"The reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated"...Mark Twain

[Arthur A. Reblitz]

My friend Rob Goodale has brought it to my attention that this is a good
time to dispel some myths. Reality: I’m alive and well in beautiful
Colorado Springs. I’ve been an RPT since 1974. I’ve been busy restoring,
tuning and servicing orchestrions since the 1960s.

For the past 20 years, my shop has performed many restorations, some
taking over two years, for the Victorian Palace, a private collection in
a 45,000 (!) square foot home on 50 acres in a Chicago suburb. The owner
regularly opens this fabulous treasure trove to collectors’ and
fund-raising groups, and has shared it with tens of thousands of people.
It was one of the first large collections where a major investment was
made in bringing automatic instruments to a high standard of musical
performance, and in ongoing maintenance to keep them playing well. RPT
members who have worked with me include Roger Hathaway (now in Santa Fe,
NM), and Jennifer Parks (now in Manhattan, KS). 

As much as I enjoy "talking shop," I’ve been so busy with the Victorian
Palace and other collections that I haven’t had time for many other
activities. I’ve never spoken at a PTG Convention because I’m a better
writer than public speaker. My phone number is unlisted, not because I’m
unfriendly, but because I have to earn a living and there aren’t enough
hours in the day to socialize with the many great friends I’ve met along
the way. I haven’t attended PTG conventions because I’m busy with several
other groups, spreading the word on high quality piano work among
automatic instrument collectors.

For the past five years, I’ve been writing a 400+ page book, "The Golden
Age of Automatic Musical Instruments," funded by three major collectors.
It contains hundreds of beautiful professional color photographs of
millions of dollars worth of rare musical treasures, a substantial text
on the history, mechanisms, and musical qualities of each instrument, and
a photographic tribute to pioneer collectors who preserved these charming
"musical time machines" during the early years when the instruments had
little monetary value. The book is not available yet, but we will
advertise it in the Journal when it’s in print in mid-2001.

Your discussion of my spelling of "whippen" vs. "wippen" substantiates
the old adage that "few people ever read the introduction to a book." The
2nd edition of my "Piano Servicing, Tuning & Rebuilding" (1993) includes
this in the introduction: "When the author wrote the 1st edition, the
spellings ‘whippen’ and ‘wippen’ were both in common use by other
technicians. Since then, the PTG, most piano manufacturers, and most
other authors have standardized the spelling ‘wippen.’ To conform to
convention, this edition uses that spelling throughout, although
‘whippen’ will always seem correct to the author." What it doesn’t say is
that I grew up buying supplies from Schaff on Clybourn Ave. in the 1960s,
where it was spelled "whippen." There’s no more to it than that!

Best regards to all,

Art Reblitz
orchestrion@juno.com