Guidance needed for a project with educational purpose.

Hi, I don't know much where to start.  I am very much acquainted
with instrument playing, less so with instrument building, and even
less so with the mechanical instruments.  My goal would be to make
an instrument similar to this one: https://youtu.be/bJ0bYoNhRDU 
but to have a modern MIDI-capable system commanding the key levers
instead of a clockwork with a pinned barrel.

The educational part comes from the fact that I would like to record
the results of my research on Engramelle, a French monk who wrote
on mechanical instruments, whom I am sure you must be familiar with.

There is, in my opinion, not much to learn by pinning a barrel of a
cylinder, but I would really like to have the pieces played by a real
musical instrument.  Up until now I had the pieces played via a MIDI
sampler, with results that are really wanting.

Basically, I can take care of the organ pipes, the keys, the jacks,
strings, etc., all pertaining to the instrument.  What I would need
is just the part capable of receiving MIDI data and transferring
that to a set of actuators that will move the keys up and release
them at the set times.  I can very well imagine something very similar
to the instrument from the video -- the famous Bidermann Langenbucher
clockwork claviorgan -- in the same pitch range, and with about 15 to
25 different keys.

Any guidance would be much appreciated.  My email can be published,
if anyone wants to write directly, but I think that for the interest
of future readers of the forum, it would be best to leave it public.

Best regards,

P. J. Lascano
capdelduende@gmail.com.geentroep [delete ".geentroep" to reply]

P.S.:  I am attaching sampler-based realizations of Engramelle (only
the first half of them, to comply with file size limits).  These are
the first half of the realization of serinette pieces by Engramelle
in his two books.

 [ http://www.mmdigest.com/Attachments/18/12/07/181207_044712_serinette_examples_1-16.zip 

 [ Father Marie-Dominique-Joseph Engramelle (1727-1805) was a French
 [ monk who invented a method of recording music.  In 1775 he published
 [ his treatise, "La Tonotechnie ou l'Art de noter les cylindres", on
 [ how to record the pinning of cylinders for the mechanical organ.
 [ He also collaborated in "The Art of the Organ Factor" by Dom Bedos
 [ de Celles, 1766-1778.  Ref.
 [ https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marie-Dominique-Joseph_Engramelle 
 [ -- Robbie