At 6:22 AM 2/6/97, Gene A. Perla wrote:

> To: rollreq@foxtail.com
> From: gperla@ccinyc.com (Perla, Gene A.)
> Subject: Joseph Dickenson
> Date: Thu, 6 Feb 1997 09:22:45 -0500
>
> I've been told that Joseph Dickenson (spelling?) is the inventor of the
> player piano.  If you can help with any info. about this, it would be
> appreciated.
>
> Thank you.
>
> Gene A. Perla

Dear Gene,

Here is a quote from one of the fine reference books, "Encyclopedia of
Automatic Musical Instruments," by Q. David Bowers, Vestal Press, Vestal,
NY, 1972, page 255:

             "History of the Player Piano"

"Although barrel-operated stringed instruments were known centuries
earlier, the first roll-operated piano seems to have been conceived by
Claude-Felix Seytre of Lyons, France, who patented in 1842 a piano-playing
system which used a music sheet made of stiff cardboard.  Alexander Bain's
1848 English patent for a roll-operated piano described a perforated roll
of normal thickness paper.

"In 1863 Fourneaux, a Frenchman, patented a pneumatically-operated player
piano.  Called the Pianista (a term later used generically in France to
describe other types of player instruments), unlike its predecessors,
was made in commercial quantities and was sold with success.  The Pianista
was exhibited at the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia in 1876, and it
caused much comment at the time."

 - - -

Mr. Bowers goes on to note that the early devices were not built into the
piano; rather, the mechanism was in a separate cabinet which was offered up
to the keyboard, and which pushed the piano keys with small fingers.  The
generic English term for this machine is "push-up player", and a popular
German name is "Vorsetzer", the name of the player cabinet sold by the
Welte company of Freiburg, which "sits before" the piano.

But in all cases the push-up player was heavy and bulky, and of course had
to be moved aside so that little Susie could practice her piano lessons.
And once moved it wasn't often replaced at the piano.  So the industry
shrunk the player mechanism (and expanded the piano case slightly) to make
the "inner-player" or "player piano", which became popular shortly after
1900.  By 1910 the old-style push-up piano player was obsolete.

In 1923 it is estimated that 170,500 player pianos were built in America,
and someone once noted that this figure is more than the number of babies
born that year!  In 1937 only 250 players were built.

Just as "Victrola" and "Phonograph" became generic terms, the "Pianola",
built by the Aeolian Company, became a generic name for the "player-piano"
or "roller piano".  ("Roller" refers to the roll of paper with the music,
and not to a capstan roller.)

Did you know that the gesture of "winding up" the player piano has it's
basis in fact?  Actually, in two devices.  Long before the pneumatic
system, pianos were made with a pinned-cylinder player mechanism, like a
music box.  The giant cylinder was the length of the keyboard and so gave
it the name, "barrel piano", which was powered by a hand-crank.

The other device was the more modern player piano, but which moved the
music roll using a large spring-motor.  Until the builder figured a way to
wind the motor from the foot pedals it was necessary to "wind up" the
spring, like a phonograph, before playing the song.  The spring-motor
stored enough energy that it could completely rewind the roll too!

The player piano reigned as the "home entertainment center" of the era
until it was displaced by the electric phonograph in the late 1920s;
the coin-operated piano (the "Nickelodeon") survived into the 1930s until
it, too, was replaced by the electric jukebox.

Robbie Rhodes