What is a Piano Roll?
Throughout the ages, a piano has become a true art form in and of itself. Some of the great musical geniuses in all of history have been fantastically adept piano players. The beauty of playing the piano is that almost anyone can become quite proficient at it with enough practice.
There are also a great many pianos that can be used to make music, starting with the modest upright piano and proceeding all the way up to grand pianos. However, you may have heard about another type of piano which is the player piano, and that operates using a piano roll. In this article, we’ll discuss what a player piano is and how it uses a piano roll to produce sweet-sounding music.
What is a player piano?
A player piano is sometimes referred to as a pianola, and it is a kind of self-playing piano. It has an electromechanical mechanism that operates the piano using programmed music and movements to replace the sound and movements of an actual pianist who would be playing the instrument.
The player piano became quite popular in the late 19th century and was an exciting addition to many households up through the early part of the twentieth century. Player piano sales peaked in the 1920s, and then began to decline with the advent of phonograph recordings.
Once records came into the picture, it was no longer necessary to go to the expense of purchasing a player piano to provide music for appreciative fans in the household. A player piano works by using a piano role that has pre-punched holes spaced to fit into the player piano, so that different types of music can be played.
Piano rolls
A piano roll is a music storage device that was used in past years to operate a player piano. Piano rolls are continuous paper rolls with perforations punched in them to represent musical notes, and to guide the piano as it makes music. While the piano roll is rolling over, it’s moving toward a reading system which is referred to as a tracker bar. This tracker bar can ‘read’ the holes and it triggers the corresponding keys by managing the hammers and the action of the player piano.
This is the controlling mechanism behind a player piano, and it provides the appearance of someone actually playing the piano and striking the keys to make the sounds you hear. As early as 1896, piano rolls were mass-manufactured, and quickly became extremely popular. It was very common throughout all of America to have people gather around the player piano to appreciate the novelty of a piano being played without a human operator.
It was also possible to have a person play the piano while it was also being operated by the piano roll, and this created a more resounding effect by harmonizing with the piano roll melody. Many companies spent enormous amounts of money to mass-produce thousands of piano rolls and add them to their catalogs of music.
Most of the piano rolls produced at this time were in the genres of religious music, light music, classical music, and even some ragtime music. All these were extremely popular for about fifty years, as the 19th century gave way to the 20th century. At the zenith of the player piano, piano rolls were being designed with 11-1/4” wide rolls so as to be compatible with all makes and models of player pianos.
In some cases, manufacturers decided to make their own piano rolls with non-standard rolls that would only be compatible with a few models of player pianos that were then being produced. This is thought to be one reason for the demise of the player piano, in addition to the sudden advent of phonograph recordings.
Nowadays, it’s very difficult to find any piano rolls at all, primarily because they are no longer mass-produced. It might be possible to find antique piano rolls if you browse through enough antique shops, or if you get lucky and talk to someone who has one or more in the family.
Inventor of the piano roll
As mentioned above, piano rolls have been used ever since the 1880s and they were first used commercially by Welte & Sons from about 1883 onwards. The piano rolls used by Welte and Sons were generally made by a single performer creating a rollography, which is much like a discography.
The invention of the piano roll itself is generally attributed to a man named Melville Clark. Mr. Clark introduced the world to two innovative ideas during his lifetime, both of which he would be remembered for long after his passing. The first was a full-scale piano roll that was capable of playing every note on a standard keyboard.
The second of his major inventions was an internal player which became a standard component of the player piano. Together, these two inventions allowed for the possibility of the player piano, which entertained millions of Americans for half a century, until advancing technology gently thrust it aside.
Can a player piano play be played normally?
The keyboard and the piano action of a player piano are entirely conventional, which means that a player piano can also be played by hand with a human operator in the traditional way. In many cases, during the heyday of player pianos, it was possible to play the piano with both a piano roll and an accompanying human, so as to enrich the sound heard by listeners.
If it is desired to add more notes or harmonies while the roll mechanism is operating, it’s very easy to play the keyboard at the same time as the roll mechanism is operating. This will produce a richer sound, although it may take some practice for the human operator to stay in sync with the piano.
Why would anyone use a piano roll?
You can think of a piano roll as the sheet music for a piano player. The player piano operates very similarly to a music box, and that means it produces the music mechanically rather than by being operated by a human. Once the roll is placed inside the piano, an operator can work the pedals to deliver air to the piano’s interior pneumatics.
When the piano roll unfurls, air will pass through the tiny holes in the paper, and this activates notes on the piano to play whatever song has been selected. The piano roll is absolutely essential to the player piano, because the piano must read the roll in order to play the notes without a human operator. Piano rolls and player pianos are inseparable for this very reason, although it is possible for a player piano to be played without a piano roll.
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