It is always exciting to discover something or, at least, to think
that something has been discovered.  In my current endeavor to archive
the rolls in the Aeolian Organ 116-note library, I am also adding the
necessary coding to those rolls to make them fully automatic [176-note]
Duo-Art Organ rolls.  This is all being done within the computer MIDI
data files.

The task is huge.  Some of the 116-note rolls are truly superb.
In an effort to find the best rolls, I decided to look at the ones from
the later production years.  Of course some of these rolls already
exist in Duo-Art format, and I will archive them last.

One roll, number 1099, "Scherzo in E-Flat", by Gaston Dethier,
was selected for the archival and upgrade process for two reasons:
(1) I could find no record of that roll ever being issued as a Duo-Art
roll, and also (2) the performance of Dethier playing his "Caprice -
The Brook" on Duo-Art roll 3251 is phenomenal.

After getting all the stop changes just right, I turned my attention
to coding the swell shutters.  Even after the shutters were tweaked to
be perfectly synchronized, something still didn't sound quite right.
It was the pedal.  On 116-note rolls, the lowest 13 notes of Manual I
are used to activate the pedal.  In editing, it is a simple task to
"strip" these 13 notes out and place them in the MIDI track that
operates the pedal.   They are actually just "copied", as those notes
still remain in the Manual I track and serve as the "Great to Pedal"
coupler.

I began to study the actual perforations in the roll to find out what
was actually happening.  My first conclusion was that the performance
was not possible in human terms.  Too many things were happening at
once.  I also thought perhaps the roll had been mismarked and areas
of "Pedal Off" had been omitted.  So those areas where the pedal notes
made no sense were taken out of the data file.  Still the roll did not
sound right.

Looking again at the pedal notes, the "light went on".  After three
years of editing Duo-Art rolls, I had failed to recognize transposed
pedal notes used in the Duo-Art system!  This roll, 1099, has the
Duo-Art pedal note scheme already on the roll.   The only thing lacking
was the coding.

Quickly I found the pedal notes that should be playing an octave higher
and made the changes.  In two places that made the pedal chromatic runs
continue smoothly well into the second pedal octave.  And, one note
actually made it into the third pedal octave, which is a real rarity.

Now the performance makes sense and, like his Duo-Art roll, this roll
is really exciting.  So I am excited, too.  This means several possible
things:

1. This roll was released as a Duo-Art roll, but is not cataloged.
2. This roll was coded as Duo-Art but not released.
3. This roll was hand-played on the recording organ.

All of these possibilities are interesting.  If anyone has this roll
in Duo-Art format, please let me know.  That number needs to be added
to the data base.  Of course any information or comments would be
wonderful.

Bob Taylor