MARK TWAIN PLAYS BEETHOVEN'S FIFTH SYMPHONY

Mark Twain once said that Wagner's music was not as bad as it sounds.   Still, he liked Music enough to buy this instrument, which cost as much as a house.      Another quote is: "All of us contain Music & Truth, but most of us can't get it out."

   Mark Twain was not a musician, but when he was performing at his 8 foot-tall player-organ, called an Orchestrelle, he was the Conductor of an Orchestra. It's a way to "get out" the Music inside him, and this method which he used is totally foreign to most of us. It's different from any other musical instrument ever invented. That is why I am selling photos of these remarkable machines for $0.99 each. Actually, you can copy any of my photos for free, as I am not really trying to sell photos; Ebay's new fee policy makes it impossible for me to sustain an ad every week for these valuable instruments.  I am a collector and restorer of  Pianolas and Orchestrelles, and have several for sale. They are genuine musical instruments and not buzzing gizmos.

   Today, all of us, me included, are willing slaves to countless buzzing gizmos.  Any loudspeaker (love that term), earpiece, telephone, etc. has got some sort of buzzing gizmo that generates the sound waves that are analagous to the real sound waves created by a real human with a real instrument. It can be digitally-this and digitally-that, but by definition the final step is to generate sound waves that are ANALOGous to the Real waves made by a Real person, etc.

  You instinctively know the difference between what is live music, and what I call recordead sound.

  On the other hand, trying to lug around thousands of pounds of music machinery has been fortunately replaced by the buzzing gizmos.  Even I love my iPod.

 One Art form that has virtually vanished is that of the air-powered  Player Piano or Player Organ, giving (hopefully) artistic performances. In order to create these performances,  the performers have to pump bellows pedals with their feet to power the pneumatic machinery.

  Contrary to popular belief, you do not have to be an athlete to generate enough energy to play the music automatically. It required no more effort to pump the Orchestrelle's pedals than to walk down the street, and if you can't do that easily, you're not in good shape. Mark Twain was playing it at age 68.

  When these instruments are unrestored or restored poorly, as they usually are nowadays, an athlete could barely keep up with the job of pumping enough pressure, and electric motors are often installed to pump the air, instead of fixing the air leaks which would be the right thing to do.

 Back around 100 years ago, you  basically either played an instrument or were played to, or there was no music at all.  Recordead  music was still in a primitive state, and it is a well known statistic that there were more pianos than bathtubs.

http://books.google.com/books?id=7qWxm0nzMxcC&pg=PA6&lpg=PA6&dq=more++pianos+than+bathtubs&source=bl&ots=lcOvg5I9hY&sig=IrAEStMsUE9CfbzgHRYXGa-b6A4&hl=en&ei=XGJKSqu7L5PoMf-l_bMC&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1

 The introduction of The Pianola and Orchestrelles in the late 1890's made Music automatic, and revolutionized the Music world. By making the greatest Music ever written into easily accessible and hypnotically interesting piano rolls, (the visuals are not unlike video games)-- Aeolian brought digital technology to Music.

  For  many years, The Aeolian Company was the world's largest manufacturer of Musical Instruments. Their headquarters is a building that still exists:  right across 42nd St. from the north wall of the great Central Library  (the one with the lions) at 5th Ave. In that building was an auditorium called Aeolian  Hall, and in 1924, one of the employees of Aeolian ( he was paid to play piano rolls, and thus arrange the music) wrote a composition for two pianos and it was then orchestrated and given its world premiere at Aeolian Hall: Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin.

 Anybody who wants to, can play these machines. I am not doing anything that you can't do-----and better.  You were supposed to do it yourself !  Can I brag by saying "I can do a better job on 'paint-by-numbers paintings' than you can."?  My attitude is "If you think you can do a better job, you're right!"   Pianolas are very democratic; everyone has unlimited talent. Well, sorta. You have to want to play the  piece.

 My name is Randolph Herr, and I would like to show you something you probably may be interested in assuming you've read this far:

 Antique Air-Powered Computers that allow anyone to be a musical performer.

 Mark Twain himself used to play this  Player Organ--for the entertainment of himself and his guests.  Buying it at age 68, in 1904, sometimes he would be at the controls, pumping the foot pedals to generate the air pressure, and controlling the speed and volume of the Music, which came wound up on a paper roll.  Frequently, it would be 4-hand  arrangements of great classics such as Beethoven's Fifth Symphony.

 Other times, members of his family or the servants would pump (and thereby control) the Orchestrelle, and Twain was then just a spectator to a live performance, and no longer the performer.

  That's one of the great things about these instruments--its as easy to be the performer as it is to be a member of the audience.

  The Aeolian Company made Orchestrelles and also Pianolas, machines that allow anyone to do with a Piano exactly what the Conductor of an Orchestra does:

  The Conductor does not play any notes but continuously controls the tempo and loudness of the performance, so to bring the piece to life.

  Just as no two humans can play the piano exactly the same way, no two operators of these machines can play it exactly the same. The way I see it, if it's a live performance, it can never be duplicated, and if it's recordead sound, then let's stop right there.  

