The Music Typewriter

Many of our young people don’t even remember the typewriter, since a keyboard for them is the one they use on their laptop, computer, or Ipad. Yet the typewriter was one of the most ingenious inventions of the last century. Who knows how many thousands of books, millions of articles and billions of letters were typed with an Olivetti, and Imperial or any other typewriter. Then I came across another similar invention, with the same technique – a music typewriter! The Keaton Music Typewriter was patented in 1936 and came with 14 keys. By the 1950s, it received an update and started to feature 33 keys on the circular keyboard! The typewriter worked by putting a sheet below the typing mechanism and then the notation marker would begin to type. It might sound complicated, but the truth was that the musical typewriters made it easier to write sheet music. However, it was important for the composer to work very carefully since they needed to start over with a new sheet if they made a mistake. The machine had 3 space keys that let users move the typehead through the units. Now, of course, we have programs that help us type the notes on a music program, one which used frequently very successfully.