My music box project

[Perry Hilbert Jr]

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[Don Orr]

Nice teaser-Let's see (and hear) it in action when done please!

[John K Jordan]

Nice teaser-Let's see (and hear) it in action when done please!

Yes, show the finished music box.

I love to make them. BTW, if you can get some, sassafras makes a great music box due it its tonal qualities, especially if you put in to feet so the sound can get out the bottom.

JKJ

[Chris A Lawrence]

Love making music boxes for gifts. I made 3 this year. I get 4 inch beveled glass discs off ebay to recess into the top under the lid and the movements without the plastic box. Everyone i gave them to last year loved being able to watch the movements as it played.

[John K Jordan]

Love making music boxes for gifts. I made 3 this year. I get 4 inch beveled glass discs off ebay to recess into the top under the lid and the movements without the plastic box. Everyone i gave them to last year loved being able to watch the movements as it played.

Chris,
Have you ever tried one of the large 72-note movements? The music on these is incredible, especially with a good sound board.

Decades ago I bought a 72-note Reuge movement (made in Switzerland) that plays Hungarian Rhapsody #2. I got it from the San Fran Music Box company and I think I paid around $250 for it. I still haven't made the box - my idea was to make a model of my Baldwin grand piano.

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Just for fun, I did an internet search to see what one was going for today. Gasp! I found out they are rare since the Reuge company apparently quit selling just the movement. Music boxes with these movements seem to be selling for $2000 to $8000 and higher. Now I'm almost afraid to put it in something I would build. I'm not worthy!

Bare 72-note movements actually available (from other manufacturers) go for $400-$800.

JKJ

[Chris A Lawrence]

Once you get past the cheap Chinese made movements they jump in price to real expensive. The boxes i make are going to children that could potentially wear them out pretty quick. The cheap ones keep them entertained for a long time and are easy enough to change out when they stop playing.

[Ernie Miller]

Chris,
Have you ever tried one of the large 72-note movements? The music on these is incredible, especially with a good sound board.

Decades ago I bought a 72-note Reuge movement (made in Switzerland) that plays Hungarian Rhapsody #2. I got it from the San Fran Music Box company and I think I paid around $250 for it. I still haven't made the box - my idea was to make a model of my Baldwin grand piano.

399769

Just for fun, I did an internet search to see what one was going for today. Gasp! I found out they are rare since the Reuge company apparently quit selling just the movement. Music boxes with these movements seem to be selling for $2000 to $8000 and higher. Now I'm almost afraid to put it in something I would build. I'm not worthy!

Bare 72-note movements actually available (from other manufacturers) go for $400-$800.

JKJ

Several years ago I made a music box model of a Steinway concert grand piano. The music plays when you press down on the keyboard. I used an inexpensive movement as I couldn't see spending hundreds of dollars for what is essentially a curiosity.

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Ernie

[John K Jordan]

Several years ago I made a music box model of a Steinway concert grand piano.
...I couldn't see spending hundreds of dollars for what is essentially a curiosity.

That's beautiful, Ernie! I like your idea for starting. I'd want the keyboard to scale, too, but making the black keys for all seven (+) octaves might be "too much" fun. :)
I can't quite tell from the visual clues - do you remember the scale you used for the overall case? (i.e., the actual width of the model at the keyboard, basically the same on all pianos regardless of the model)

Also, did you make the "cast iron" frame or find it somewhere?

Spending the $100s for the movement might make sense for someone who wants to make these to sell.

https://www.musichouseshop.com/store/musicbox72note.html
https://www.musicboxattic.com/reuge.html#pageViewAll&sortdefault0

BTW, some of the movements, such as all the 72 note I've seen, have three parts or separate songs on the same drum with the pins of each section slightly offset. The drum is shifted a tiny bit at the end of each section to move the next set of pins into place. Fun to watch.
There are lots of videos of this type of movement, for example this one. Unfortunately the audio recording is not the best.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1jZ23DAQHuE



JKJ

[Ernie Miller]

That's beautiful, Ernie! I like your idea for starting. I'd want the keyboard to scale, too, but making the black keys for all seven (+) octaves might be "too much" fun. :)
I can't quite tell from the visual clues - do you remember the scale you used for the overall case? (i.e., the actual width of the model at the keyboard, basically the same on all pianos regardless of the model)

Also, did you make the "cast iron" frame or find it somewhere?
JKJ

Thanks John. It was a fun and challenging project. I toyed with the idea of making the entire 88 note keyboard, but I knew that would be beyond my ability level - each key would be too small for me to work with. I did make the "cast iron" plate myself, out of wood and a whole lot of red auto body putty which I used to make the raised areas around the sound holes.

