Pianos

During our visit to the Vienna Mueseum of Science and Technology, I spent a disproportionate amount of time amidst the surprisingly large exhibit on the developments and building of pianos. Aside from being an incredibly cool room,  both in terms of interest and temperature, the displays contained not only relics of innovation but also truly remarkable machines created for the world of the ‘player pianos’. Oftimes, music was a pastime of pubs and social gatherings. Unfortunately, many parties lasted longer than an musician was willing to play. Financially it was even more unreadable to  pay multiple bands to play throughout a night. As a way to provide musical entertainment for guests or even just for the wealthy in the luxury of their parlors, devices were created which would perform a tume on a keyboard completely hands-free. Eventually electric powered, a large spool of perforated paper would spin making contact with fine sensors of sorts which would when passing over the perfeorated bump (marked in its according position) would press down the pianos hammer on the desired key. The length of the mark on the paper determined the length the note was held. Eventually many of these devices were coin operated attractions.