At the beginning of the 19th century, Mälzel explored the limits of sound simulation and automation with his Panharmonicons, powerful orchestrions, and caused a sensation. It was not until about a century later that there were significant leaps in technological development with punched tape technology and the early electric musical instruments, which were made artistically productive, especially from the 1920s onwards. In both periods, there was a broad discussion about the music for such music machines, which included aesthetic, practical, sociological, and economic aspects. As is shown by the handling of Mälzel’s music automatons and the trend-setting events on mechanical musical instruments at the Donaueschingen Music Festival curated by Hindemith, expectations, ideas, and visions were attached to these devices across the epochs, which fundamentally questioned the importance of humans as sound creators assigning them different roles.