你好The player piano was a pretty amazing invention for the late 1890’s. Edwin S. Vosey, an American invented a pump in a box operated by foot pedals that sucked air through perforations in a roll of paper as it ran over a tracker bar with holes. The holes represented notes and the notes created by the perforated holes activated a row of felt-covered fingers. When pushed up to the keyboard of any piano these fingers could play the instrument. The pedals controlled the dynamics and levers controlled the speed. It was an accomplishment even a Steve Jobs could be proud of.

In 1904 Edwin Welte and Karl Bockisch of Germany produced an electrically driven pneumatic version that automated the entire performance. It was called the Welte-Mignon and piano manufacturers like Steinway incorporated the device into their pianos. Of all the knock-offs that appeared soon afterwards, Duo-Art was one that survived.

Were the piano rolls better than the 78 rpm discs of the time? A difficult question, but what they could do was paint a perfectly vivid portrait of a performance. And lots of performers wanted their portraits painted.

In 1925 George Gershwin produced two Duo-Art piano rolls of his performance of the Rhapsody in Blue. In addition to the solo performance, Gershwin added a piano reduction of the passages normally played by the orchestra. Evidence suggests that when the notes exceeded what two hands could play, a second “pass” was made add more to give the piano performance added pizzazz. Although in the case of Gershwin, well-known to be a dazzling master of the piano, experts can’t be completely sure about what was actually played and what was added after the fact.

What’s in our player now: Gershwin: Rhapsody In Blue – George Gershwin, piano* (1925 Duo-Art piano roll), Columbia Jazz Band, Michael Tilson Thomas, Cond. Sony –SMK42240

Gershwin’s showpiece combines the verve of early jazz with virtuoso piano writing worthy of Rachmaninoff or Liszt. This recording has Gershwin’s famous 1925 piano roll backed with the original jazz orchestration that was done for Paul Whiteman’s jazz band. You can almost hear that it was composed on a railroad trip from New York to Boston. As Gershwin claimed at the time, “…it was on the train with its steely rhythms, it’s clickety-clack that is so stimulating to a composer. I frequently hear music in the very heart of noise. And then suddenly I heard –even saw on paper – the complete construction of the Rhapsody from beginning to end…as a sort of music kaleidoscope of America.”

Terrific sound and need we say that the piano playing is like nothing you've ever heard before. Gershwin could make Liszt or Paderewski pale in comparison.