I’ve been genuinely surprised by how many people are still using paper rolls to control their organs, and how many organs are still being produced for this technology. The means used to bridge the gap between electronic composition and paper device control are interesting–they remind me of what I think happened in (Italian?) textiles in the transition to full mechanisation. Midiboek “converts standard Midi files to templates for street organs, pianola’s, music boxes and so on” and MIDster PUNCH is “way to punch your own music rolls in any format directly from MIDI files.” I want direct MIDI control from hard disk, so I can’t say that I’d use any of them. But it’s all interesting stuff.

Rather taken with Castlewood = 20 note (which notes?) (MIDI file on site). 375mm (15″) wide x 300mm (12″) high x 290mm (11.5″) deep - ie wee bit bigger than my Dell opened up. Photos of kit & construction. 2008/6/16 complete kit price 1420AUS = 860EUR, possibly plus 3.2% European tariff. US 810€inc PP Profile of the maker. Re friend: “Eventually he built the world’s first computer controlled punch for making organ roll music.” Can I MIDIfy it? Could I stack a laptop under it?

The redundant (heavy-metal) umlaut and the missing t in Kränkenkabinet seem like reasonable grounds for wondering whether “Hansel Urnst Grüsel” has ever been further east than New Jersey, never mind Neubrandenburg, and the stage show is similarly fantastic. Check out the video of Tea for two at the end of this post (the MP3 audio file is missing). Are all those wires and boxes functional or simply part of that mad professor thing? (Via Baggage Reclaim)

La Java Viennoise played at Les Primitifs du Futur:

That looks like Fay Lovsky on musical saw, and yes, that is Robert Crumb in the background. You are going to do something by Ms Lovsky, asks S. Well, of course. I tend to prefer what I imagine are her B-sides, and unfortunately they don’t seem to turn up on YT. So here she is with the Ukelele Club of Paris:

We do not aim to follow in the tangled path of “the Evangelical-Lutheran town church pc. Jakob in Rothenburg whether that deaf ones” (via Transblawg)

Further news: an advisory panel is being formed. Apparently the next Archbishop of Canterbury is too busy, but there will be big names in there. And we are getting closer to determining budget and sources thereof.

Nice little video here from this sparsely documented international artist:

I don’t know what its specification is, and I don’t know the Kassel maker, but this is probably the kind of thing I’m interested in. The mini-pram-type carriage is interesting, but a trike will give me speed and flexibility.

No way José.

He’s got a false arm, he’s a spoons virtuoso, he’s got a good hat, his monkey plays the violin. In short, a genius:

Comments:

1. He’s got a pole support and the organ strapped round his neck, like all the guys in Mexico DF. That’s fine, although I imagine it must cause back trouble, but I like to be able to jump and run about in order to inspire a slightly higher degree of fear in the public.
2. I’m slightly puzzled by the machinery. If he’s got his books spilling all over the place his replacement bill must be rather high. And I can’t figure out what’s going on inside when the front case opens. Are those more puppets inside? The monkey-violin effect must be digital, so is there actually any conventional machinery at all? Whatever, I need to look at more organ innards.
3. We tend to associate the French with accordeons, but in fact their (related) barrel organ tradition (ah! French engineering!) is far more glorious, and to my mind superior to what those cunning Dutch and Germans get up to.
4. Who is this man? What’s the rest of his show like?

“Orgue de Barbarie”

What with QEI having sent an organ to the Turk, it’s only right that the French have their organs come from Barbary. Wikipédia says:

L’explication la plus répandue de son nom viendrait d’une déformation d’« orgue de Barberi », d’après le fabricant italien de Modène, Giovanni Barbieri (début du XVIIIe siècle), mais selon d’autres opinions il vient plutôt du fait que les joueurs du XVII^e siècle et XVIII^e siècle « baragouinaient un français approximatif et qu’ils venaient “d’ailleurs” ».

Une autre hypothèse est une provenance du Maghreb. En effet à cet époque-là, le Maghreb était appelé la « Barbarie » par les Européens. Pour les « vrais » musiciens, les « amateurs » qui se contentaient de tourner une manivelle venaient voler comme des barbares leur musique et leur gagne-pain. Toutefois, l’usage veut que l’on écrive Barbarie avec une majuscule.

Le nom orgue est masculin au singulier, et au pluriel, lorsqu’il désigne plusieurs instruments distincts. Il peut être utilisé au féminin pluriel lorsqu’il s’agit d’un seul instrument. Exemple : les grands orgues de France (plusieurs instruments), le grand orgue de Notre-Dame, ou les grandes orgues de Notre-Dame (un seul instrument). Cette particularité ne s’applique pas aux orgues de Barbarie, pour lesquels on conserve le masculin.

