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August 10 Production resumes on Ampico 20 to 1 rollsFor the first time since Ampico began producing 30 to 1 piano rolls in 1923, Keystone has gained the ability to reissue Ampico piano roll titles mastered in the older 20 to 1 format which was originally implemented by Rythmodik. Few of the 20 to 1 masters were retained apparently because the popular dance music of the time tended to be replaced rather quickly by new material and would drop off the charts. A few holiday titles would remain in demand and continued to be produced in later years but for the most part, the majority of Ampico rolls produced after 1923 were done on the new stencil machine in the 30 to 1 format... until the merger with Aeolian.
With the last batch of rolls scanned and punch masters rendered, I traveled to Bethleham, PA with CD ROM in hand and spent the latter half of last week assisting Frank Thompson in the cutting of many hundreds of Ampico rolls for the upcoming catalog. Quite a few 30 to 1 titles were run, then I changed to the 20 to 1 gear set and the remaining time was spent cutting that format. The equipment ran well and the rolls look and sound flawless.
For a video of the perforator in operation, try this YouTube link:
We briefly installed the 21 to 1 gear set and punched the unissued Paderewski 'Etude' roll recovered from a surviving Aeolian cardboard stencil. Later, after playing it on the Knabe, I discovered I had made an error in translating the T0-T8 control tracks to the corresponding notes on the musical scale. In short, they were transposed down by two steps. A corrected master punch file has been sent to Keystone for recutting.
We took time out Thursday to go visit the John Zeiner piano shop in Allentown. It did not take long to decide this would be the shop where the full restoration of my 1926 5'-8" Chickering will be done. After looking at the facilities and several beautifully restored pianos, I spoke with a few of the technicians and the owner, John Zeiner. It will be 8 months to a year before the work will commence. This allows plenty of time to correctly restore the Ampico expression system, a subject which will undoubtedly occupy these blog pages in coming months.
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