest readers,  Several recent postings stated that
there is little demand for "classical" music on rolls (which would
include George Gershwin and Ferde Grofe today).

This is not true, and Artcraft is living proof that the rolls which
sell are "good" (meaning exciting, sparkling, effervescent or lyric and
subtle).  The "bad" arrangements are something else (meaning boring,
formula rolls, often with notation instead of 'performance' standards
in the perforations).

My third enterprise, Artcraft Rolls, began in 1982 at The Musical
Wonder House museum, http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/mwh.htm and then
in 1986 became an "around the corner" studio where the rolls are now
being produced full-time on a steady basis.

Muriel Pollack once rightly stated, "The choice is not between popular
and classical music, but between 'good' and 'bad' music."  Our rolls
have a simulation of keyboard attack, due to perforating detail that
goes down to a 1/4 perforation and a realistic type of sustaining
pedal score; the latter facet is partly in the overlap staccato cutting
and secondarily in the damper lifting (speed and travel).  Classical
music lovers respond to the "perforated performance" if it offers
something to rival the audio recordings of today, and presents music
which fits the pianos attributes.

At this writing, I'm around 300 copies for our "Mephisto Waltz"
Duo-Art roll, half being sold to owners of standard pedal players.
For more information see http://www.wiscasset.net/artcraft/mephisto.htm
Our Mozart-Salieri roll is in the 200-plus range today, and the bulk of
our offerings in this genre are in the 100-200 spectrum, with no end in
sight.

Many of the old rolls were sold to people without radios or phonographs,
so a Tchaikowsky Symphony could be perforated and marketed, but not
today!  The orchestral tone colors are not in the piano, and recuts of
notation-oriented rolls are dull when compared to LPs, tapes and CDs
available in our day.

Legato pieces are not effective on the Pianola, if they are something
like Chopin's "Etude in E-major", unless the roll were specially made
for playing on one specific piano.  On the other hand, Gottschalk-like
compositions, given our "graduated staccato", are thrilling to
experience in the music roll medium.  Frank French's "Merengue" Concert
Etude in our catalogue is an example of the technically-demanding works
which suit the mechanical piano.

You might be interested to know that the sales of our classical rolls
rival those of our ragtime selections.  Muriel Pollack's observation
still rings true in this age of electronics!

The quality of the arrangement is for us what "sells" the roll, not
the genre.  (Of course, we dismiss a keyboard artist's presence, so
no Artcraft rolls feature a promotion based on a pianist 'recording'
our offerings.  Audio is the sphere for capturing a live performance.
Rolls are arranged, not matter what is claimed.)

These are just observations from the decades of roll publishing in
Maine, and for a short time in Washington/Georgetown, DC, in the
'Sixties.

Regards,
Douglas Henderson - Artcraft Music Rolls
Wiscasset, Maine
http://wiscasset.nnei.net/artcraft/