A symphony of time and technology has inspired a new era in complicated timepieces. With the push of a button, the Minute Repeater chimes the hour, quarter hour and minute. The minute repeater works like
the quarter repeater, with the addition that, after the hours and quarter hours are sounded, the number of minute since the last quarter hour are sounded. This requires three different sounds to distinguish hours, quarters, and minutes. Often the hours are signaled by a low tone, the quarters are signaled by a sequence of two tones and the minutes by a high tone. For example, if the time is 2:49 then the minute repeater will sound 2 low tones representing 2 hours, 3 sequence tones representing 45 minutes, and 4 high tones representing 4 minutes. The invention of the initial repeater mechanism dates back to the before-electric-lighting time when people were wearing pocket watches that 'sounded' the time for their owners.
