[ Jeff Taylor wrote in 120531 MMDigest:

> This suggests arrangers were sitting at keyboards and playing their
> arrangements to prepare a roll.  Does that make sense?  In 1913?
> Is it the "hand-played" idea, but with the performer working from
> a musical score he or she prepared him/herself?

I cannot speak for what was technically possible or common in 1913 --
only for the musical side: every arranger (and composer) has his or her
own way of creating music.  I think you will find the full spectrum
from "notation only" (as far as I know, the famous Gershwin rolls of
"An American in Paris" by Frank Milne were directly drawn on the master
roll; and of course rolls for orchestrions etc. required writing of a
score) to "play only" (still, usually with subsequent corrections on
the master roll).

In my practical experience, creating quality rolls by "hand-playing"
is substantially more expensive than writing a score, mostly because
adding in the required precision is about as much work as creating the
raw score.

Harald Mueller