The Origins of Mechanical Music and of the Music Box

The carillon at the beginning of the 14th century marks the true beginning of mechanical music, and was much later to lead to comb instruments, the mechanical singing birds, the street organ, the musical pocket watch and the disk musical box. Following a progressive miniaturization and refinement, mechanical music reached its current form approximately 200 years ago, with Sainte-Croix as the world capital in this specialist field since 1811. The numerous innovations and historical events marking the 20th century wrought havoc in this particular craft industry, with Reuge emerging as the current leader in the field, thanks to its highly developed entrepreneurial spirit.

The origin of mechanical music was in Flanders around the 14th century in the form of a peal of bells called a carillon, capable of reproducing crystal sounding melodies.

The invention was made by a ringer who was probably tired of repeatedly ringing bells in the same order! He constructed a cylinder pierced by a number of pins which in turn controlled cogs linked to the hammers striking the bells. The relatively vertical position of the pins governed the rhythm produced and the relatively horizontal position governed which bell was selected. Combination on both axes produced chords.

Writing arrangements and devising a system that made it possible to change the cylinder was all that was required to obtain an infinite variety of melodies to be produced.

Over the ensuing centuries carillons became more widespread and began to be miniaturized. Soon carillons were found with up to a thousand bells and musical clocks containing several dozens.

Around 1780, in La Chaux-de-Fonds (Switzerland), Jaquet-Droz invented a remarkable and different sort of mechanism inspired by the world of automatons : the mechanical singing bird. Approximately 60 years later its operation was perfected to such a high degree by the Blaise Bontems workshop in Paris (continued by Reuge S.A. as from 1960) that its manufacture remains virtually unchanged to date.

It was also around this time that the street organs began to be common in the streets.

In 1796, an invention by the Genevan clockmaker Antoine Favre revolutionized mechanical music. Again using the cylinder and pin system, he replaced the bells with pre-tuned metal strips which produced sounds that were both more varied and more precise. This new technique made it possible to reach extremes of miniaturization which became a considerable success during the century that followed.

Thus, about 200 years ago, the music box was born, shortly followed by the musical pocket watch. Both saw a rapid development, first in Geneva and then from 1811 in Sainte-Croix.

In 1870, a German inventor created the disk musical box: replacing the cylinder with a disk and thus allowing for a more frequent change of the melody.

This was also the golden age of the automata, already known to the Egyptians in a more primitive version, now perfected to a true form of art.

During the first decades of the 19th century, Geneva and Sainte-Croix were literally caught in an epidemic of musical boxes which were perfected and refined to a considerable degree of sophistication. For example: an increased number of combs, an increased number of tunes per cylinder and interchangeable cylinders, or uninterrupted play of different tunes by means of complicated mechanisms enabling the cylinder to change track automatically. In Sainte-Croix this industry rapidly replaced clock manufacturing and lace making, hitherto the two main sources of income in the region, and earned this little part of the Jura an international reputation. In Geneva on the other hand, this activity was gradually supplanted by the watch and clock manufacture industries which eventually became the success we know today.

It was as much the invention of the phonograph in 1877 by the American Thomas Edison as the First World War, followed by the economical crisis of the 20's, that signaled the end of the flourishing industry of Sainte-Croix and destroyed the luxury music box market completely. In spite of this, even in the 1960s there were still thirty or so manufacturers. It was also true that both Swiss and foreign manufacturers (Bontems in Paris and Eschle in Germany) were all confronted with similar problems, namely that their industry was in steep decline and factories were dated. Closure often seemed to be the only option.

Reuge S.A. emerged from this storm intact and even experienced an upturn, doubtless as a result of the pursuit of various parallel activities (mainly the production of Kandahar ski bindings and renewal of the manufacture of large luxury music boxes). In fact, Americans passing through towards the end of the Second World War and for a while after that, discovered «miniature music» and took the idea home to the States.

The Japanese were already interested in the industry and were quick to invest in large, sophisticated production lines. This last battle was to prove fatal to most Jura based companies and now only three remain, Reuge being the largest of these by far.

In 1994, the Chinese music box industry had grown to a level that started "hunting" the only Japanese manufacturer's. - After loosing over 35% of their market to the Chinese manufacturer’s, the Japanese started moving a portion of their production to China - Sometimes history repeats itself !