Mechanical Organ
   HOME
*





Mechanical Organ
A mechanical organ is an organ that is self-playing, rather than played by a musician. For example, the barrel organ is activated either by a person turning a crank, or by clockwork driven by weights or springs. Usually, mechanical organs are pipe organs although some instruments were built using reeds similar to those found in a harmonium. Since the 1950s, some instruments have been built using electronics to generate the sound, though still operated by mechanical or pneumatic means. From the 1990s pipe organs have been built that are operated by MIDI rather than the earlier mechanical means. Originally, the music for mechanical organs was stored by pins on a large barrel. Such instruments were called barrel organs. Such organs only have a very limited repertoire, both in the number of musical selections that could be stored, and the length of tune that could be accommodated. In the 1890s, book music was invented. This meant that the length of music was no longer constrained. ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Musician
A musician is a person who composes, conducts, or performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general term used to designate one who follows music as a profession. Musicians include songwriters who write both music and lyrics for songs, conductors who direct a musical performance, or performers who perform for an audience. A music performer is generally either a singer who provides vocals or an instrumentalist who plays a musical instrument. Musicians may perform on their own or as part of a group, band or orchestra. Musicians specialize in a musical style, and some musicians play in a variety of different styles depending on cultures and background. A musician who records and releases music can be known as a recording artist. Types Composer A composer is a musician who creates musical compositions. The title is principally used for those who write classical music or film music. Those who write the music for popular songs may b ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Fairground Organ
A fairground organ (french: limonaire) is a French pneumatic musical organ covering the wind and percussive sections of an orchestra. Originated in Paris, France, it was designed for use in commercial fairground settings to provide loud music to accompany rides and attractions, mostly merry-go-rounds. Unlike organs for indoor use, they are designed to produce a large volume of sound to be heard above the noises of crowds and fairground machinery. History As fairgrounds became more mechanised at the end of the nineteenth century, their musical needs grew. The period of greatest activity of fairground organ manufacture and development was the late 1830s, particularly with the opening of the Limonaire Frères company of Avenue Daumesnil, Paris in 1839. Virtually all ambient fairground music continued to be produced by fairground organs and similar pneumatically operated instruments until the advent of effective electrical sound amplification in the mid-1920s. The organ chassis ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Mechanical Musical Instruments
Mechanical may refer to: Machine * Machine (mechanical), a system of mechanisms that shape the actuator input to achieve a specific application of output forces and movement * Mechanical calculator, a device used to perform the basic operations of arithmetic * Mechanical energy, the sum of potential energy and kinetic energy * Mechanical system, a system that manages the power of forces and movements to accomplish a task * Mechanism (engineering), a portion of a mechanical device Other * Mechanical (character), one of several characters in Shakespeare's ''A Midsummer Night's Dream'' * A kind of typeface in the VOX-ATypI classification See also * Machine, especially in opposition to an electronic item * ''Mechanical Animals'', the third full-length studio release by Marilyn Manson * Manufactured or artificial, especially in opposition to a biological or natural component * Automation, using machine decisions and processing instead of human * Mechanization, using machine labor inste ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Pipe Organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks'', each of which has a common timbre and volume throughout the keyboard compass. Most organs have many ranks of pipes of differing timbre, pitch, and volume that the player can employ singly or in combination through the use of controls called stops. A pipe organ has one or more keyboards (called '' manuals'') played by the hands, and a pedal clavier played by the feet; each keyboard controls its own division, or group of stops. The keyboard(s), pedalboard, and stops are housed in the organ's ''console''. The organ's continuous supply of wind allows it to sustain notes for as long as the corresponding keys are pressed, unlike the piano and harpsichord whose sound begins to dissipate immediately after a key is depressed. The smallest po ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Street Organ
A street organ (french: orgue de rue or ''orgue de barbarie''; german: Straßenorgel) played by an organ grinder is a French-German automatic mechanical pneumatic organ designed to be mobile enough to play its music in the street. The two most commonly seen types are the smaller German and the larger Dutch street organ. History The first descriptions of the street organ, at that time always a barrel organ owing to its use of a pinned cylinder (barrel) to operate levers and play notes, can be found in literature as early as the late 18th century. Many were built by Italian organ builders who had settled in France and Germany, creating companies such as Frati, Gavioli, Gasparini and Fassano. These early organs had more pipes than the serinette, could play more than one tune, and were considerably larger, in sizes up to 75 cm (29 in) long and 40 cm (16 in) deep. Wooden bass pipes were placed underneath the organ and on the front were often mounted a set of pa ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Serinette
