This project brings to life one of the most celebrated creations of the German inventor Johann Nepomuk Maelzel (1772–1838): the Panharmonicon. Maelzel is best known today for inventing the first mechanical metronome, a device that is still used by musicians to the present day. During his own... Show moreThis project brings to life one of the most celebrated creations of the German inventor Johann Nepomuk Maelzel (1772–1838): the Panharmonicon. Maelzel is best known today for inventing the first mechanical metronome, a device that is still used by musicians to the present day. During his own lifetime, however, Maelzel was known as a showman who traveled across Europe and North America exhibiting his various contraptions and inventions. One such invention was a mechanical trumpeter, which played French and Austrian cavalry marches and signals as well as marches by various composers. Maelzel also purchased a mechanical chess-playing device from its inventor Wolfgang von Kempelen (in fact, the “mechanical” chess player was secretly operated by a real chess player hiding inside the device). His other inventions include a set of ear trumpets that he fashioned for the composer Ludwig van Beethoven to use as hearing aids. Maelzel did not publish his design for the Panharmonicon, so the precise workings of his instrument are unknown, but the sounds were evidently created by various pipes and air-driven percussion devices, which were operated by bellows. The musical compositions were inscribed onto large pinned barrels, similar to the cylinders found in toy music boxes. At least one replica of the instrument was made during Maelzel’s lifetime, but no Panharmonicon survives today. This virtual reconstruction of the Panharmonicon was created from surviving images and descriptions of the instrument. Show less
