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Nidec’s Music Box Department has two resident professional music box arrangers.
You can make a music box of any song you like, as long as the copyright issues are cleared.

Arranging songs with very strict copyrights, such as Disney songs, can be difficult.

The process of making a music box song is as follows

Items to be prepared

1. Sound source
2. Sheet music

Sound source

Prepare the sound source as MP3 etc.

Sheet music

Prepare the score of the song you want to have arranged.

Nidec’s professional arranger arranges the song as a music box.

Process of arranging music

It takes two months to arrange the song. The arrangement flow is as follows

1. Arrangement
2. Check arrangement
3. Drum making
4. Vibrating plate making
5. Check drum and vibrating plate engagement
6. Finish by tightening the mains

Here are the fees for arranging a music box.

Re-limitations of the original piece of music

Cylinder music boxes, due to their structure, have restrictions in terms of range, number of notes, and song length.

For example, 72 note music box has the following restrictions.

1. 5 octave range
2. note limitation (72 notes = 72 sounds)
3. 30-45 seconds per revolution (90-135 seconds of song expression is possible with 3 revolutions per song)

Although most songs can be expressed in a 5-octave range,
In the case of reproducing music of 8 octaves or more, such as classical orchestral music, there will be some notes that will be cut or substituted.

And unlike a keyboard instrument like a piano, the vibrating plate of a music box does not have every note set to an individual scale.
Scales that are used more often have a greater number of notes to compensate for their expressive power, so it’s important to keep in mind the number of notes that can be sounded at the same time.

In addition, depending on the length of the music, it is often necessary to cut down on phrases, which means that the musical structure of the original music cannot be used.
If all notes are forced to be included, the music plays very quickly, and the image of the original music is changed drastically.

Cutting phrases is also a part of the music that arrangers are very concerned about, because it can easily affect the differences from the original music.

Trying to reproduce the original music without any differences can lead away from a beautiful sound.

Music box arrangement “Comparison of speed adjustment”

Arrangement fee

Type	Note	Turns	Seconds	Cost
Cylinder Type	50notes	2 turns	30-45 s x 2	$1,235
Cylinder Type	50 notes	3 turns	30-45 s x 3	$1,523
Cylinder Type	72 notes	3 turns	30-45 s x 3	$1,904
Disc Type	45 notes	–	50 to 80 s	$1,269
Disc Type	160notes	–		Ask

Many schools and companies request arrangements of school songs for graduation celebrations.

Contact us if you would like to make an arrangement.

Enjoy your music box time！

Takako Japan Store Online