The player piano came into being based on an idea by Jacquard Mills of France. In 1800, he created a loom that designed intricate patterns on fabric based on a punched card diagram. In 1863, the Frenchman Fourneaux created the first player piano. Fourneaux's "Pianista" used the first pneumatic piano mechanism. It worked by way of a short roll of metal wound on a stick that had holes punched in the metal at specific spots where a note was supposed to play. The "Pianista" was introduced to the world at the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876.
Early piano rolls were metal and played only simple, short songs. In 1887, Edwin Welte introduced the first perforated paper roll in Germany. With paper rolls, longer songs could be punched on the paper and then played on the player pianos. Edwin Scott Votey invented a piano that played using paper piano rolls and foot-powered pedals. Although he applied for his patent in 1897, it wasn't until 1900 that he was awarded the patent. The player piano was very popular from 1900 to the 1930s.
Piano rolls, whether paper or cloth, work on the same principal as metal piano rolls: As the piano roll goes around, a hole in the roll causes a key to touch against a cord and produce musical note. Although the piano roll played the keys of the piano, the foot pedals still had to be operated manually, as without the pedals, the piano roll could not rotate.
Player pianos went out of fashion during the Depression, and thousands of them were destroyed and used for fuel. After the economy improved and World War II ended, player pianos became popular again. The pianos that still survived were restored and piano roll production was undertaken again. It is still possible to purchase piano rolls, but they are an extremely rare find. Actual paper rolls are expensive and are rarely used due to their fragile nature.
Modern piano rolls are not truly rolls at all; rather, they are discs or CDs that use MIDI technology to connect with computer equipment that operate the keys on the piano. A conversion kit can be purchased to convert a regular piano into a modern version of a player piano, but one must be extremely well-versed in computer technology in order to do so. The days of paper piano rolls or even metal piano rolls are long past.