Janine and I were in Amsterdam visiting our friends Estrella Acosta and Arjen Gorter. One day the girls went off shopping and and Arjen (who is a world-class standup Bass player) and I went to look for music adventures. Arjen suggested we go to the G. Perlee music machine museum. We took pot luck and went to the address to find a simple house with a large garage door. There was no indication that it was open and that anyone was around. It just so happened a young woman appeared at the door ringing the bell. Arjen asked her in Dutch if the museum was open. She told us she was a care giver for the mother of the man who ran the museum. She said she would ask for us. A few minutes later a man appeared at the garage doors and invited us in. He was the grandson of the owner of the museum and it was now his honor to be the one who now builds, rebuilds, and repairs these rare music making machines from days gone by. For the next two hours he showed us and played every machine in the collection. He showed how he makes and repairs the stack of cards the machines use to play the music.
Each machine was like a small church organ powered by compressed air. A pump would provide the air pressure and the loaded cards that passed through the machine would open and close valves to let the air pressure power a specific pipe. Some of these machines had hundreds of pipes, percussion instruments and other moving parts. He showed us how the coded cards were made and his collection of hundreds of songs for each machine.
Arjen and I were blown away by the custom tour we received. Apparently no-one had been by in a long time and he was very excited to show us his world.
