I've always felt that because of the QRS tendency to use house names
I would not be far off to assume that everything within a rather wide
time span was by J. Lawrence Cook, unless I knew for certain it was by
someone else. Although the circumstance of recutting a roll was by
necessity, I imagine that he really enjoyed producing the "same" roll
in various styles -- "You are lost in a little maze of identical QRS
roll numbers, all different."
The actual name of the arranger for each version of each roll is an
area for careful research. A Ph.D. dissertation, anyone? Or several
conflicting Ph.D. dissertations?
And we've not even touched the subjects of the rolls Cook made for
other houses under various names, or the veracity of attribution of
famous names to rolls said to be hand played. The piano-roll companies
were just trying to sell rolls. Who ever thought anybody would be
interested in the historical details?
Peter Neilson
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