A serinette is a type of mechanical musical instrument consisting of a small barrel organ. It appeared in the first half of the 18th century in eastern France, and was used to teach tunes to canaries. Its name is derived from the French ''serin'', meaning “canary.” Serinettes are housed in a wooden case, normally of walnut, and typically measuring 265 × 200 × 150 mm. The instrument is played by turning a crank mounted on the front. The crank pumps a bellows to supply air to the pipes, and also turns a wooden barrel by means of gears. Driven into the barrel are brass pins and staples with which the pieces of music are encoded. Mounted over the barrel is a bar carrying wooden keys connected to valves by vertical wooden rods. As the barrel turns, the pins and staples lift the keys, in turn opening the valves to let air into the pipes, which are located at the rear of the instrument. Tunes are selected by first lifting the bar carrying the keys, then shifting the barrel along i ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Reproducing Piano
A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern implementations using MIDI. The rise of the player piano grew with the rise of the mass-produced piano for the home, in the late 19th and early 20th century. Sales peaked in 1924, then declined, as the improvement in phonograph recordings due to electrical recording methods developed in the mid-1920s. The advent of electrical amplification in home music reproduction via radio in the same period helped cause their eventual decline in popularity, and the stock market crash of 1929 virtually wiped out production. History In 1896, Edwin S. Votey invented the first practical pneumatic piano player, called the Pianola. This mechanism came into widespread use in the 20th century, and was all-pneumatic, with foot-operated bellows providing a sourc ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Player Piano
A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern implementations using MIDI. The rise of the player piano grew with the rise of the mass-produced piano for the home, in the late 19th and early 20th century. Sales peaked in 1924, then declined, as the improvement in phonograph recordings due to electrical recording methods developed in the mid-1920s. The advent of electrical amplification in home music reproduction via radio in the same period helped cause their eventual decline in popularity, and the stock market crash of 1929 virtually wiped out production. History In 1896, Edwin S. Votey invented the first practical pneumatic piano player, called the Pianola. This mechanism came into widespread use in the 20th century, and was all-pneumatic, with foot-operated bellows providing a sour ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Organ Grinder
A street organ (french: orgue de rue or ''orgue de barbarie''; german: Straßenorgel) played by an organ grinder is a French-German automatic mechanical pneumatic organ designed to be mobile enough to play its music in the street. The two most commonly seen types are the smaller German and the larger Dutch street organ. History The first descriptions of the street organ, at that time always a barrel organ owing to its use of a pinned cylinder (barrel) to operate levers and play notes, can be found in literature as early as the late 18th century. Many were built by Italian organ builders who had settled in France and Germany, creating companies such as Frati, Gavioli, Gasparini and Fassano. These early organs had more pipes than the serinette, could play more than one tune, and were considerably larger, in sizes up to 75 cm (29 in) long and 40 cm (16 in) deep. Wooden bass pipes were placed underneath the organ and on the front were often mounted a set of pa ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Orchestrion
Orchestrion is a generic name for a machine that plays music and is designed to sound like an orchestra or band. Orchestrions may be operated by means of a large pinned cylinder or by a music roll and less commonly book music. The sound is usually produced by pipes, though they will be voiced differently from those found in a pipe organ, as well as percussion instruments. Many orchestrions contain a piano as well. At the Musical Museum in Brentford, London England, examples may be seen and heard of several of the instrument types described below. It is confused by some with the steam-powered calliope, which was also used to produce music on period carousels. It used steam whistles rather than organ pipes to produce its principal sounds. See also the similar fairground organ. Types of orchestrion The name "orchestrion" has also been applied to several musical instruments: Chamber organ A chamber organ, designed by Georg Joseph Vogler (''Abbé Vogler'') in 1790, incorpora ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Musical Box
A music box (American English) or musical box (British English) is an automatic musical instrument in a box that produces musical notes by using a set of pins placed on a revolving cylinder or disc to pluck the tuned teeth (or ''lamellae'') of a steel comb. The popular device best known today as a "music box" developed from musical snuff boxes of the 18th century and were originally called ''carillons à musique'' (French for "chimes of music"). Some of the more complex boxes also contain a tiny drum and/or bells in addition to the metal comb. History The Symphonium company started business in 1885 as the first manufacturers of disc-playing music boxes. Two of the founders of the company, Gustave Brachhausen and Paul Riessner, left to set up a new firm, Polyphon, in direct competition with their original business and their third partner, Oscar Paul Lochmann. Following the establishment of the Original Musikwerke Paul Lochmann in 1900, the founding Symphonion business contin ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]