"The Key is......."

It is amazing how many references to 'Key' or 'Keys' can be found in music.

Apart from the obvious Key that the music is played in, we can come across many songs with words like 'the key to my heart'.

This lady on the left is going to lock her heart 'and throw away the key'.

I wonder how this association of keys and hearts came about? Perhaps it originates from the fashion of ladies wearing a Locket on a chain, locked with their sweethearts photo or picture inside?

I was not going to write about this type of key or the musical key, as in 'the key of D Minor', but on the reference to 'keyless' organs......or perhaps the '112 key Mortier organ'.

The number of keys on an organ refer to the small levers on the playing frame through which the card music passes. Each key is pneumatically and mechanically coupled to a number of pipes, percussive instruments or other movement incorporated in the organ. Hence unlike a piano keyboard, the number of organ keys is not equal to the number of notes available.

A 98 key organ may have over 700 pipes.  All the keys are normally depressed, except when a slot in the music card allows them to rise.

In a “keyless” organ, the row of keys is replaced by a row of holes on the tracker-bar. The principle is like the player piano and uses air suction through the tracker-bar holes. In my organ however the music roll and tracker-bar are enclosed in a pressure box so we have a “blow” instead of a “suck” to control the playing.

So my little organ is actually a 26 note keyless organ with 70 pipes. 

There are, of course, all the keys on a keyboard instrument but Deb at Harmony Club is the expert on these.

And lastly, as I'm a bit of a clock person, I leave you with a circle of lovely Victorian Clock Keys.