A calliope is a musical instrument that produces sound by sending a gas, originally steam or, more recently, compressed air, through large whistles—originally locomotive whistles.
A drum machine is an electronic musical instrument that creates percussion sounds, drum beats, and patterns. Drum machines may imitate drum kits or other percussion instruments, or produce unique sounds, such as synthesized electronic tones. A drum machine often has pre-programmed beats and patterns for popular genres and styles, such as pop music, rock music, and dance music. Most modern drum machines made in the 2010s and 2020s also allow users to program their own rhythms and beats. Drum machines may create sounds using analog synthesis or play prerecorded samples.
In music, the organ is a keyboard instrument of one or more pipe divisions or other means for producing tones, each played with its own keyboard, played either with the hands on a keyboard or with the feet using pedals.
An automaton is a relatively self-operating machine, or control mechanism designed to automatically follow a sequence of operations, or respond to predetermined instructions. Some automata, such as bellstrikers in mechanical clocks, are designed to give the illusion to the casual observer that they are operating under their own power. Since long ago, the term is commonly associated with automated puppets that resemble moving humans or animals, built to impress and/or to entertain people.
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.
Book music is a medium for storing the music played on mechanical organs, mainly of European manufacture. Book music is made from thick cardboard, containing perforated holes specifying the musical notes to be played, with the book folded zig-zag style. Unlike the heavy pinned barrels, which could only contain a few tunes of fixed length, that had been used on earlier instruments, book music enabled large repertoires to be built up. The length of each tune was no longer determined by the physical dimensions of the instrument.
An electric organ, also known as electronic organ, is an electronic keyboard instrument which was derived from the harmonium, pipe organ and theatre organ. Originally designed to imitate their sound, or orchestral sounds, it has since developed into several types of instruments:
A barrel organ is a French mechanical musical instrument consisting of bellows and one or more ranks of pipes housed in a case, usually of wood, and often highly decorated. The basic principle is the same as a traditional pipe organ, but rather than being played by an organist, the barrel organ is activated either by a person turning a crank, or by clockwork driven by weights or springs. The pieces of music are encoded onto wooden barrels, which are analogous to the keyboard of the traditional pipe organ. A person which plays a barrel organ is known as an organ grinder.
Laurens Hammond, was an American engineer and inventor. His inventions include the Hammond organ, the Hammond clock, and the world's first polyphonic musical synthesizer, the Novachord.
Orchestrion is a generic name for a machine that plays music and is designed to sound like an orchestra or band. Orchestrions may be operated by means of a large pinned cylinder or by a music roll and less commonly book music. The sound is usually produced by pipes, though they will be voiced differently from those found in a pipe organ, as well as percussion instruments. Many orchestrions contain a piano as well. At the Musical Museum in Brentford, London England, examples may be seen and heard of several of the instrument types described below.
M. Welte & Sons, Freiburg and New York was a manufacturer of orchestrions, organs and reproducing pianos, established in Vöhrenbach by Michael Welte (1807–1880) in 1832.
A fairground organ is a pneumatic musical organ covering the wind and percussive sections of an orchestra, designed for use in commercial fairground settings to provide loud music to accompany rides and attractions, mostly merry-go-rounds. Unlike organs for indoor use, they are designed to produce a large volume of sound to be heard above the noises of crowds and fairground machinery.
Museum Speelklok is a museum in The Netherlands in the city of Utrecht specializing in self-playing musical instruments. Since 1984, it has been housed in the centre of Utrecht in a former church called Buurkerk. Among the instruments on display are music boxes, musical clocks, pianolas, barrel organs and a turret clock with a carillon, most of which are still able to play for visitors. The word speelklok means musical clock.
DeBence Antique Music World is a museum in Franklin, Pennsylvania whose collection contains more than 100 antique mechanical musical instruments, including music boxes, band organs, player pianos, a nickelodeon piano, as well as a number of other antiques. Many of the collection's mechanical instruments are rare; a number are among only a few manufactured, and a few are among the last in existence. Although the collection’s value cannot be measured, an offer for a sum of multiple millions of dollars was once rejected.
Gavioli & Cie were a Franco–Italian organ builder company that manufactured fairground organs in both Italy and later France.
The Aeolian Company was a musical-instrument making firm whose products included player organs, pianos, sheet music, records and phonographs. Founded in 1887, it was at one point the world's largest such firm. During the mid 20th century, it surpassed Kimball to become the largest supplier of pianos in the United States, having contracts with Steinway & Sons due to its Duo-Art system of player pianos. It went out of business in 1985.
Gulbransen Company was a musical instrument manufacturer of player pianos and home organs in the United States. It also made reed organs. It was originally established in 1904 by Axel Gulbransen as Gulbransen Piano Company.
John McTammany (1845–1915) was a Scottish-born American inventor who is credited with a number of patents. He immigrated to the United States as a teenager and served in the Civil War.
Edwin Scott Votey was an American businessman, inventor, industrial designer, and manufacturer of pianos and organs. He worked in the organ field all his adult life and had over twenty patents. He invented or co-invented several inventions for World War I. One was a pilotless airplane that was going to be used to drop bombs on the enemy but was never used.
Henry Bishop Horton was an American inventor, remembered chiefly for his inventions in automatic music players and clock-making.