    Other clients of The Aeolian Company from the 1890's to the 1920's include Theodore Roosevelt, Louis C. Tiffany, J.P. Morgan, George Bernard Shaw, Thomas Edison, The King of England, the Kaiser, the Czar and The Pope.  Well, what did they know?

 Frank Lloyd Wright had a "Pianola-type" machine he would push up to the keyboard of his grand piano and he would also play Beethoven Symphonies.

 Below are links to references to this remarkable machine's effect on the life of Samuel L. Clemens. It is unfortunate that both Player Pianos and Player Organs are almost totally forgotten as the serious musical instruments they once were (and still are and will always be.)

 If you have any questions about these remarkable machines, please email me at AeolianPiano@gmail.com .

The drawing is a sketch by Enrico Caruso who was a talented caricaturist in addition to being the world's greatest singer. It shows him seated at a machine that is pushed up to the keyboard of any piano. He might have been rehearsing for a part, but that is just speculation. (The picture will be added soon)

 Besides selling Orchestrelles, I am also selling both Pianolas and Pianola Pianos. I have several pianos available in a range of prices and conditions, and it would be best to contact me at my address (above) for the details.

 I played my Pianola to a sold-out Carnegie Hall, (although no one there came to see just me), but it was at the request of Michael Feinstein who was giving the concert, and I will be happy to provide more info if you want.

 I have a video on YouTube; it is of me playing on my 6.5' Steineway Grand Pianola a seemingly "lost" composition by Enrique Granados. Its name is "Improvisation: Theme of Valencia Jota with the influence of the Arab Music of the South".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDldUQKYetc

You can read more about me at http://www.northportarts.org/pianola.html

You can call me at 718 520-1443

The five pictures I have for sale (but you can just copy them for free) are of :

1) Mark Twain's Orchestrelle

2) Art-Nouveau ad showing a young woman playing a Pianola which has been pushed up to the keys of her Weber grand piano.

3) Ad for The Steinway Grand Pianola Piano

4) Ad for The Weber Upright Pianola Piano

5) The original Pianola, pushed up to a piano.

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He was a charming host. He looked just like the pictures and he was as gracious to us three little girls as to my mother and father. Moreover, there was a dinner to delight children, topped off with a fairy-like mousse, piled high in a crystal bowl and accompanied by a sauce of big, red strawberries. Had he remembered that, at our age, dessert was at least as impressive as fame?

After dinner, he played the orchestrelle, the first time I had ever heard the full, warm tones of an organ except for church music. Years afterward this orchestrelle was presented to us and we added a special room for it to our Redding house. I used to run it by the hour, playing over and over again the selections that Mark Twain had preferred.

The apartment in the basement is now occupied by Dr. Robert H. Kahn, who moved into the building when Mark Twain and his family left, and for many years used the entire premises. He had known the Clemens family for years. At his country home he still keeps the orchestrelle with which Twain entertained himself in the Fifth Avenue house, playing Beethoven's Fifth Symphony and other compositions of which he was fond.

Mark Twain moved in during the Fall of 1904 and remained until the Summer of 1908, when he occupied Stormfield, just built for him at Redding, Conn. There he died April 21, 1910, aged 74.

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The old author was living in a large, old red brick building on the corner of 9th Street and Fifth Avenue.

He was old; his life had been a sad one and its sadness was reflected in the humorist's manner. Occasionally his secretary sat at an automatic organ and played while I worked, but I soon saw that his interest in music was primarily a literary one, for the pieces which he asked for were sentimental ones--old tunes of his youth.

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It was finally decided that the sofa in the room between the parlor and the dining-room would be the best place for him to pose. It was there as a usual thing he would sit after lunch and smoke and dream. On one side of the room was a large organ, and often during the sittings either his daughter or secretary would play. Music seems to appeal to him, rather from the associations it recalled than on its own account; and often when some old ballad or war song was played, a peculiar look would steal across his face, and his eyes would fill with tears; then, as the melody changed and some other remembrance came to him, he would pass it off with a light remark, joking in a way at his own seriousness.

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When I brought the portrait to my studio, the uncompromising north light made me dissatisfied with it. It was a large canvas, and in the background I had introduced the organ which was behind him as he posed. But this jarred the composition. I determined to change it--a very dangerous task, for painting, after all, is a matter of relations. An object takes on a certain tone because of the surrounding tones and if one part of a picture is changed it may throw the entire canvas out of harmony.

I was young and daring. Retaining the background immediately behind the head, I substituted a flat tone for the offending colored organ pipes. This did not satisfy me either; the canvas looked empty. Accordingly, I borrowed a piece of old tapestry. I introduced that, changing its design so as to improve the entire composition and suggesting Joan of Arc as one of the figures.

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 Here are links to documents about Twain and his Orchestrelle:  

http://www.twainquotes.com/WoolfPortraits.html

http://www.twainquotes.com/Music.html

http://books.google.com/books?id=zEyTEPNlz84C&pg=RA1-PA527&lpg=RA1-PA527&dq=twain+orchestrelle&source=bl&ots=fSL5LIvgU7&sig=7U992rWjgsuMLs9Yxtz9wNds7bc&hl=en&ei=HD5ESr69FsqwmAe6ivG5Ag&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=3

http://www.thepianoworld.com/whats_new.html