orchestrion

American  

[awr-kes-tree-uhn] / ɔrˈkɛs tri ən /

noun

1. a mechanical musical instrument, resembling a barrel organ but more elaborate, for producing the effect of an orchestra.

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Etymology

Origin of orchestrion

1830–40; orchestr(a) + -ion, as in accordion

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

orchestrion

See, for instance, the music room, where a brass-looking, water-spewing elephant trunk fuels the instruments, including an ornate orchestrion.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 16, 2023

It was a kind of combination between a gramaphone and an orchestrion.

From Septimus by William John Locke

The basis of Hannibal Perkin's idea was the orchestrion, with the addition of certain adjuncts of the fog-horn, to secure a volume of sound equaling that which nightly woke the echoes and everything else.

From The Cassowary What Chanced in the Cleft Mountains by Stanley Waterloo

Somebody had touched off the orchestrion in the drawing-room, and that willing instrument had begun again in the middle of a bar at the point where it had been switched off.

From Three Men and a Maid by P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse

The orchestrion bellowed and thundered on its platform, filling the ears with its long monotonous song.

From Men, Women, and Boats by Stephen Crane