I have around 100mg's of CAD, photoshop, and Sketchup files for this model. If you think they might be helpful, send me a PM with your email address and I'll gladly send you a zip file containing everything I have.

Ernie

[Mel Fulks]

Am I the only who has this figured out !! The wall and bench are giant fakes and the piano is concert size.

[Ernie Miller]

Am I the only who has this figured out !! The wall and bench are giant fakes and the piano is concert size.

Darn! - You figured it out. Still, getting that full-sized piano onto the bench was tough.:)

[John K Jordan]

Am I the only who has this figured out !! The wall and bench are giant fakes and the piano is concert size.

Yes, and note the custom keyboard with just four octaves instead of seven, and with keys are specially sized for huge-handed ogres and incredible Hulks. (And it's one of those special enchanted stringless Steinways too.)

Ernie, thanks for the offer, the outline shape alone could save me some work measuring. I'm starting to get fired up about making one now. Did you start from scratch or get drawings? My Baldwin is a 7' grand and the proportions on yours look to be about the same or longer, although it's hard for me to get behind mine to look because of where I have it.

Perhaps an interesting bit of personal trivia: the concert bench I have is the same one Billy Joel sat on when he came to Knoxville - buying it used from the music store was a LOT cheaper than a new one. When I finally wore out the upholstery a friend of mine told me to be sure to save what came off. Ha! I cut off a piece for him.

Do you have a Steinway? I have an interesting book "Piano: The Making of a Steinway Concert Grand" that might be worth reading. It is amazing the effort that goes into a good piano. For example, the action of mine was made in Germany - I'm told the shop was a building inside another building for climate control. I read somewhere that around 9000 individual pieces went into a concert grand.

JKJ

[Ernie Miller]

Yes, and note the custom keyboard with just four octaves instead of seven, and with keys are specially sized for huge-handed ogres and incredible Hulks. (And it's one of those special enchanted stringless Steinways too.)

Ernie, thanks for the offer, the outline shape alone could save me some work measuring. I'm starting to get fired up about making one now. Did you start from scratch or get drawings? My Baldwin is a 7' grand and the proportions on yours look to be about the same or longer, although it's hard for me to get behind mine to look because of where I have it.

Perhaps an interesting bit of personal trivia: the concert bench I have is the same one Billy Joel sat on when he came to Knoxville - buying it used from the music store was a LOT cheaper than a new one. When I finally wore out the upholstery a friend of mine told me to be sure to save what came off. Ha! I cut off a piece for him.

Do you have a Steinway? I have an interesting book "Piano: The Making of a Steinway Concert Grand" that might be worth reading. It is amazing the effort that goes into a good piano. For example, the action of mine was made in Germany - I'm told the shop was a building inside another building for climate control. I read somewhere that around 9000 individual pieces went into a concert grand.

JKJ

No, I don't have a Steinway. I have a 6' Young Chang. I drew up the plans myself by taking the overall dimension of a concert grand and figuring out the rest. I took some pictures of the piano plate and resized it to fit in my outline. The rest is a bit hazy, but I'm happy to send you the plans that I have.

There's a great video on making a miniature Steinway concert grand. It proves my belief that, no matter how good you are, or think you are, there's always someone better. Check the video out.


(https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrSMMHvwuzo)

[Mel Fulks]

There is a film,made years ago, about the top pianists picking out which concert grand they wanted to use at ....think is was Carnegie Hall,
not sure. Showed how those giants are stored and moved. Before seeing it I thought the hall had a good piano, tuned it ,
and expected the star to use it.

[Ernie Miller]

There is a film,made years ago, about the top pianists picking out which concert grand they wanted to use at ....think is was Carnegie Hall,
not sure. Showed how those giants are stored and moved. Before seeing it I thought the hall had a good piano, tuned it ,
and expected the star to use it.

