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Outline

Saving Our Musical Heritage: The Violano Rollscanning & Rollography Projects Jack Breen AMICA Workshop July 28, 2006

AMICA Bi-Laws ARTICLE II – OBJECTIVES Section 1.  The purposes and objectives of the Association shall include: (b) To promote the acquisition and distribution of instruments, recordings & technical & historical information concerning these instruments. (f) To encourage and assist in the production, distribution, and preservation of recordings, both reissues and new performances.

Rollscanning and Rollography Goals Collect complete information about all rolls made for the Violano Rollography: roll label and catalog information Rollscanning: archival scan of all rolls

Rollscanning Output Optical silhouette image of the original roll MIDI file that can be used for: Creating a new roll recut Controlling MIDI equipped mechanical music machines Listening to simulations on a computer Editing and conversion to other machines

What is MIDI? Musical Instrument Digital Interface Electronic equivalent of a roll Tracks: Roll Channels: Instruments Events: Notes or Control Commands Event On: Lock or Note Start Event Off: Cancel or Note End It is NOT an audio recording

Why Scan Rolls? Degradation of paper rolls with time & use Archive of rolls, especially those not considered “re-cut worthy” Inability of recut projects to capture all rolls Reconstruction of original punch matrix Combination of partial rolls to produce a complete master

Heartbreaks of Rolls

Rollscan Process Physical repair of any major damage Scan image into computer – raw .pxl file Convert image to .cis file Size reduction Compatibility with next steps View & edit with CISViewer program Convert .cis file to MIDI and punch files with CISConverter program

Elements of a Rollscanner

Close-up view

Chucks for various roll types

Scan in progress

Demonstration of the Rollscanning and File Manipulation Process

Supporting Software Rollscan Gene Gerety CIS Roll Scan Viewer Anthony Robinson RollScanConverter_XML Warren Trachtman

Hardware development Wide format scanner used for Violano rollscanning project designed and built by Gerety Engineering Based on the work of many predecessors including: Richard Stibbons Spencer Chase Members of the Rollscanning group

Methods for Identifying Unknown Violano Rolls

Number in Pencil on Leader (Late rolls only)

Number in Pencil on Trailer (late rolls only)

Song Length (if in archive of previous scans)

Spooltype

Violano Rollography