Optical Reader for 88-note Player Piano Rolls, with expressions - Rossini– William Tell - Ouverture

Описание: Optical Reader for 88-note Player Piano Rolls, with expressions
The satisfaction of listening to a real player piano, operated by a good player pianist, is incomparable.
However, it is increasingly difficult to find a player piano in excellent working condition. Most of them are half destroyed and the costs of restoration are not always within everyone's reach.
Vice versa, it is not difficult to find perforated rolls, even those 100 years old or more, in a vast repertoire and in playable condition.
Just in time we recovered the roll winding/unwinding unit of a player piano destined for the landfill and with appropriate modifications we transformed it into an optical reader for 88-note piano rolls, with the possibility of manually intervening to interpret the music.
So, in addition to the detection of the roll holes, we have added some commands so that those who want to improvise as “player pianists” can give expression to the performance by acting as they wish on: tempo variation, sonority variation, theme accentuation (bass and treble), soft and sustain command.
It is also possible to change register, either to change the piano timbre or even have a marimba or organ play in its place.
A bit like a driving simulator, but for music.
The system is based on an Arduino Mega which converts the paper holes and manual commands, into MIDI signals.
Instead of the original pneumatic Tracker Bar, we made and installed a PCB with 93 IR sensors (88 notes + bass and treble themes + sustain + left and right edge alignment).
Since the inputs/outputs of Arduino Mega are insufficient, we used 6 Demultiplexers each with 16 inputs, thus limiting the inputs used in Arduino and simplifying the wiring.
Arduino then manages the roll advancement speed (Vdc gearmotor), the paper alignment (servomotor), the interpretation of the Sustain and Theme holes, the manual commands, the MIDI signal output.
The sensors are illuminated with a simple LED strip, by adjusting the light intensity we can also read rolls of particularly transparent paper.
The result is sufficiently performing and we hope it can give satisfaction to some new improvised “player pianist”, waiting to be able to play a real well-restored Player Piano.

G. Rossini – Guglielmo Tell (William Tell) – Ouverture - Piano Roll F.I.R.S.T. n°1180 (Fabbrica Italiana Rulli Sonori Traforati)
Project and Realization for AMMILAB: Niccolò Perego - Flavio Pedrazzini