Music Trade Review

Music Trade Review -- © mbsi.org, arcade-museum.com -- digitized with support from namm.org
THE MUSIC TRADE REVIEW.
From A Traveler's
Note Book.
PIANOS
MUST
ADVERTISING
BE
PUSHED
IS THE
PERSISTENT
POLE THAT KNOCKS
OFF THE PERSIMMONS—THE MOST SUCCESS-
FUL DEALERS ARE THOSE WHO USE THE
COLUMNS OF THE PRESS LIBERALLY.
A VISIT TO IVORVTON
A CHARM-
ING SPOT—THE COMSTOCK-CHE-
NEY
ACTION
A
SCENE
IN
MEXICO—MOVING A PIANO.
AMERICA FULL OF PRO-
VINCIALISMS
TRA"
"WUX-
OPINIONS OF
A GERMAN TOUR-
IST
ON
AMERI-
CAN ADVER-
TISING.
"STANDARD" USED FREQUENTLY
THE WAY
OTHERS SEE US.
HE theory that if a piano
has anything in it that
it will not need push-
ling is a business fallacy.
Pianos as well as any-
thing else which should
be brought to the atten-
tion of the purchasing public must be
placed systematically before them through
the medium of printers' ink. The day
when people are going to tumble over each
other in their haste to reach a particular
locality to purchase a special article has
gone by. There are more articles made
nowadays and more pianos. Many publish-
ers have a theory regarding novel publish-
ing; that is, that after a few hundred
copies have been sent out to the newspapers
for review, and a page .or two taken in a
publisher's catalogue, that they have done
about all that is required to bring it before
the people, and that the book will do the
rest. It is just as much a mistake about
this as it is about the piano business. It is
persistent advertising that reached the
gilded persimmons, and the firm who has
the longest advertising pole can knock
them down every time.
*
•
'
•
"
*
I have noticed in my travels that the
dealers who are really the most successful
are the ones who are liberal patronizers of
printers' ink. They use the columns of
their local papers liberally. They use
"display ads." and "readers," and in some
cases with exceedingly fine and discrim-
inating taste. It is well for the men who
consider tneir goods possess merit enough
to sell themselves without any additional
effort on their part either to advertise in
the trade or daily press. That is, if they
would keep up with the procession.
v *
*
A short time ago I took a little jaunt
through New England, stopping off at
Ivoryton, a charming little village near the
Connecticut River, where the factories of
Comstock, Cheney & Co. are located. It
was a bright, fresh summer morning, and
the drive over from the depot was an en-
ii
joyable one—lying as it did past snug look- the tour of this country have all noticed
ing cottages which betokened thrift. On that.
one side of the street was a pond, on the
The newsboy of New York has a sound
bosom of which floated sportive ducks dart- for the letter " r " following a vowel in a
ing in and out from between huge groups word heard nowhere else on earth. He
of pond lilies which floated buoyantly upon gives it invariably the sound of "oy," or
the surface. I have always been of the be- "ay," as, for instance, the words "bird" or
lief that work carried on under such peace- "third" he pronounces "boyd" and
ful and harmonious surroundings is often- "thoyd."
times performed with greater care and
Right here in New York there are as
nicety than under different conditions. many cries as papers—and that is a good
However that may be, the pianoforte ac- many.
tions manufactured by Comstock, Cheney
But the one which overtops all others is
& Co. have steadily grown in trade popu- that of the man who sells "extras."
larity, and still the augmentation of their
He tears through the streets after dark.
popularity goes steadily on.
He carries a pile of papers on his arm.
They are not even folded. This conveys
ik
I was standing on a street corner in the the idea that he is selling out so rapidly
City of Mexico some months ago, gazing that he has no time to fold them.
People hear his lusty-lunged cry and rush
thoughtfully on the paintings on the ex-
terior wall of a pulque shop—stout maidens out to buy of him.
The paper is bought and eagerly scanned.
in scant vestments lovingly confronting a
brimming glass, kings out of all proportion Then the feeling of curiosity is changed to
draining goblets to more stout maidens— that of disgust, for the "extra" contains
the whole a wild mass of red, green, blue, nothing new. It has been read coming
yellow, purple, like a concert hall curtain home.
The newsman goes on his way, provok-
in a mining town.
ing
disg ist and driving his fellow man to
Far up the street six men in white cot-
"swear-words."
ton shirts and short trousers became visible.
He disappears from view, yet this song
They were bent forward, and upon their
floats
out upon the night air: "Wuxtra!
shoulders there was some kind of an enor-
mous black thing. They moved at a sham- Wuxtra! All."
bling trot.
It is pleasant sometimes, and profitable
I wondered about the enormous black
as
well,
thing, but the distance defeated them.
"To see oursel's as ithcrs see us."
The six men, however, were approaching
The
tourist
hitherward from Europe very
at an unvarying pace, and at last my com-
panion, an American, was enabled to cry often gives us this chance; but he is most
frequently an Englishman or a Frenchman.
out: "Holy poker; it's a piano!"
There was a shuffling sound of sandals Very recently, though, a well-known Ger-
upon the stones. In the vivid yellow sun- man has taken our country in hand, and
light the black surface of the piano glis- has written of what he saw here in the
tened. The six brown faces were stolid and monthly called Nord mid sud. The writer
is Dr. Paul Lin'dau, the editor of the maga-
unworried beneath it.
When you first go to Mexico, and you see zine referred to; and, being an editor, he
a donkey so loaded that little of him but has been especially observant of the style
a furry nose and four short legs appear to in which we advertise.
What impressed him mainly in our an-
the eye, you wonder at it. Later, when
nouncements
of things for sale was the in-
you see a haystack approaching with noth-
tensity
of
the
advertising descriptions.
ing under it but a pair of thin human legs,
Everything
here
seems to him to be in the
you begin to understand the local point of
superlative. Nothing our dealers offer is
view.
merely good, or good enough; it is all
"absolutely good. " But his comments refer
America is full of provincialisms. No mainly to the Northwestern States, and his
country is more so. Max O'Rell says we most vivid examples were picked up in
have no distinctively American t5 7 pe of Seattle. In every new article we put upon
man. We certainly have no universal the market he finds our first plan is to ob-
method of pronunciation or vocabulary.
tain for it a very "conspicuous" or else a
The English have a general softened most astounding name. The name must
pronunciation, an almost universal accen- "show at once that it would be impossible
tuation and a musical vocabulary. With to surpass the article's good qualities."
Americans it is different—all these are
There are "standard tooth brushes,"
sectional. The vocabulary might be im- "standard writing machines," "standard"
proved.
everything.
The effete East smiles at the honest,
This word "standard" was first, and I
rounded "burr" of the Westerner's " r . " think has been lorgest, applied to Web-
New Englanders soften it, and the South- ster's Dictionary, with which Dr. Lindau
erner improves on it still further.
does not seem to connect it. But he goes
The Westerner derides the nasal twang on:
of his Yankee brother, while the Southerner
Another variety is "elite shoe blacking,"
laughs at both.
"palace insect powder," etc. Many shops
Even the street hawkers, selling the have as part of their device the letters
same wares, have a different cry in the " I X L," to be interpreted as "I excel."
various sections. People who have made
V