Have you noticed?  Whether the audience is of two or thirty people,
as soon as a mechanical music instrument begins to play, after a few
seconds, inevitably, one, two or three voices arise, covering the
music partially or completely while they

- Admire: "It's beautiful!  And this facade!  These figures!
Look at the roll!  These self-moving keys!  And _that_ musical box:
this inlay, this comb, this mechanism ..."

- Question: "From when is it dated?  Where was it made?  What is
the use of the lever, there, on the side?  How many tunes?  How many
pins?  Are there still repairers?  Does one still find a lot of these
instruments?"  and frequently the horrible, "How much does that cost?"

- Inform (tour guides are often guilty of this, while the music plays):
"This box was fabricated at [city] in [date] by [maker].  You will
notice the admirable notation (!) and sound (!!!).  The lever on the
right is for ... etc."   When pressed for time they happily start the
next instrument without waiting for the previous one to finish playing,
or they stop the instrument in the middle of a tune.

In short -- as you can guess -- the person who wants to listen
attentively to the music is frequently frustrated, confronted with the
deluge of words which, very curiously, often stops suddenly when the
music stops: then applause, or some seconds of silence before the words
will fuse again, more present than ever.

We've all done the same, and me too, so I am not casting stones at
anybody.  But I seek an explanation -- there are probably several.

When a real flesh and blood musician begins singing or playing his
piano, guitar or saxophone, generally everybody listens in silence.
It is often the same, fortunately, when an artist turns the crank of
his street organ -- because it is a human being who plays, not a
machine.  And even more when he sings, and also often encourages the
audience to sing along.  This is an exception to the subject of this
article.

Within jazz clubs, some conversations continue on and on in the
background.  All music lovers know that nothing is more annoying at
a concert than the background noise (air conditioning, frequent
coughing and ... ring tones), not to mention the premature applause!

It might be different when listening at home to a concert on television,
or to a CD recording, but there the attention remains big and the music
takes precedence.

So why this relegation of the music to a very secondary place when
listening to mechanical music instruments?  It's not too bothersome
when a large fairground or dance organ plays, or even an orchestrion
or nickelodeon, but it becomes so for a player piano and even more so
for a musical box ... and I don't even speak of musical snuffboxes,
some of which are admirably notated and that, strangely, we would
listen to more silently if their sound was amplified by a powerful
sound system.

The mechanical musical instruments fascinate us for several reasons:
their appearance (facades, woodwork, etc.); their history; their
technical art; the fact that, precisely, they play mysteriously without
a human performer, and even their approximations can move us.  Hence
the many exclamations and questions.

So -- shall we content ourselves with "the noise they make"?
And sometimes it would be better, when we consider how listening to
some of these instruments on CDs is disappointing.  When we do not
have any more the magic of the surroundings, of the facade, of the
automatons, then we pay more attention to the unwanted noises, imperfect
tuning, bad rhythms, et cetera that our imagination hides (occults?)
when listening to the "real" instrument.

Or -- shall we try to remain silent and listen with the utmost
attention to the music of these instruments when facing them in
reality?  And this as a tribute to or in harmony with an especially
capable maker or restorer, and with the musician who, recently or in
the past, has notated their cylinders, rolls or books with love and
virtuosity, from a score written by a talented composer?

Happily, a great number of mechanical music instruments fill these
demanding criteria, so that they give good listening satisfactions --
as long as we make the effort to really listen to them.

Through many visits of collections, I have known only one collector who
succeeded to enforce a total silence on an audience of eighty, in order
to listen to his disc musical boxes: Mr. Al Choffnes, in the USA (near
Chicago, a great collector and former president of the MBSI).

He refused to start an instrument as long as he had not obtained the
attention and the complete silence of everyone.  He certainly said
something strong to get that result (but alas I don't remember his
words), as no voice dared to speak or even whisper before the end of
the tune, and the fading of the last harmonics...

I shall let you think about all that.  Have a pleasant listening, and,
after having patiently (I dare not say religiously) listened 'til the
last notes, then tell each other your admiration for these machines,
share your knowledge, and ask your questions!

And please, wait till the silence is completely reestablished before
starting the following tune or instrument.

Philippe Rouillé
Paris (a vice-president of the French Society)

(This article, translated into English thanks to Robbie Rhodes,
was first published in "Musiques Mécaniques Vivantes", the journal
of the French society "Association des Amis des Instruments et
de la Musique Mécanique", No. 78, April 2011, pp. 15-16.  Visit
http://www.aaimm.org/  and see also http://www.musicamecanica.org/ )