Re: 980917 MMDigest

> On the ebay WWW auction site, I noticed 22 piano rolls up for sale,
> lot 29413686.  They were Picturoll rolls intended to be used to
> accompany silent movies.
> This is probably a rhetorical question, but is $30+ a typical value of
> such movie music rolls or did each of these 2 people just really,
> really want them for some reason?

These were highly specialized rolls, and very few instruments that use
them survive.  Even fewer of the ROLLS survive, because when the films
went to sound, the rolls were usually discarded, often along with the
instruments that played them.  I'm the owner of a Robert Morton Style
39 pit organ, which was built to use rolls such as those, but the $30+
each price tag definitely kept me from paying $600+ for those rolls;
I only paid $300 for the ORGAN!  I think that the ebay auction is a
perfect example of what can happen when 'auction fever' strikes!

Regards,

Bob