Dear folks,  Joyce Brite writes asking about rubber bands for piano
rolls.  I have had pretty good luck at the commercial stationary stores
locally.  They generally have quite a few sizes in stock.  They are
packaged in fairly large numbers (1000 or so) but are not terribly
expensive.

Joyce also writes:

> There are some out there who believe that rubber bands should not
> be used on rolls at all.  What, then, should you use to secure the
> roll in place?

I have purchased some old rolls that were in good shape except that the
rubber bands deteriorated and left significant residue on the paper
requiring scraping to remove the remnants.  It is a bit labor intensive,
but now I put rubber bands on all my rolls with a strip of paper wrapped
around the roll under the rubber band.  I haven't done this to my
entire collection but keep a supply of paper strips by the piano and
then put on the paper and rubber band when I finish playing a roll.
I figure this will keep the roll snug but will protect the paper in
case the rubber rots.  Just an idea.

By the way, new, high-end rolls used to have a paper retainer on the
roll.  This was a single use item as it had to be torn to remove it
from the roll.  Some roll vendors like Larry Norman use a reproduction
of this strip on rolls that they sell.

Cheers,
Bob Conant
Bradenton, Florida