Marguerite Volavy | |
---|---|
Died | July 30, 1951 64) [1] | (aged
Other names | Felix Gerdts George Kerr |
Marguerite Volavy, also known as MadameVolavy (1886 - 1951), was a pianist known for her recordings of Czech music and composers.
Volavy was born in Brno, Moravia, and studied at the Vienna Conservatory under Anton Door. [2] [3] She graduated first in her class in piano at the age of 15. [4] In 1902 she began playing with the Prague Orchestra, and then in 1912 she moved to the United States where she played her first concert at Carnegie Hall in 1915. [4] She performed in New York City, multiple times. [5] [6] [7]
In addition to her live performances, Volavy recorded piano rolls and talked with newspaper reporters about how the piano rolls were made and edited. [3] She recorded piano songs under the name Volavy and two pseudonyms (Felix Gerdts and George Kerr). [1] Her piano rolls were recorded by the American Piano Company also known as Ampico. [8] On the piano rolls, the pieces she recorded included works by Robert Schumann [9] [10] and Ludwig van Beethoven. [11]
Volavy's hand was damaged in an accident on the subway in New York City. [1] She received financial compensation for the injury [12] and she was unable to continue playing the piano. In 1926 she began working as a music editor with the American Piano Company, [1] where she was responsible for making sure recordings produced the musician's music correctly. [13] She also lectured about music, [14] and started teaching in 1932, [4] Some said she was known as Madame Volavy because she resembled a madam as might be found in a brothel, [15] while other publications noted "her proportions" were such that the name seemed appropriate. [16]
Volavy died in Valhalla, New York in 1951. [1]
A player piano 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.
A piano roll is a music storage medium used to operate a player piano, piano player or reproducing piano. Piano rolls, like other music rolls, are continuous rolls of paper with holes punched into them. These perforations represent note control data. The roll moves over a reading system known as a tracker bar; the playing cycle for each musical note is triggered when a perforation crosses the bar.
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