Pianola music roll played by Percy Grainger

This pianola roll isn’t a relic, it's a performance. Personally played by the legendary Percy Grainger and collected from the Sydney Opera House, it captures the touch of one of Australia’s most eccentric and brilliant 20th century musical minds. Grainger (1882–1961) was a world-famous pianist and composer and an unapologetic original. Also an ethnomusicologist and inventor, he devoted his life to preserving global musical traditions, transcribing over 300 folk songs and recording 200 phonograph cylinders of rare tunes. His pioneering activity extended to the Duo-Art Reproducing Piano, for which he recorded live music rolls that let audiences hear his exact interpretations of the music, note for note. These self-playing pianos, powered by perforated rolls, were the height of musical tech from the 1900s to the 1930s, until the rise of the electrical phonograph.