Books › The Story of the violano-virtuoso : world's only self-playing violin and piano, 1900 › scan 21
Scan 21
The Story of the violano-virtuoso : world's only self-playing violin and piano, 1900
22 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 15. See the scan on archive.org.
1Revolving Bows
3The bows are revolved by a simple motor—there are four bows, one for each string.
5This motor driven bow is so simply and yet so ingeniously designed that it does everything that a hand bow can do and a little more. It is built up of conical discs of flexible celluloid, the edge of each disc acting as the hair of a bow. The full musical resonance of the straight bow is thus produced on this circular bow, while the revolving action gives a much steadier stroke and an unusual clearness to the music.
7Because the Violano-Virtuoso has an individual finger for every note and a bow for each string on the violin, it is capable of playing all four strings at once, producing stringed quartette and other harmonies perfectly. One instrument can thus give you musical effects which it would take at least two human violinists to produce.
9The circular bows also permit a continuous stroke which can play a note of any duration. The human violinist is confined to playing a single note only long enough to run his bow its full length up or down the string.
11How the Bows Give Superb Expression
13To completely remove all suggestion of the mechanical in this music, the pressure of the bows against the strings is at all times under the automatic control of the music roll. The speed of the bowing and the amount of the pressure determine the loudness and softness of the notes, and if these factors did not vary in the same way as the artist's playing when he is recording the roll, there would be no gradation of expression to the music.
15"Has averaged at least $100 per month in the two years I have owned it."
16—JOS DISTILLATOR,
17601 Main St., Norfolk, Va.
19"In the two and one-half years we have had the Violano, we have taken in $1,625."
20—PENCE & STERLING,
21Charlottesville, Va.
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.