In thinking about the best way to add a MIDI interface to
a keyed fairground organ, it seemed to me that one of the easiest,
most transferable, and most sympathetic means would be to make
a "mini-Vorsetzer" that would clamp on to the keyframe in place of
the pressure bar and play the organ by operating the keys just as the
book does, rather than by introducing additional plumbing downstream.
This would keep the keyframe "exercised" (which I'm told is a good
thing), and would be much simpler than other means of MIDI-fying
a typical pressure-operated keyframe.  I wonder if anyone has made
such a thing and how it worked?

On a related note, it seems that most MIDI systems I see use
relatively archaic systems for data storage and transfer (like floppy
discs or proprietary ROMs).  How hard would it be to make the organ
(or piano) an Ethernet network device with a wireless card so that it
could be run off a remote laptop, perhaps displaying an electronic
piano roll version of the music, a la Cakewalk?

As you can tell, I'm not an engineer (but I know there are many lurking
here)!  :-)

Roger Wiegand
Wayland, Massachusetts, USA
www.band-organ.com