Old Swiss MB Plays Japanese Songs
By Robbie Rhodes
Dear Miho,
I enjoyed your introductory story in Digest 960717, and don't worry about your command of English -- it's just fine!
This evening I telephoned a friend who owns a unique antique music box which plays all Japanese songs. He gave me the data attached below.
If we send you a music cassette could you identify the songs? We think they sound quite pretty, and "true to the style". But, of course, we don't have anything like it for comparison, so an expert Japanese is needed to listen and evaluate the music quality!
Someday the owner would like to have a replacement "tune card" lettered with the song names in nice Japanese characters.
Best regards,
Robbie Rhodes (for owner Bob Fine)
- - - - -
Music box plays Japanese songs, owned by Bob & Carol Fine, Highland, CA
Description:
Maker: definitely Swiss, maker presently unknown Date: late 1800s Style: Table-model cylinder music box Size: approx. 24 wide, 13 deep, 11 high (inches) Cylinder: 8-tunes, approx. 15-inch length; diameter = ?
split comb, 10 or 12 organ-pipes play from the middle of the
cylinder. Condition: very good, recently overhauled by Robin W. (?) Songs:
Unknown -- the song card is missing. All Japanese songs. Other features:
The tune indicator dial has Japanese numerals.
The lid has a very distinctive inlaid top (European design).
History:
Original buyer unknown. Make presently unknown.
Purchased in Japan, as an antique, sometime after 1950 by an American professor resident in Japan, who later gave it to a visitor from USA. Bob Fine doesn't know it's history from then until he acquired it.
Speculation:
The music box is high-quality Swiss. The buyer must have been a wealthy Japanese man of the late 1800s, with a fascination for the mechanical music box. I suspect that he hired a Japanese trader to purchase a suitable music box for him from Switzerland, to play familiar Japanese popular songs. (They don't sound like hymns to _my_ ears!)
The Japanese trader, probably with suggestions from a friendly local musician, selected the 8 songs, and then he found a musically- trained scribe to write the Japanese melodies in Western music notation, for the Swiss song arranger.
Before the trader delivered the music box to his customer he removed the song card, and had the titles artfully lettered in Japanese. It's a shame the card has disappeared.
- - - - -
|
(Message sent Fri 19 Jul 1996, 06:37:24 GMT, from time zone GMT-0700.) |
|
|
Mechanical
Music Digest™ Archives
