What makes them work? Are they electric? Why do they have big foot-pedals?
What sort of music do player-pianos play?
What kinds of piano rolls are there?
Note: links to commercial sites are provided in good faith for interest and information, and do not represent endorsement or recommendation by the NWPPA. We are not responsible for the content of websites other than our own.It is a conventional (acoustic) piano which plays music automatically, reading the music from paper rolls (in the case of traditional player pianos dating mainly from 1900 to the 1930s, with a few being made post-war until quite recently) or from digital media (in the case of electronically-controlled player pianos dating from the 1970s to the present day).
It was the Aeolian Company’s trade name for a brand of player piano; it has come to refer to any brand of straightforward player piano (just as “gramophone” and “phonograph” are were originally trade names of early talking-machine manufacturers but now refer to any record-player). Strictly speaking, the first Pianolas (in 1897) were piano players which were machines with mechanical fingers which played conventional pianos, though it was not long before the mechanism was made compact enough to be incorporated into specially-made Pianola pianos to make a self-contained unit. Other manufacturers soon caught on and made their own systems (e.g. Autopiano, Angelus, Solophonola etc.)
Some are electrically-driven, but the underlying mechanism is pneumatic (operated with air or, more accurately, a partial vacuum or suction). Straightforward player pianos create the suction using foot-operated bellows or “exhausters” operated by large, sloping pedals, though an electric pump has sometimes been added at a later date. The luxury models, however, were electrically pumped when they were originally made, and incorporate sophisticated pneumatic control systems to read special coding in the rolls to make the music play with a full range of expression (see reproducing pianos).
Click here to see how player pianos play the notes from the paper roll.
Modern computer-controlled player pianos are of course electrically-operated throughout, and use solenoids (a kind of electromagnet) to operate the keys.
These were the luxury models aimed at the more affluent classes and were the top-end “hi-fi” systems of the player piano era; they were much more sophisticated than the straightforward foot-pumped player pianos and came with a price tag to match. There were various systems e.g. Duo-Art, Ampico, Welte (of which there were three variants) and various other less common ones (e.g. Artrio-Angelus, Triphonola). They are still operated by air, but this is pumped either by a set of electrically-driven bellows or by a “Motora” high-speed rotary pump. They play specially-adapted rolls which are recordings of actual performances of pianists, and include special coding in the margins of the rolls to play the music with all the loud-and-soft expression. Many famous pianists (including Rachmaninov, Paderewski and Rubinstein) recorded reproducing piano rolls, mostly during the period 1905-1930. The quality of gramophone recordings only reached an acceptable standard in the mid/late 1920’s and until then often involved serious distortions to the playing style to get a usable recording, so these piano roll recordings are often a more faithful likeness of early 20th century pianists’ playing than their sound recordings.
Nickelodeons (also known as piano-orchestrions) were also mostly electrically-operated and play from rolls, but there the resemblance to reproducing pianos finishes. They were coin-operated and were installed in cafés and bars, and were the juke-boxes of the player piano world.
Almost every kind of music has been perforated on piano rolls. Early rolls
concentrated on classical music, ballads and hymns, together with waltzes and
marches. The “roaring twenties” brought an almost endless string of foxtrots,
which formed the bulk of the popular music of the time. Jazz, ragtime, boogie
etc. are also well represented in the popular piano roll repertoire. Player
pianos lost their popularity at about the time of the Wall Street Crash and
the worldwide recession which followed it, though rolls continued to be produced
on a more limited basis and these show a rather more restrained or sophisticated
style than the earlier, extrovert arrangements. Many of the tunes we describe
today as “evergreens” and “standards” date from this time and it is interesting
to hear the style of performance from those days. Popular music continues to
be issued on piano roll by a small number of companies, notably QRS
in the
The classical music available shows a surprising shift of emphasis from today’s classical repertoire: Bach and Handel hardly figured at all and Mozart only occasionally, while Chopin and Liszt were extremely popular. Composers of “salon music” (pleasant but somewhat insubstantial pieces) such as Chaminade and Moszkowski were also popular, yet are almost forgotten today. Other mainstream classical/romantic composers such as Schubert and Schumann were popular then and have remained in vogue to the present day.
There are many kinds, but for straightforward player pianos there are two main formats.: 65-note and 88-note rolls. Both are 11.25 inches wide so measuring them will not help you to distinguish them. However, you can easily tell them apart because of the end fittings: 65-note rolls have small metal protrusions from the ends (one resembles the tip of a knitting needle, the other is similar but has small “wings” on it to provide the drive), while 88-note rolls have shallow recesses in each end, one having a slot and the other a conical edge. The overwhelming majority of rolls are straightforward 88-note rolls. Rolls which are narrower but have similar end-fittings to 65-note rolls are probably for player organs such as those made by Aeolian and by Wilcox & White. Then of course there are nickelodeon rolls, fair organ rolls, dance organ rolls, band organ rolls etc., but most people are unlikely to come across these!
Reproducing piano rolls were mostly
based on the 88-note format and have the same width (11.25 inches) and spool
shape (spools ends have shallow recesses), but the expression information is
coded in different ways which are (unfortunately) incompatible with each other!
Fortunately they are nearly always distinguishable because they bear the name
of the relevant system: Ampico, Duo-Art, Welte (T-98, made
from green paper for some reason!), Welte Licensee
(
There are several manufacturers of straightforward 88-note piano rolls: see the list on our website as well as other listings (on the Mechanical Music Digest (MMD) website and PlayerCare) for manufacturers of these. The repertoire includes standard popular pieces, pop hits and specialist jazz arrangements.
There are also specialist manufacturers of reproducing piano rolls (again see the list on our website and MMD). These are mostly (but not entirely) re-issues of original Ampico, Duo-Art and Welte rolls.
We’re not aware that conventional pneumatic (roll-playing) pianos are still being manufactured (we'd be delighted to be corrected on this one if they are!), though some were still being made until at least the 1970s. However, computer-controlled player pianos and player systems certainly are in production, such as the Yamaha Disklavier and the QRS Pianomation system.