To close the circle, here’s Mozart’s Turkish March (slightly tweaked) played on a Odin Barbary organ:

From The Parish Clerk (1907) by Peter Hampson Ditchfield:

Robert Dicker, quondam cabinet-maker in the town of Crediton, Devon, reigned for many years as parish clerk to the, at one time, collegiate church of the same town. He appears to have fulfilled his office satisfactorily up to about 1870, when his mind became somewhat feeble. Nevertheless, no desire was apparent to shorten the days of his office, as he was regular in his attendance and musically inclined; but when he began to play pranks upon the vicar it became necessary to consider the advisability of finding a substitute who should do the work and receive half the pay. One of his escapades was to stand up in the middle of service and call the vicar a liar; at another time he announced that a wedding was to take place on a certain day. The vicar, therefore, attended and waited for an hour, when the clerk affirmed that he must have dreamed it! Dicker was given to the study of astronomy, and it is related that he once gave a lecture on this subject in the Public Rooms. There is close to the town a small park in memory of one of the Duller family. A man one night was much alarmed when walking therein to discover a bright light in one of the trees, and, later, to hear the voice of the worthy clerk, who addressed him in these words: “Fear not, my friend, and do not be affrighted. I am Robert Dicker, clerk of the parish. I am examining the stars.” Another account alleges that he affirmed himself to be “counting the stars.” Whichever account is the true one, it will be gathered that he was already “far gone.”

Another of his achievements was the conversion of a barrel organ,purchased from a neighbouring church, into a manual, obtaining the wind therefor by a pedal arrangement which worked a large wheel attached to a crank working the bellows. On all great festivals and especially on Christmas Day he was wont to rouse the neighbourhood as early as three and four o’clock, remarking of the ungrateful, complaining neighbours that they had no heart for music or religion.

The wheel mentioned above was part of one of his tricycle schemes. His first attempt in cycle-making resulted in the construction of a bicycle the wheels of which resembled the top of a round deal table; this soon came to grief. His second endeavour was more successful and became a tricycle, the wheels of which were made of wrought iron and the base of a triangular shape. Upon the large end he placed an arm-chair, averring that it would be useful to rest in whenever he should grow weary! Then, making another attempt, he succeeded in turning out (being aided by another person) a very respectable and useful tricycle upon which he made many journeys to Barnstaple and elsewhere.

However, just as an end comes to everything that is mortal, so did an end come to our friend the clerk; for, as so many stories finish, he died in a good old age, and his substitute reigned in his stead.

I’ve never seriously ridden a tricycle, but it’s the logical solution.

This is not Bert Gilbert, the actor, wife-beater and adulterer (although possibly solely for the purposes of the decree nisi) who starred as ‘Arry Wilkins in the 1906 demonstration at the Hippodrome of the effects of The flood on London, of which was wrote:

Three hundred thousand gallons of water sweep away the bridges, pull down the houses, and float away everything that will float; while terrified horses and oxen dash down the hillside and plunge into the lake; and men and women are swimming for their lives. A very exciting five minutes, and a very clever piece of invention.

I wonder what scene ii was like.

No, indeed, this is Bert Gilbert, teacher, barrel organ man, drummer and singer, and an altogether more peaceful soul:

Points of interest:

• Bert’s haircut.
  I’m going to invest in a few more wigs, but skinheads are natural organgrinders, politico-culturally speaking.
• The paintwork, details here. Bert writes that “these organs are normally painted in a fairly classical fashion. Sometimes they get a one-colour paint job, and the typical German organs often have flower motifs. I ordered my organ unpainted and in collaboration with [Bas van Duyvenbode at] Airbrush Workshop The Dovecot it has acquired its own identity. The organ is called ‘The Eagle’ so that it is only normal that the bird can be found on it.”
  A popular old organ tune is the Austro-Hungarian military march Unter dem Doppeladler, Under the double eagle, which will no doubt go down well in those parts of Catalonia where people still long for a Hapsburg dynasty. I know a few scenery painters here who might do this sort of job. The cabinetmaker is likely to be more of a problem, but I’m not yet sure what kind of cabinet I want anyway, as Mariano Rajoy said to the undertaker.
• The innards, by Deleika.
  They look shipshape, but I want control from a generic chopped up laptop instead of Deleika’s no doubt excellent proprietary memory storage device. This is to give myself more musical flexibility (I’m writing the arrangements and want to be able to fool around as I proceed) and more (non-musical) input and output options, including stuff like infra-red movement inputs and the mechanical puppets output control I keep going on about. I respect Bert’s faith in cardboard books, but I need to keep weight down if I’m going to ride around with everything on a bicycle.
• 20 notes. On the one hand that’s clearly not enough. On the other, part of the charm of writing for barrel organ is coping with the limitations of the medium. (When everyone still used cardboard books and music was sold by the metre, you had to be careful with arrangements to avoid stuff like diagonal lines of holes that could cause book tears.) Hmm.