The pianola

[Anastasius]

Not sure where to post this.

Watching QI the other night, they were talking about the pianola and that there were rolls of the composers actually playing their own works..."As if you had Grieg playing for you"...IIRC.

So if this is true, how do they encode the finer details such as how hard the keys are hit etc ?

TIA

[Bryn]

Not sure where to post this.

Watching QI the other night, they were talking about the pianola and that there were rolls of the composers actually playing their own works..."As if you had Grieg playing for you"...IIRC.

So if this is true, how do they encode the finer details such as how hard the keys are hit etc ?

TIA

In two words, air pressure. In rather more words: http://pianola.org/reproducing/reproducing.cfm

Or, more fully: https://www.mmdigest.com/Smythe/Pian...Mechanisms.pdf

[Nick Armstrong]

Not sure where to post this.

Watching QI the other night, they were talking about the pianola and that there were rolls of the composers actually playing their own works..."As if you had Grieg playing for you"...IIRC.

So if this is true, how do they encode the finer details such as how hard the keys are hit etc ?

TIA

Good idea to post this on a dedicated thread

I heard that on QI too and although I have only glanced at Bryn’s references, I think that on QI they may have conflated the basic pianola (player piano) with the more sophisticated ‘reproducing’ piano - the latter (e.g. the Welte-Mignon that allows us to hear Mahler playing his own pieces).

I grew up with a basic pianola in my grandparents’ house, with a stack of piano rolls which I would periodically get out and play through till my legs got tired - there was quite a lot of Edwardian dross but some ‘proper’ pieces (I enjoyed the Mendelssohn Songs without words, I remember). The performers were never credited as far as I recall.

There was no expression etc encoded in the rolls - the apertures merely gave the notes and their length. If you pedalled away and did nothing else, the music came out at a uniform volume (although there would be tempo variations due to the length of the apertures in the roll varying according to the original performance)

For dynamics, you had to rely on a series of controls under a flap in front of the keyboard: a few sliders and rocker-switches which theoretically allowed volume control by adjusting the air pressure I suppose, or allowed additional slowing or acceleration by applying or releasing a kind of brake to the pedals. I never bothered much as the differences were pretty minimal (or the old pianola wasn’t working properly)

I’m sure the QI reference wasn’t to this basic kind of parlour pianola...

[Bryn]

Good idea to post this on a dedicated thread

I heard that on QI too and although I have only glanced at Bryn’s references, I think that on QI they may have conflated the basic pianola (player piano) with the more sophisticated ‘reproducing’ piano - the latter (e.g. the Welte-Mignon that allows us to hear Mahler playing his own pieces).

I grew up with a basic pianola in my grandparents’ house, with a stack of piano rolls which I would periodically get out and play through till my legs got tired - there was quite a lot of Edwardian dross but some ‘proper’ pieces (I enjoyed the Mendelssohn Songs without words, I remember). The performers were never credited as far as I recall.

There was no expression etc encoded in the rolls - the apertures merely gave the notes and their length. If you pedalled away and did nothing else, the music came out at a uniform volume (although there would be tempo variations due to the length of the apertures in the roll varying according to the original performance)

For dynamics, you had to rely on a series of controls under a flap in front of the keyboard: a few sliders and rocker-switches which theoretically allowed volume control by adjusting the air pressure I suppose, or allowed additional slowing or acceleration by applying or releasing a kind of brake to the pedals. I never bothered much as the differences were pretty minimal (or the old pianola wasn’t working properly)

I’m sure the QI reference wasn’t to this basic kind of parlour pianola...

Sandi Toksvig was pretty specific in a reference to the reproducing piano, 16 minutes in:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000rr2l/qi-series-r-16-rock-n-roll

[Nick Armstrong]

Sandi Toksvig was pretty specific in a reference to the reproducing piano, 16 minutes in:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episod...16-rock-n-roll

Yes indeed... but iirc the Grieg reference seemed linked with just the ‘pianola’ a bit later

[Bryn]

Yes indeed... but iirc the Grieg reference seemed linked with just the ‘pianola’ a bit later

I blame Conlon Nancarrow. His studies are given as being for the "player piano", whereas he actually composed for his two Ampico upright reproducing pianos. That said, they, the studies, sound even more impressive than usual when played on properly set up Bösendorfer-Ampoico grands https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x355htc

[Anastasius]

Many thanks, chaps, for the detailed replies. Fascinating instruments.

[Richard Barrett]

whereas he actually composed for his two Ampico upright reproducing pianos.

Indeed. When I was in NYC in 2014 there was a Nancarrow day at the Whitney Museum where all of his Studies were played on "original instruments" - the amount of mechanical sound those things emit was quite a shock in comparison with (any of) the recordings.

Any pianola thread should mention the self-described concert pianolist Rex Lawson http://rexlawson.org/index_en.html

[Bryn]

Indeed. When I was in NYC in 2014 there was a Nancarrow day at the Whitney Museum where all of his Studies were played on "original instruments" - the amount of mechanical sound those things emit was quite a shock in comparison with (any of) the recordings.

Any pianola thread should mention the self-described concert pianolist Rex Lawson http://rexlawson.org/index_en.html

Indeed. Rex played a major part in the Other Minds organised Nanacarrow 100 fest, some years back. Having played a small role in the crowd funding of the event, I qualified for mp3s of the 3 concerts and the talks. His performance of the pianolla version of The Rite of Spring there was phenomenal. Would that I could have attended.

[ardcarp]

I'm a big Nancarrow fan. His premise was, of course, that more notes/chords can be played at once via a paper roll than by any human pair of hands.
I think the word 'pianola' is used loosely to mean any sort of reproducing piano from the cheapest to those which actually reproduce an artist's expression.

As I understand it, the 'bellows' which are operated via the footpedals should really be called 'extractors', because pianolas work off negative air pressure, i.e. suction, not by blowing.

I found this:

https://www.pianotopics.nl/FT06v.htm