NEW PIANO ROLLS from JULIAN DYER

For Duo-Art and 88-note player pianos

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New rolls let you choose the music for your player piano and buy it when you want it, not just make do with what turns up. New rolls don't have the damage and decay that old rolls suffer from. Buy your new rolls here!

Below are the catalogues of rolls for  standard 88-note player pianos and automatic Duo-Art instruments. Not sure what rolls your player piano can use? Have a look at the page on compatibility. If you know what you want, you can order directly.

Duo-Art rolls

These are special rolls needed to operate Duo-Art pianos that automatically reproduce the performance of the pianist. The copies here are exact replicas of original rolls, containing each and every punch in the original roll, all in the right place and of the right size, so the new rolls perform exactly the same as the original rolls. This is quite unlike the majority of roll copies, where the new perforations only approximate the originals, to the detriment of the music. For the specification of these new rolls, see The Anatomy of a Piano Roll.

A brief description about how the Aeolian Company made the original Duo-Art rolls can be found in the page about the Duo-Art recording process. If you want to know more about how Duo-Art pianos work, have a look at Understanding and Regulating the Pedal-Electric Duo-Art.

Standard 88-note rolls

Most player pianos use 88-note rolls, with the operator (or 'Pianolist') adding all timing and expression. Some instruments have an extra accenting mechanism to highlight certain notes, and the rolls here have accenting when this is appropriate. They will play perfectly on any standard 88-note player piano. The catalogue has a mixture of replica and new rolls, including titles newly arranged by Adam Ramet to play in a way that only the player piano can!

Special recut orders

I can only offer a fairly limited list of rolls off-the-shelf, but there are huge numbers of other rolls that could be recut. Ask for the titles you want: you may well not have to find an original because there are libraries of electronic scans that can be perforated to order! Anything obtainable can be cut for bulk purchase, where the buyer takes the entire perforator run of four copies. I don't copy rolls less than 50 years old, or older recuts.

Custom-cut new rolls

I can cut new rolls from MIDI files, as long as the MIDI file is provided in a form ready for cutting - I can check a file to assess how suitable it is for making into a roll. New rolls are supplied only in batches of four copies; it's not practical to supply single rolls or proof rolls, although I can provide examples of how the MIDI will sound once it's been cut into a roll. I cannot create MIDI files for you, so if there is something you want you'll have to find somebody to create it for you, and I'll then happily cut it for you.

What's new?

September 2019 - A large and wide-ranging release of new Duo-Art and 88-note titles. From old to new (for Duo-Art) classics and much in between, and a good selection of popular rolls.

• Bach's Toccata in G major, from the renowned specialist Myra Hess.
• Plenty of Chopin - a Waltz, Nocturnes, Etudes and an Impromptu, from Cortot, Horowitz, Hofmann and Leginska.
• Alfred Cortot's fantastic roll of Schubert's Rosamunde Impromptu, for many years one of my favourites 
• A couple of Liszt transcriptions: Schumann's Widmung played by Wilhelm Bachaus and Alabieff's Nightingale played by Ignaz Friedman
• Two Percy Grainger's performances of Grieg. Following much time spent with the composer these are  valuable insights into this very personal music: Wedding day at Troldhaugen and Norwegian folks songs.
• Debussy's L'isle joyeuse played by Arthur Rubinstein and Reflets dans l'eau by George Copeland. 
• Two rolls that it's taken well over 10 years to find originals to scan. Nicolai Medtner playing his own Danza Jubilosa. Claudio Arrau playing the Waltz for Claudio Arrau written specially for him by Sophie Menter.
• Some early 20th century British music played by Percy Grainger: Balfour-Gardner's Humoresque and Cyril Scott's lovely Lento. 
• A bit of Americana from Powell: his Hoochee-Coochee Dance from 'At the fair', and Frank Milne's pairing of Holzmann's marches Blaze away and Spirit of independence.
• Spanish music in the form of Cubana from DeFalla's Piezas Españolas and French in the form of Jacques Ibert's Little White Donkey played by Guiomar Novaes
• Three out-of-tempo popular or light music: Rag Doll and Confetti 'danse chic' in Robert Armbruster's laid-back style, and Khariton's Martha tango played by the composer.
• Two show medleys played by Phil Ohman, famous Broadway pianist: Show Boat  and Hits from the Musical Comedy stage.
• Four lively dance rolls played by Pauline Alpert: Blue Grass, Me and my Shadow, Bye-bye Pretty Baby and My Blue Heaven.
• An original pairing of The way you look tonight and A fine romance from 'Swing Time' played by Adam Carroll. 
• Two other great dance rolls: Hallelujah played by Freddie Rich and So Blue played by Muriel Pollock.
• And some unusual 88-note rolls. Get  Away Big, co-composed by the great arrager for QRS, J Lawrence Cook and Joe Hilliard: Cook made a performance from ideas sketched by Hilliard. And two great original Argentinian tango rolls from the PAMPA firm in Buenos Aires, Caminino and Cascabelito.

August 2019 - new titles from Adam Ramet 

• A major new creation, Adam's Pianola version of Scott Joplin's overture to his opera, Treemonisha. The music for Treemonisha survives only as a piano-vocal score, and the overture as printed seems to omit some of the melody. For this reconstruction, the melodic lines from elsewhere in the opera have been re-introduced to the overture where their accompaniment lines appear. Treemonisha is Joplin's take on European operetta, with touches of his ragtime rhythms and melodic aproach, but this is not a ragtime roll. 
• Sydney Smith's Fairy Queen Galop, the original published 4-hand arrangement.

June 2019 - preparing a major catalogue upate 

• I have a pretty well entirely new catalogue ready to publish, and the majority of titles will be replaced so now is the time to order anything you've been keeping an eye on. Anything marked 'LAST ORDERS' will not have any further copies cut when they run out!
• New title: The Carioca, played by Victor Arden and Phil Ohman, a superb dance roll from duet-piano masters.

Replica Duo-Art rolls - list updated 14 Oct 2019

Bulk orders: take 20% off the listed prices if you order 10 or more rolls, or 10% off for more than 5 rolls.

Replica 88-note rolls

New 88-note rolls

Ordering information

Ordering is simple: just email the list of the rolls you want, your details including delivery addess, whether you want fast (expensive) or economical (slower) delivery, and if you want additional postal insurance. You will be sent a payment request for the total, no payment is needed with the order.

All prices are in UK pounds sterling. There are discounts for larger orders: 10% for 5 to 9 rolls, 20% for 10 or more rolls. Alternatively, order a bespoke perforator batch of any title (4 rolls) and deduct 20% for that particular title.

All orders are posted from the UK, or may be picked up from Wokingham. Postage is charged at cost, packing is free. Exact postage costs will be confirmed when the packed weight of your order is known and a postal service chosen – I use Royal Mail or courier services whichever is more economic, on a case-by-case basis. Payment only by cash on collection, bank transfer, cheque (Pounds Sterling, drawn on a UK bank), or PayPal for non-UK buyers only.  

Julian Dyer, 5 Richmond Rise, Wokingham RG41 3XH, United Kingdom

email: enquiries <at> pianorolls.co.uk (using @ instead of <at>)