Mel - years ago, my chapter of the Piano Technicians Guild was invited to Steinway Hall to meet with Franz Mohr, the head technician at Steinway. The highlight of the meeting was a tour of the "basement", which is not open to the public. In the basement lived (and still lives, I suppose) about 20 concert grand Steinways. When an artist had a concert at Carnegie Hall, which is right across the street, he/she would come to the basement to select a piano for the concert. Some elite pianists, like Horowitz, had a piano in the basement that was reserved for their use. I was fortunate enough to get a chance to play the Horowitz piano, and was amazed at how poorly it sounded. Mr. Mohr explained that the piano, which was very bright and brittle sounding, was voiced that way so that it could be heard over an orchestra. In a concert hall, the piano sounded wonderful.

Years later, I was doing some concert tuning for Baldwin. A Baldwin concert grand was sent for use by Liberace, and as I tuned it, it sounded terrible. That night, I went to the concert and sat in the rear of the concert hall. The piano sounded great. Thank you, Mr. Mohr, for a fantastic day.

[John K Jordan]

No, I don't have a Steinway. I have a 6' Young Chang. I drew up the plans myself by taking the overall dimension of a concert grand and figuring out the rest. I took some pictures of the piano plate and resized it to fit in my outline. The rest is a bit hazy, but I'm happy to send you the plans that I have.

There's a great video on making a miniature Steinway concert grand. It proves my belief that, no matter how good you are, or think you are, there's always someone better. Check the video out. (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrSMMHvwuzo)

That is insane! Incredible. Maybe there is hope for me - I have the same stereo microscope. (Ha!) I don't have the thousands of hours it would take - the action, the carving on that one, zounds.

I played a Young Chang years ago - it was a respectable piano. I touched a Bösendorfer once.

My piano tech said the Baldwin pianos have gone downhill over the years, is that right? Perhaps I was fortunate to get mine when I did in 1980. Especially for the cost - I simply cannot believe the prices for new pianos today.

I've afraid this thread has diverged quite a bit from the OP's music box project. To get back somewhat towards the subject, I planned to make my piano music box with a thin glass piano-shaped plate to let the action show after lifting the lid. To fit the movement then would require either cheating on the case height or making the whole thing a little larger in scale.

JKJ

[Ernie Miller]

That is insane! Incredible. Maybe there is hope for me - I have the same stereo microscope. (Ha!) I don't have the thousands of hours it would take - the action, the carving on that one, zounds.

I played a Young Chang years ago - it was a respectable piano. I touched a Bösendorfer once.

My piano tech said the Baldwin pianos have gone downhill over the years, is that right? Perhaps I was fortunate to get mine when I did in 1980. Especially for the cost - I simply cannot believe the prices for new pianos today.

I've afraid this thread has diverged quite a bit from the OP's music box project. To get back somewhat towards the subject, I planned to make my piano music box with a thin glass piano-shaped plate to let the action show after lifting the lid. To fit the movement then would require either cheating on the case height or making the whole thing a little larger in scale.

JKJ

I do think we're getting close to hijacking this thread. I'd love to talk to you more about miniature pianos, but perhaps we should do it by PM as I doubt our conversation would be of much interest to other members.

I agree with your tech that Baldwin isn't what it once was - then again, neither is Steinway except for the larger models.

[John K Jordan]

I do think we're getting close to hijacking this thread. I'd love to talk to you more about miniature pianos, but perhaps we should do it by PM as I doubt our conversation would be of much interest to other members.


Good idea - I've sent an email to you through the SMC system.

[Dennis Peacock]

Oh my goodness!!!!

https://www.musichouseshop.com/store/brAXA148048002.html

I could not imagine spending that much money for a music box. I've never seen nor heard a 144 note before.

[Mel Fulks]

Ernie, thanks for detail on that piano "pick an' play". I remember a teacher telling us that Paderewski always used his
own carried in a special rail road car.

[Ernie Miller]

Ernie, thanks for detail on that piano "pick an' play". I remember a teacher telling us that Paderewski always used his
own carried in a special rail road car.

Yup, but those days are over. Liberace was under contract with Baldwin and they supplied the pianos for his concerts. He did, however, travel with a plexiglass lid which was used in place of the wooden lid the piano came with. Nowadays, I doubt any of them bring their own pianos - too expensive!