I finished construction of my John Smith
design
"Senior 20" hand cranked organ in March 2006.
Some of my
personal modifications to the Smith design
can be seen on Melvyn Wright's web pages at www.buskerorgan.com
Mel has recently released a book on constructing simple John Smith type
organs.In my opinion, Mell sells the best 20er rolls in thew world,
wghether you want them in Smith format or the Carl Frei format aka the
Raffin 20 format.
Plans for the John Smith organs available
from a new
John Smith website, http://www.johnsmithbusker.co.uk/index.shtml
I began punching my own 20 note paper
rolls for my organ a couple of years ago. I am using a home-built
traditionally styled
one-hole foot operated punch, and guiding the paper by hand.
I wrote an article "Hand Punching My Own Rolls from Midiboek Templates" for the COAA magazine The Carousel Organ. which describes the punch and my use of it in some detail. The article, as it appeared in the magazine, is posted on this site as a .PDF file.
I'm happy with many (but not all) of the
results of
my work. I now have so many rolls I have to decide which to leave at
home when I head out to a rally.
I punch from computer print-outs generated
using the MIDIBoek program, and I have created a number of "Gamma
files" in MIDIBoek format for use in my work.
I will be happy to exchange information,
and
possibly MIDI files, with other 20er organ owners. I am not
personally punching rolls for sale, but I can arrange for Mel Wright to
punch high quality rolls from my files.
Click here
for a link to my downloadable MIDI files and information on custom
punched rolls.
Bob R... in Olcott, NY asked for some help in getting started in producing some rolls for his Clariona Organette. Later Edwin M. read the page and asked about rolls in the 14-Note Common format. I have placed a number of useful files and some explanation here.
I wrote an article on an the 2005 Organ Rally at Widnes, England which appeared in the January 2006 issue of The Carousel Organ.
I also wrote a article on adding a foot switch and tin cup to a cymbal playing monkey for The Carousel Organ.
The Carousel Organ, is The Journal
of the Carousel Organ Association of America (COAA). You can get a
collection of all the back issues of the magazine on CD for under $30.
The CD has color pictures, and you can enlarge most of them, so in some
ways it's better than the magazines themselves. Order detatils are on
the COAA web
site at www.COAA.us
COAA rallies are good fun, a a great way to learn about outdoor mechanical music in all its aspects..
My wife has an OSI Strasse Orgel. I'm her technician, so I have started web pages for a users group here. OSI Strasse Orgel Users' Group